LLearningPath
← Managing Data

8% domain · module 2

Tags, lineage, and discovery in Catalog Explorer

Tag a data asset

From Catalog Explorer, add tags (and governed tags when classification is required). Tags make search work: PII, certified, finance, gold. The exam pairs tagging with lineage as a discovery workflow.

Lineage

Unity Catalog captures table- and column-level lineage across SQL, notebooks, jobs, and dashboards. Use it to answer:

  • Where did this column come from?
  • Which dashboards break if this table changes?
  • Who owns the upstream job?

Lineage is metadata. You can see a table in the graph and still lack SELECT.

Practical discovery order

  1. Search in Catalog Explorer.
  2. Read comments and tags.
  3. Check owner and grants.
  4. Open lineage.
  5. DESCRIBE TABLE EXTENDED / preview.
  6. Only then build the dashboard dataset.

Data lineage · Tags