Designing governance rules (IBM Knowledge Catalog)

When you design a governance rule, you must define the criteria for compliance with business objectives that your organization wants to apply over the data assets it manages.

You must have the required permissions to create governance artifacts. See Required permissions.

Properties of governance rules

Governance rules have these standard properties that are similar to other governance artifacts.

Property or behavior	Supports?	Explanation
Must have unique names?	Yes	Governance rule names must be unique within a category.
Description?	Yes	Optional. Include a description to help users find this governance rule.
Add relationships to other governance rules?	Yes	See Relationships with other types of governance artifacts.
Add relationships to other types of governance artifacts?	Yes	See Relationships with other governance rules.
Add relationship to asset?	Yes	See Asset relationships in catalogs.
Add custom properties?	Yes	See Custom properties and relationships for governance artifacts and catalog assets.
Add custom relationships?	Yes	See Custom properties and relationships for governance artifacts and catalog assets.
Organize in categories?	Yes	The primary category for the artifact determines who can view or modify the artifact. See Categories.
Import from a file?	Yes	See Importing governance artifacts.
Import from a Knowledge Accelerator?	No
Export to a file?	Yes	See Exporting governance artifacts.
Managed by workflows?	Yes	See Workflows.
Specify effective start and end dates?	Yes	See Effective dates.
Assign a Steward?	Yes	See Stewards.
Add tags as properties?	Yes	See Tags.
Assign to an asset?	Yes	Governance rules can be assigned to data quality definitions and data quality rules. The relationship is defined on the assets. The assets are shown as related content.
Assign to a column in a data asset?	No
Automated assignment to assets during profiling or enrichment?	No
Predefined artifacts?	No

Relationships with other types of governance artifacts

You can assign the governance rule to:

Business terms
Select the business term to which you want to assign the governance rule. A governance rule can relate to multiple business terms.
For example, a governance rule can govern a database table. Terms can also be designated as governed assets. For example a rule named "ensure income meets minimum level" might govern a term called "income."
Classifications
Select the classifications to which you want to assign the governance rule. A governance rule can relate to multiple classifications.
Reference data
Select the reference data to which you want to assign the governance rule. A governance rule can relate to multiple data classes.

Required permissions You must have one of these category collaborator roles in the primary categories for both artifacts to add a relationship between them:

Admin
Owner
Editor
A custom role with the permission to edit both artifact types.

Relationships with other governance rules

You can assign the governance rule to related rules.

Required permissions You must have one of these category collaborator roles in the primary categories for both artifacts to add a relationship between them:

Admin
Owner
Editor
A custom role with the permission to edit governance rules.

The relationship is symmetrical. If you specify that rule A is related to rule B, then rule B is related to rule A. A rule can have multiple related governance rules.

For example, you might create a rule named "valid address" that is related to another rule named "valid city name." Related rule relationships are bidirectional. For example, if you specify that the rule "valid address" is related to the rule "valid city name," then "valid city name" is automatically related to "valid address."

Parent policies

You can assign the governance rule to parent policies.

Required permissions You must have one of these category collaborator roles in the primary categories for both artifacts to add a relationship between them:

Admin
Owner
Editor
A custom role with the permission to edit both policies and governance rules.

For example, a policy named Software Security states that software security procedures must be in place, including virus-checking software. A governance rule named Virus-checking Procedures states that virus-checking software must be updated on each computer once a week. Therefore, the author of the rule Virus-checking Procedures specifies the policy Software Security as a referenced policy to the rule.

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Parent topic: Governance rules