General rules for creating configuration files

The following rules apply to all configuration files when you use the command-line interface to mask data with the data privacy application.

  • The configuration file must be saved as a text file. You can optionally save the file with a masking-specific extension of .ioqmoda, which is the extension under which the data privacy GUI saves configuration files. Here is an example: filename.ioqmoda.
  • All keywords that are specified in a configuration file are case insensitive. That is, you can enter keywords in lowercase or uppercase letters, or any combination of the two. For example, you can enter the Report keyword as report=<file_location>, Report=<file_location>, REPORT=<file_location>, and so on.
    Note: The keywords that are described in this and other topics are shown in uppercase letters for emphasis only.
  • An equal sign (=) is used to separate each keyword from its user-assigned value, such as CONTINUEONERROR=NO.
  • A backslash character (\) is used to escape special characters in a value, such as standard symbols and Unicode characters. In the following example, for instance, the quotation marks and Unicode characters are escaped with a backslash: WORKITEM=An \"example\" workitem \u263a.
  • The following keywords are used to specify file locations:
    • REPORT
    • INPUT
    • OUTPUT
    • HADOOPCACHE, which is used only when masking in Hadoop

    You can specify a path or a URI for these keywords, but you must enter all paths and URIs with forward or backward slashes, as appropriate to the operating system. If you specify a URI, follow standard internet practices for specifying the URI.

    Do not escape a file path in Microsoft Windows. For example, to specify the Windows path c:\temp\myinput as input for a masking process, type INPUT=c:\temp\myinput, and not INPUT=c:\\temp\\myinput.

  • All enumerated values, such as Yes and No values, are case insensitive: that is, you can enter them in uppercase or lowercase letters, or any combination of the two. This rule applies to the values specified for the following keywords:
    • REPLACE
    • FILETYPE
    • PARALLEL
    • STRICTMETADATA
    • CONTINUEONERROR
    • ACTION
    • DATAPRESENCE, which is used only when masking XML files
  • If the value specified for any keyword includes leading or trailing spaces, those spaces are ignored during processing, unless the text is enclosed in single (') or double (") quotation marks.

    For example, WORKITEM=   My Work Item    is treated as WORKITEM=My Work Item. But if the same value is entered with quotation marks as WORKITEM="   My Work Item   ", the leading and trailing spaces are retained in the entry.

    Therefore, if an entry includes significant leading or trailing spaces that you want retained during processing, you must enclose that entry in single or double quotation marks. If the leading or trailing spaces are not significant, quotation marks are not needed.

  • Any comments included in the supplied configuration file are identified by a pound symbol (#), before the comment.

    You can enter a comment at the beginning of a line or anywhere on a line, without affecting the masking process. Any text that appears following a pound symbol is treated as a user-supplied comment. In the following example, for instance, the text This workitem masks OPTIM_CSV* would not affect the masking process because a pound symbol appears before that comment:

    WORKITEM=Workitem 1 # This workitem masks OPTIM_CSV*

  • If an entry in the configuration file spans multiple lines, use the hyphen (-) line-continuation character to identify the end of one line and the beginning of the next line.

    Do the following to use this feature:

    • Type a hyphen (-) as the last character at the end of each line that is continued on another line, and
    • Type a hyphen (-) as the first character on the continuation line.
    Warning: Do not type a continuation character at the end of the last line. If you do that, you will receive an error message indicating that a continuation character was specified, but a next line was not specified.

    Here is an example of how to use the line-continuation character to indicate that a masking string is specified over two lines:

    
field=CREDITCARD_NUMBER,mask="PROVIDER=CCN,FLDDEF1=(NAME=CREDIT-
-CARD_NUMBER,DT=WVARCHAR_SZ,LEN=80),MTD=repeatable,WHENINV=PRE"

    Notice that the user typed a hyphen at the end of the first line and the beginning of the second line. The user typed the hyphens to indicate that the masking string is specified over two lines.