7.3 View and Manage Annotations

Annotations added to tables and columns improve data clarity by providing relevant context, and support AI-driven use cases. The metadata enrichment feature lets you create and manage data entity annotations directly in Data Transforms.

When you import data entities in Data Transforms you can choose to also import the annotations, if any, as part of the import process. You can also create or modify them in Data Transforms, and carry them forward to downstream target tables using data flows. For target tables you can use AI to generate annotations for the table description and all the columns.

Import Annotations

To import annotations,
  1. From the left pane of the Home page, click the Data Entities tab.
  2. On the Data Entities page click Import Data Entities.
  3. In the Import Data Entities page select the connection and set the required details. See Import Data Entities for detailed instructions.
  4. Under Options, set Import annotations to True.
  5. Click Start to initiate the import process.

When the import process completes, Data Transforms imports the data entities and the associated annotations. All the imported Data Entities are displayed in the Data Entities page.

Manage Annotations on the Data Entities page

To manage annotations,

  1. Click the data entity from the displayed list. You can also click the Actions icon (Actions icon) next to the data entity you want to manage annotations for and select Edit.
  2. In the Edit Data Entity page, under the Annotation column, click Manage Annotations.
  3. In the Manage Annotations page add or remove annotations as required.

Manage Annotations on the Data Flow Editor

Similarly, you can manage annotations using the Data Flow Editor. You can also use AI to create annotations for target tables.

To manage annotations using the Data Flow Editor,

  1. Click the component on the Design Canvas and in the Properties Panel click Annotations.
  2. ClickManage Annotationsto edit, add, or remove annotations.
  3. If the component you have selected is a target table, you can use Suggest annotations with AI to create annotations for the table description and all the columns in the table. The AI-generated annotations will overwrite any existing annotations. You can edit the AI-generated annotations.

    Note that to use this feature you must have an OpenAI connection (see Create an OpenAI Connection) and you must configure the LLM settings you want to use (see Configure LLM Settings).

Parent topic: Data Entities