The Data Model Resource Book, Volume 3: Universal Patterns for Data Modeling

Silverston c05.tex V2 - 11/21/2008 3:04am Page 187

CHAPTER

5

Types and Categories:

the Classification o f Data

Since the 1980s we have seen the amazing growth in data content around the

world, in part due to the World Wide Web being part of people’s lives. How

do we manage this data content, how do we begin to get our minds around

this myriad of information? Biologists have come to the rescue. They have

been using classifications, also known as taxonomies, since the days of Carl

Linnaeus,

1

the great Swedish naturalist.

It seems to be part of human nature to create classifications. It helps people

to organize complex sets of data into categories. Classifications give humans

a common vocabulary for grouping data sets. For example, most enterprises

need reports and analytics to manage their business. Senior management

needs to see revenue reports categorized by business line, and a technical

call center’s work gets driven by exception reports sorted by various types

of errors. Manufacturing companies need to report on available inventory by

product type and so on. People working in these enterprises need to analyze

the data in the reports, summarize the report information into classes, or drill

into the detail of a class to the underlying data. The categories in the reports

are a common vocabulary between departments and people in an enterprise.

This common language requires that various types of data can ...