John Morehouse takes us through data dictionaries:
Data professionals—whether they’re database administrators (DBAs), developers, or data scientists—work in a wide and varied landscape usually in flux and filled with challenges. These challenges could range from changing business requirements to keeping up with the sheer velocity at which technology evolves.
It’s also critical for these professionals to understand their organization’s data and how it applies to a given application or business unit. Better outcomes usually come from employing data dictionaries throughout the organization. Through many years of experience in IT professions, I’ve seen the utilization of data dictionaries range from “not at all” to “I’m documenting every possible data attribute known to humankind.” In my experience, data-related projects with data dictionaries as part of the process are far more likely to be successful than projects without them (even extremely populated data dictionaries are more useful than nothing at all). Trust me on this.
Click through to understand why you should trust John on this one.