Introduction

The InfoSphere Business Glossary (Business Glossary) enables you to use a controlled vocabulary to create, manage, and share standard definitions of business and organization concepts. The Business Glossary product uses a category hierarchy in which categories contain terms. You can use terms to classify data assets in the metadata repository based on the needs of your organization.

Populating a business glossary with data is the first step to using it. In Version 8.1.1, the Business Glossary introduced some new import and export methods that use CSV and XML formats such that glossary administrators can import and export glossary content to and from external files of these types. These methods introduced greater flexibility in creating glossary content, enabling users to populate their business glossaries more easily and in a more comprehensive manner.

This tutorial describes and explains how to use these new import and export features. The tutorial includes best practices, tips, and examples to help you implement these features efficiently to populate a business glossary.

The examples in this tutorial use data from the IBM Industry Models Telecom Business Glossary Content Pack. IBM provides InfoSphere Business Glossary content packs for various industries, including banking, insurance, telecommunications, retail, and healthcare.

Choosing the import method

CSV and XML are common import methods. Deciding which import method to use to populate a business glossary is based on a number of factors, including the existing glossary content and the skill level of the business glossary administration staff.

CSV

The CSV format is simple. It includes the capability to contain categories and terms with their property values, such as descriptions, abbreviations, and custom attribute values. It also enables you to define steward relationships.

XML

The XML format is more comprehensive and complex. It includes the capability to define every possible relationship among terms, categories, and other object types, including terms relating to other terms, categories referring to terms, terms linking to assigned assets.

You might already have a version of a glossary in some format and want to use that content to start to populate a new business glossary. Or you might choose to build a business glossary from scratch. Because these scenarios start from different points, the recommended import method might be different.

If your data is in a spreadsheet, you should probably convert your existing spreadsheet to the Business Glossary CSV format. If you are starting from scratch, choose the import method based on the kind of data you need to import and on your technical skill level.

Table 1 and Table 2 describe the values that can be included in a CSV file and an XML file.

Note: If you need to transfer business glossary content from versions older than Version 8.1.1 to newer business glossary instances, the only available method is the Glossary Archive import and export (format is XMI), which lets you transfer all or a subset of glossary data between glossary instances without editing their contents. In Business Glossary Version 8.1, if you wanted to transfer only categories and terms with their basic properties, you could also use the CSV import and export.

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Table of contents

• Introduction
• Importing using CSV format
• Importing using XML format
• Conclusion
• Download
• Resources
• About the authors

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