CAT use-cases

When do you need CAT?

CAT is a tool for testing data in an automated way. But when exactly it may help you? This page describes typical CAT use-cases.

DATA QUALITY #

A typical company has more systems with data. The data is being transfered between systems, cleansed, enriched, transformed, served to different audiences. There are more systems containing data, there are more processes working with data and anything can go wrong.

Do surnames contain numbers or did we loose non-english characters? Do we have phone number for every open complaint? Was every new company customer assigned an account manager? CAT will answer you any queistions. You use plain SQL to define the check (it is both powerful and extremely easy and quick to create). CAT will also allow you to measure how many data quality problems you have and how it evolves over time - you then decide about priorities.

DATA ARCHITECTURE #

When you build a system, you likely have a set of rules you follow. Naming conventions, mandatory columns in each table (possible different ones in different schemas), rules for relationships, indexes, data types…

CAT will help you to enforce the rules (while also allowing exceptions easily when you decide so). The rules will not stay only in your MS Word/Excel document - you don’t even need them there. No wasted time in peer-reviews for something that CAT can do automatically. Define the rules once. They will be working with no additional effort also for new objects (and especially for new team members).

DATA MIGRATION #

Data migration from old system to newer one is always error prone. CAT drastically raises the probability of a success when migrating data. Why? It allows you, even beforehand, setting up comparison tests between old and new system.

You can then see where you have problems, react and meassure progress. Did someone make a change that significantly affects the data in the new system? A few days before go-live? With CAT this will not be un-noticed. Is some data missing or corrupted? You will know what, where, how much.

DATA CONSISTENCY #

Many data are present in more than one system. With CAT you can easily compare them - with plain SQL, even accross different database systems.

Is there a customer in my CRM, while the same customer is missing in my DWH / analytical solution? Are all my products in stock present also in the e-shop system? Automate such check with CAT like a breeze.

DATA ACCESS #

Do you have more access roles? Some people should see only their data? Is every permission set correctly? You will never know until you automate tests for that. And guess what - with CAT it is simple :-)

Think about your environment and try to sort the above mentioned by relevancy. Please also keep in mind the above list is by no means exhaustive. Anytime you want to automate any check against your data, CAT is your friend.