ABAC (Attribute-Based Access Control)
ABAC decides access by evaluating attributes of the person, the resource, the action, and the context against a policy, instead of by member...
Read definitionACID transactions
ACID transactions are the four guarantees that keep database changes correct: atomicity, consistency, isolation, and durability. They make s...
Read definitionActivity (process mining)
In process mining, an activity is the type of process step an event describes, such as Order created or Invoice approved. The activity label...
Read definitionAgent memory
Agent memory is everything an AI agent deliberately keeps between sessions, as opposed to whatever happens to be in its context window right...
Read definitionAgent sandbox (AI)
An agent sandbox is an isolated environment where an AI agent can run code, edit files and reach the network without touching your real syst...
Read definitionAgent skill
An agent skill is a folder of instructions, scripts and resources that an AI agent loads only when a task calls for it. The agent sees a one...
Read definitionAgentic AI
Agentic AI is a design property: the degree to which a language model, rather than your code, decides what happens next and keeps looping un...
Read definitionAggregation table
An aggregation table is a precomputed summary that stores data at a coarser grain than the detailed table it comes from, so common queries r...
Read definitionAggregations (Power BI)
Aggregations in Power BI are pre-summarised tables kept alongside a detailed table, so common report queries are answered from the small sum...
Read definitionAI Act (EU)
The AI Act is the European Union regulation that governs artificial intelligence. It sorts AI systems by risk and places obligations on anyo...
Read definitionAI agent
An AI agent is an AI system that autonomously plans and executes multiple steps to reach a goal. It uses a language model as its brain and c...
Read definitionAI Builder
AI Builder is the low-code AI feature of Microsoft Power Platform. It brings prebuilt and custom models, plus generative AI prompts, into Po...
Read definitionAI harness
An AI harness is the software layer around a language model that turns it into a working agent. It runs the loop, exposes the tools, manages...
Read definitionAI literacy
AI literacy is the knowledge and judgement people need to use AI responsibly: understanding what a model can do, checking its output, protec...
Read definitionAlignment (process mining)
An alignment lines up an observed process trace with a process model and shows where the two agree and where they diverge. Deviations appear...
Read definitionAlpha Miner
Alpha Miner is one of the first process discovery algorithms. It reads an event log, works out which activities directly follow each other, ...
Read definitionAnomaly detection
Anomaly detection automatically flags data points, events, or patterns that do not fit normal behaviour. It can catch odd invoices, machine ...
Read definitionAnonymisation and pseudonymisation
Anonymisation makes data no longer reasonably linkable to a person. Pseudonymisation replaces identifiers with codes but keeps a route back ...
Read definitionApache Airflow
Apache Airflow is an open-source workflow orchestrator for batch-oriented data pipelines. You define workflows as Python code, connect tasks...
Read definitionApache Hudi
Apache Hudi is an open table format for data lakes that makes Parquet files behave like transactional tables. It is strongest where data cha...
Read definitionApache Iceberg
Apache Iceberg is an open table format for large analytical datasets on object storage. It adds snapshots, schema evolution, partition evolu...
Read definitionApache Kafka
Apache Kafka is an open-source event streaming platform. Producers write events to topics, Kafka stores them as durable partitioned logs, an...
Read definitionApache Spark
Apache Spark is an open-source engine for large-scale data processing. It lets teams write SQL, Python, Scala, Java, or R code while Spark d...
Read definitionAPI (Application Programming Interface)
An API, or Application Programming Interface, is a contract that lets software talk to other software. In a data context, APIs are how conne...
Read definitionAPI automation
API automation makes systems exchange data and commands through their documented programming interfaces. It relies on requests, authenticati...
Read definitionAPI gateway
An API gateway is a single entry point that sits in front of one or more backend services. It handles cross-cutting work like authentication...
Read definitionApproval workflow
An approval workflow routes a request to the people who must sign off before it takes effect. A purchase, an expense, a data change, or an a...
Read definitionArtificial Intelligence (AI)
Artificial intelligence is technology that teaches computers to learn, reason, and make decisions from data instead of following hand-writte...
