Atlan allows users to "tag" assets with classifications. You use them to identify key characteristics of assets, or to group them together for usage or data protection.
Directly classify an asset
To directly classify an asset:
- Open the asset's overview.
- Under the Classification heading, click the + icon.
- Select one or more classifications for the asset by checking them.
- Click on any whitespace on the asset's overview page to save them.
Propagate classifications
Atlan propagates classifications to related assets for you automatically. This works in two dimensions:
To downstream assets
If you classify an asset that has lineage, propagation will classify all the downstream assets the same way. For example, if you classify a column as PII and it has downstream columns in lineage, those downstream columns will also be classified as PII.
This is particularly useful when you want to classify data for protection reasons. When combined with purposes, all downstream copies of the data will be protected automatically.
To child assets
If you classify a parent asset, propagation will classify all its child assets the same way. For example, if you classify a database table as Marketing then all the columns in that table will be classified as Marketing as well.
This is particularly useful when you want to classify data for a business domain or project use. All assets under the level you classify will automatically be included in that business domain or project.
