Azure Data Catalog

Score8.7 out of 10

27 Reviews and Ratings

What is Azure Data Catalog?

Microsoft's Azure Data Catalog is an enterprise-wide metadata catalog designed to make data asset discovery straightforward, a fully-managed service that lets analysts. data scientists, and developers to register, enrich, discover, understand, and consume data sources.

Categories & Use Cases

Khairul Islam Tonmoy View profile

Software Developer in Product Management at STAR TECH IT solution Ltd (11-50 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Azure Data Catalog combines flexibility, fine-tuning, automation, and sound monitoring. Our primary use case is for advanced analytics data migration. We put it to use in various ETL-related activities, including transforming and normalizing data, bulk uploading, populating data stores, and more. It enables the creation of secure analytic data stores, machine learning on our data, and rapid schema adaptation. One of the tool's most valuable features is its drag-and-drop interface, allowing us to quickly access any data source or table they require. It has changed how we think about storing and getting information. It has revolutionized how we conduct business and the people we can reach and collaborate with worldwide.

Pros

Drag-and-drop works.
Pipeline orchestration tool.
Quickly identify data sources.
Easy to build cloud-native solutions.
Scalable, quick to support, and secure.

Cons

Multiple choices confuse.
Complex implementation.
Time-consuming cloud service uploads.

Most Important Features

Task-list.
Excellent GUI.
Multi-Source.
Metadata extract.
Intuitive navigation.

Return on Investment

It is brilliant and directly helps us solve data problems, especially those on data discovery.
It had a straightforward process that was simple enough that even non-technical people could use it.
It is a metadata catalog that spans the entirety of the business and simplifies the process of finding data assets.

Alternatives Considered

data.world

Other Software Used

Snowflake, SAP Master Data Governance, Tableau Desktop, Microsoft Power BI

Sumon K Chowdhury View profile

Asst. Software Specialist in Information Technology at i-Tech Software Ltd. (11-50 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Azure Data Catalog simplifies data analysis and provides insights. We use it for data transformation, bulk uploads, ETL tasks, and normalization. It's a cloud service that works with cloud and on-premises data sources, providing a hybrid solution. It helps us improve our search and discovery services and move up in the rankings. Azure Data Catalog allows us to create secure data analytic stores, run machine learning on our data, and easily adapt to schema changes. The tool allows us to tag and add descriptions, which enriches the data set. It's a reliable data-security management system.

Pros

It's easy to use and implement.
Ownership of the data.
It's helpful for all businesses.
Policy on data preservation.
It can utilize various data sources.
Data management is secure and simple.

Cons

Cloud service has long upload times.
High-stability connections are needed.
Unable to export or import some formats.

Most Important Features

Integration of data and reporting on it
No code, drag-and-drop interface.
Scalability and security are good.
Managing complex data in one place is easier.

Return on Investment

It provides a space-saving record of our organization's data, assets, and clients.
It uses threat monitoring agents to generate real-time alerts and reports.
It unifies on-prem and cloud data sources and builds a reporting dashboard.
It collects data from different sources, puts it on one plate, and processes it.

Alternatives Considered

Boomi

Other Software Used

Microsoft Power BI, Azure Data Factory, Informatica PowerCenter

Robbie Scott View profile

Security Software Engineer in Information Technology at Tata Consultancy Services (10,001+ employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Azure data catalog is used by our teams to help with categorizing metadata whilst occupying less Azure storage space. It offers a cloud-based service where data is entered and indexed, making it easy to find each data source. We use it to quickly find the correct data that we need, whether it's for application testing or any task via search.

Pros

Discovering data is fast.
building cloud native solutions.
Automatic scanning of azure data sources.
Integration with the existing environment.

Cons

Maintenance and creation of documentation for data sources takes a lot of time
One cannot connect to data using a client's app unless they know the locus of the data source.

Most Important Features

Integration.
Data security.
Search

Return on Investment

Less time spent on data searches.
Discovering, understanding and consumption of data sources is much easier.
We recover data from different locations from a central point.

Other Software Used

SQL Server Integration Services, Azure Virtual WAN

Ramprasad Rangachary, PMP®View profile

Product Manager in Information Technology at Inchcape Shipping Services (1001-5000 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We have wealth of information around financial data aggregated from customers around the world. We shed out PII information and then mine this data and provide valuable intelligence to the customers themselves and other service providers who make meaningful decisions using this valuable data. We use Azure Data Catalog for data management, searching, data inventory, and data evaluation.

Pros

Data Source Registrations
Data Source Discovery
BI & Documentation

Cons

We have been it for a while now and I do not see any major concerns with the product interms of UX/UI, product support and periodic releases

Most Important Features

Dataset Searching
Dataset Evaluation
Dataset Analysis

Return on Investment

Azure platform makes it easier for us to register & catalogue all available information easily. This way when the customer actually made a sudden request or they want to access sensitive information on their own, the data is readily presented to them. Needless to say we use this mined and catalogue data for a variety of inhouse training and other improvement initiatives.

Alternatives Considered

Dataedo and SAP PowerDesigner

Other Software Used

Tableau Desktop, Alteryx, Microsoft Power BI

Mithil Patel View profile

Sr. Digital Marketing Director in Marketing at Trevelino/Keller (11-50 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use Azure Data Catalog in our organization to solve data collection and conduct thematic audits of data modules. We use the platform to quantify data first and then find structures or common themes to derive actionable reports for our quarter-end efforts. The scope is strictly internal for now but in the future, we want to roll out the solution for clients as well.

Pros

Quality of data collection
range of modules to choose from
wide recognition and industry visibility of the brand

Cons

UX and design in terms of usage and features.
Format of the platform can at times be complicated during on boarding.
Reporting templates at times dont fit our needs

Most Important Features

data quality
industry recognition - all our clients use Azure too so it was a natural fit
pricing

Return on Investment

I think the pricing structure has been a big plus for us
I feel industry recognition of the brand too has been a big positive to our ROI. Partners are more eager to work with us.
onboarding has certainly been easer for teams.

Alternatives Considered

AWS Backup

Other Software Used

AwsQuality Salesforce Services, Snowflake, Accenture Cloud Platform