Read definitionAt-least-once delivery
At-least-once delivery means every message should arrive one or more times. It protects against loss, but retries can create duplicates. Tha...
Read definitionAt-most-once delivery
At-most-once delivery means a message is delivered zero or one time. It will not be duplicated, but it can be lost. That trade-off fits tele...
Read definitionAttended and unattended automation
Attended and unattended automation are the two ways a software robot runs. Attended automation works alongside a signed-in employee who star...
Read definitionAudit trail
An audit trail is an immutable, time-ordered record of who did what, when, and to which record. You use it to reconstruct events after a dis...
Read definitionAutomated cloud flow
An automated cloud flow starts on its own when an event happens in a connected service, such as a new Dataverse row, an incoming email, or a...
Read definitionAutomation debt
Automation debt is the maintenance and risk burden that builds up when bots and flows are made quickly, left undocumented, or never properly...
Read definitionAutomation governance
Automation governance is the set of decision rights, responsibilities, and controls that keep a portfolio of automations secure, compliant, ...
Read definitionAutomation lifecycle
The automation lifecycle is the full path a bot or flow travels, from first idea through design, build, testing, and daily operation to even...
Read definitionBaaS (Banking as a Service)
Banking as a Service lets non-bank companies offer banking features under their own brand by using a licensed bank or regulated provider beh...
Read definitionBackfill
A backfill is the rerun of a data pipeline over historical periods that were missed, wrong, or not yet processed. It is common when launchin...
Read definitionBackpressure
Backpressure is a flow-control mechanism where a slow consumer signals that it cannot keep up, so the producer upstream slows down, buffers,...
Read definitionBatch processing
Batch processing collects a set of work and runs it as one bounded job on a schedule or a trigger, instead of handling each record the momen...
Read definitionBias
Bias in AI is a skew that creeps into models through data, algorithms, or human choices. It is not always harmful, but it has to be managed ...
Read definitionBot runner
A bot runner is the machine and runtime that actually executes an RPA bot, usually unattended and under its own identity. Scheduling and que...
Read definitionBottleneck analysis
Bottleneck analysis finds the step in a process where work gets stuck waiting, the step that dictates total throughput time. You spot bottle...
Read definitionBridge table
A bridge table is an intermediate table that resolves a many-to-many relationship in a star schema. It stores the valid pairs between two ta...
Read definitionBusiness glossary
A business glossary is the agreed list of what your business words mean. It records terms like revenue, active customer, margin and churn in...
Read definitionBusiness intelligence (BI)
Business intelligence (BI) turns data from systems such as ERP, CRM, ecommerce, and accounting into reports and dashboards people use to mak...
Read definitionBusiness key
A business key is the identifier a business already uses to recognise something real, like an invoice number, VAT number, EAN or employee nu...
Read definitionBusiness Process Automation (BPA)
Business Process Automation, or BPA, uses software to run a recurring business process in full or in part. It connects the tasks, decisions,...
Read definitionBusiness process flow
A business process flow is a guided bar across the top of a form in a model-driven Power App. It walks a user through stages and steps, show...
Read definitionBusiness Process Model and Notation (BPMN)
BPMN is a visual standard for mapping business processes clearly. With a fixed set of symbols you can see at a glance who does what, where d...
Read definitionBusiness rules engine
A business rules engine is software that runs your decision logic separately from your application code, so rules like discount tiers or app...
Read definitionCalculated column and measure
Calculated columns and measures are the two ways to add calculations to a Power BI model with DAX. A calculated column is worked out at refr...
Read definitionCalculation group
A calculation group applies one DAX pattern to every measure in your model. You write YTD, MTD and YoY% once instead of repeating them for e...
Read definitionCandidate key
A candidate key is any column or set of columns that can uniquely identify every row in a table, with no redundant column in it. A table can...
Read definitionCanvas app
A canvas app is a type of Power Apps app where the maker lays out screens and controls freely on a blank surface. It uses the Power Fx formu...
