Capture information flow data

Information flows exchange business objects between applications. For each information flow, one application is considered the source of the information flow and the other application is considered the target of the information flow. The information flows transfer the business object that applications either create, read, update, or delete (CRUD).

The number of information flows that an application is associated with helps the application architect determine the complexity of the application, potential redundancies among applications, and the effort involved in migrating or replacing an application.

Users with the user profiles Portfolio Manager, and Portfolio Admin can add and edit information flows in Alfabet. Click for an overview of permission concepts.

You can add a new information flow from anywhere in the product via the orange New button in the header. Or go to Information Architecture > Information Flows to open the data workbench for information flow.

The syntax of the information flow name is: <Source Application> > <Target Application>:

Try to capture as much information as possible about the information flow because complete data considerably improves the results of business questions and other analytics.

An application can be a source of an outgoing information flow and the target of an incoming information flow. The information flow transfers the business object that applications operate on. The application can create, read, update, delete (CRUD), or process the business data. The application's information flows may also use the business object.

In the data table, click the Navigate  Navigate button to open the information flow's content area. Go to the Overview > Connection Data. In the Business Objects field, enter the name of the business object you want to assign to the information flow. Or click in the field to open the selector and select each business object that you want to assign to the information flow. Click outside of the selector to close it and update the Business Objectsfield.

Specify the use of the business object by the source or target application. In the Overview page of the information flow, click either the application displayed in either the From (Source) Owner attribute or To (Target) Owner attribute to navigate to the application. In the Information Context tab, scroll to the Business Object Usage page to open it.​ Add business objects to the application via New > Add Existing Business Object. For each business object, select Yes or No in the following columns to describe how the application uses the business object.

  • Create: Select if the business object can be created by the application.
  • Is Input: Select if the business object can be used by any of the application's incoming information flows.
  • Read: Select if the business object can be read by the application.
  • Is Output: Select if the business object can be used by any of the application's outgoing information flows.
  • Update: Select if the business object can be updated by the application.
  • Delete: Select if the business object can be deleted by the application.
  • Processing: Select if the application processes information pertaining to the business object. Processing indicates that the business object is handled in the context of the relevant object without the data being altered, created or deleted. The data is typically kept locally so that a desynchronization results between the processed business object and the system(s) of records for the business object.

    Typically, it is not the raw data that is processed but some aggregation or abstraction of the business object (for example, data in an operational data store or an OLAP-based reporting solution).

  • Usage Comments: Provide additional information about the use of the business object by the application.