Administrators can establish Action Types to enable users to take actions on an asset, such as raising data quality issues or suggesting new business terms. When you create an Action Type, you are defining the information that the user will need to complete when they take that type of action.
Action Types are closely related to workflows. Generally, once you have defined an Action Type, the next step would be to build a workflow around it. The workflow determines what happens after a user has taken the action, and allows you to route issues to the relevant person who will determine the next steps.
You can create Action Types and define fields to specify the information that users will need to provide when they take that type of action:
- Go to .
- Click the Add button to create a new Action Type.
- In the New Action Type panel, type a Name and a Description. The Name that you enter is the value that users will be able to select when they click the Take Action button, for example "Report Data Quality Issue":
- Click Save.
- You can add new custom fields to further tailor the information that users will need to provide when they choose the selected Action Type. To add a new field, select the action type, then click the Add button on the Fields tab.
Define list fields on action types
You can add a List type field on an Action Type to allow users to provide additional information about the issue that they are reporting by selecting options from a pre-defined list.
For example, for a data quality issue, you may want to add a List type field where users can select from a pre-defined list of data quality issue types, such as accuracy or completeness. Or, you may want to add a List type field that allows users to select a severity level for the issue that they are raising.
Define list options based on reference lists
For List type fields, you can select a Reference List Item from the Type of List menu.
The Reference List Items that are available to select from the Type of List menu correspond to the Reference Lists that you have previously defined on the Reference Lists page.
The Reference List Item: Criticality is provided by default, and contains a pre-defined set of severity levels, allowing users to select from:
- Low
- Medium
- High
- Critical
You can edit these values, or create new Reference Lists on the Reference Lists page.
Define list options based on asset/model relationships
For List type fields where the Type of List is an asset or a model, you have the option to restrict the list of items from which users can select to only those which form the subject or object in a relationship to another asset or model.
A relationship between the selected Type of List asset or model and another asset or model must already exist.
If this type of relationship exists, and you have selected an asset or a model in the Type of List field, two optional Filter Configuration fields are displayed, allowing you to choose a predicate and a second asset or list of assets to filter by.
From the Filter Relationship Predicate field, choose the predicate of the relationship that you want to filter by. You can choose from any predicate where the Type of List asset or model is the subject or the object of that relationship.
When you have selected a predicate, the corresponding relationship subjects or objects will be available to select from the Filter by Related Assets in Field menu. When defining a list filter on an Action Type, you can select 'Action Subject'. This option is not available when defining a filtered list on other asset types.
Your choices will restrict the list of items from which a user can select to only those that have a matching relationship with the selected Type of List asset or model.
Examples
- Choose 'stores' and 'Action Subject' to filter a list of applications to include only those which store the subject asset.
- Choose 'governed by' and a list field of policies to filter a list of items to include only those which are governed by the policies chosen from a previous list.
- Choose 'reads from' and 'Action Subject' to filter a list of applications to include only those which read from the subject asset.
End users can raise actions using the categories that you have created by clicking the Take Action button, see Raising issues for more information on how to take an action on an asset.
Edit or delete Action Types
To edit or delete an existing Action Type, click the Edit or Delete icon to the right of the selected issue type.
Allocations
You can limit Action Types to a specific asset so that users can only assign an issue to a certain category if the issue relates to a specified object type.
- Go to .
- Click the name of an item. For example, to restrict the types of assets that can be based on the "Business Data Incorrect" Action Type, select the Business Data Incorrect action type.
- Select the Allocations tab, then click the Add button.
The New Issue Type Allocation panel displays.
- Select an Asset Type from the list. For example, select Business Asset: Business Term to limit the availability of the "Business Data Incorrect" Action Type to Business Term objects.
- Under Responsibility, select one or more responsibilities from the list, if required.
If one or more responsibilities are selected, users can only perform the action if they have at least one of the responsibilities assigned to them. If none are selected, anyone can perform the action on assets of the selected type.
Any selected responsibilities display on the Allocations tab. - Click Save.
The new allocation will apply to the selected Action Type.
To edit the asset type or responsibility assignments later, click Edit to the right of the appropriate row on the Allocations tab, and make the required changes.
When you have defined a new Action Type, the next step is to build a workflow around it.