Read definitionCardinality in Power BI
Cardinality in Power BI describes how rows in two tables relate: one-to-many, many-to-one, one-to-one, or many-to-many. It controls relation...
Read definitionCase ID
A case ID is the key that ties all events of one process run together. Think of an order number, a ticket number or a patient file. Without ...
Read definitionCase management
Case management organises knowledge work around a single case, its goal, and its collected information. The caseworker decides which activit...
Read definitionCase notion
A case notion defines which events belong together as one process run in a process mining analysis. Choosing the order, order line, delivery...
Read definitionCenter of Excellence (CoE)
A Center of Excellence (CoE) is a team or framework that sets standards, governance, training, and reuse for a capability. For the Power Pla...
Read definitionChain-of-thought prompting
Chain-of-thought prompting asks a language model to work through intermediate reasoning steps before answering. It can improve arithmetic, l...
Read definitionChange Data Capture (CDC)
Change Data Capture (CDC) is the practice of detecting every change in a source system and forwarding it to downstream systems. It keeps you...
Read definitionChatbot
A chatbot is software that has a conversation with a user through text or speech. Simple bots follow fixed rules and menus; modern bots ofte...
Read definitionCheckpointing
Checkpointing periodically saves a streaming job's progress, its input offsets and its running state, to durable storage so it can restart f...
Read definitionChunking
Chunking is the step where documents are split into smaller pieces before they are embedded and indexed for retrieval. Good chunks help a RA...
Read definitionCircuit breaker
A circuit breaker watches the calls your application makes to a dependency and, once failures cross a threshold, stops sending calls for a w...
Read definitionCitizen developer
A citizen developer is a business user who builds apps and automations with approved low-code or no-code tools, under IT governance. They kn...
Read definitionClass imbalance
Class imbalance is when one class in a classification dataset vastly outnumbers the other, like fraud among normal transactions. The rare cl...
Read definitionCloud flow
A cloud flow is a Power Automate workflow that runs in the cloud, linking online services through triggers, actions, and connectors. It can ...
Read definitionCode set
A code set is the fixed list of permitted codes and their meanings for a single field, such as order statuses, country codes, or currencies....
Read definitionColumnar storage
Columnar storage keeps the values of each column together on disk instead of storing whole rows side by side. An analytical query that reads...
Read definitionCommon Table Expression (CTE)
A common table expression, or CTE, is a named temporary result set that exists only for the single SQL statement that defines it. You write ...
Read definitionComposite key
A composite key uses two or more columns together to identify a row. No column is unique on its own, but the combination is. You meet them i...
Read definitionComposite model (Power BI)
A composite model in Power BI mixes storage modes in one semantic model. Some tables can be imported into memory, while others stay live thr...
Read definitionComputer vision
Computer vision is software that interprets images and video. It can classify images, detect objects, segment defects, read text with OCR, o...
Read definitionConformance checking
Conformance checking compares how a process actually runs against how it is supposed to run. It is the second pillar of process mining along...
Read definitionConformed dimension
A conformed dimension is a shared dimension table, such as Date, Customer, or Product, reused consistently across several fact tables or dat...
Read definitionConfusion matrix
A confusion matrix is a small table that splits a classification model's predictions into four counts: right and wrong on each class. It sho...
Read definitionConnection pool
A connection pool is a set of open database connections that an application borrows, uses for one query or transaction, and returns instead ...
Read definitionConnection reference
A connection reference is a Power Platform solution component that points to a connection for a given connector. Flows and apps bind to the ...
Read definitionConsent management
Consent management is how you capture, store, and honour the permission people give for their personal data to be processed. It covers cooki...
Read definitionContext compaction
Context compaction is what an AI assistant does when a long session runs out of room: it summarises the conversation so far and restarts fro...
Read definitionContext engineering
Context engineering is the practice of deciding what goes into an AI model's context window on each call: the instructions, retrieved docume...
Read definitionContext rot
Context rot is the gradual drop in how reliably a language model uses information as the input gets longer. A model advertising a 200,000-to...
Read definitionContext transition
Context transition is what happens when CALCULATE turns the current row context into an equivalent filter context. It is why a measure behav...
Read definitionContext window
The context window is the amount of text a language model can see and process in a single call. It sets how many instructions, documents, an...
Read definitionCRM (Customer Relationship Management)
A CRM system stores and manages customer relationships: contacts, accounts, leads, opportunities, service cases, campaigns, and customer com...
Read definitionCross-organisational process mining
Cross-organisational process mining analyses a process that runs across several independent organisations. It links the shared interactions ...
Read definitionCross-validation
Cross-validation estimates how well a model generalises by splitting the data into k folds, training on all but one and scoring on the fold ...
Read definitionCustom connector
A custom connector is one you build yourself when no ready-made connector exists for a source or destination. In Power Automate and Logic Ap...
Read definitionDAG (directed acyclic graph)
A DAG is a directed acyclic graph: a set of steps connected by one-way dependencies with no loops. In data work, it is the shape used to des...
Read definitionDagster
Dagster is an open-source data orchestrator built around data assets. You describe the tables, files, models, and checks that should exist, ...
Read definitionDashboard
A dashboard is a single-screen visual display of the most important metrics and KPIs, arranged so you can check the state of things at a gla...
Read definitionData catalog
A data catalog is a searchable inventory of an organisation's data assets. It records metadata such as owner, schema, description, lineage, ...
Read definitionData classification
Data classification is the practice of sorting data by how sensitive it is and how much it matters to the business, using labels such as pub...
Read definitionData clean room
A data clean room is a controlled environment where two or more parties analyse their combined data without either side seeing the other's r...
Read definitionData consumer
A data consumer is any person, team, report, dashboard, model, API, or downstream process that reads a data product. Naming your consumers i...
Read definitionData contract
A data contract is an explicit agreement between the producer and the consumers of a dataset: which schema, which quality, which frequency, ...
Read definitionData democratization
Data democratization is the practice of making trusted data safely usable by people across a business, not just analysts and engineers. It p...
Read definitionData domain
A data domain is a clearly bounded business area, such as sales, finance, logistics, or HR, together with the data that belongs to it and th...
Read definitionData downtime
Data downtime is the time during which data is missing, stale, wrong, duplicated, incomplete, or otherwise untrusted. It treats broken data ...
Read definitionData drift
Data drift is a change in the statistical distribution of the input data a model or report was built on, while the columns and their types s...
Read definitionData enrichment
Data enrichment is the practice of adding extra detail to records you already hold by pulling in data from internal or external sources, suc...
Read definitionData fabric
A data fabric is an architecture that connects distributed data across systems, clouds, and domains through metadata, governance, automation...
Read definitionData freshness (data SLA)
Data freshness measures how recent data is compared with the real-world event or source it represents. A data SLA makes that expectation exp...
Read definitionData governance
Data governance is the set of roles, rules, processes, and controls that decides how an organisation manages, protects, defines, shares, and...
Read definitionData ingestion
Data ingestion is the process of collecting data from its sources and bringing it into a system where you can store, process or analyse it. ...
Read definitionData lake
A data lake is a central store for raw data in many formats: tables, JSON, logs, images, documents, audio, and video. It keeps data cheaply ...
Read definitionData leakage
Data leakage is when information that would not be available at prediction time slips into training, so a model scores brilliantly in valida...
Read definitionData lineage
Data lineage shows the full journey data takes inside an organisation. From the original source to the final report, with meaning and contex...
Read definitionData literacy
Data literacy is the ability to read, question, interpret, and communicate with data. It is not the same as being an analyst; it is knowing ...
Read definitionData mart
A data mart is a focused analytics layer for one department, domain, or topic. It usually contains a selected subset of warehouse or lakehou...
Read definitionData masking
Data masking replaces sensitive values with realistic but fake ones so people can work with data without seeing the real content. Static mas...
Read definitionData mesh
Data mesh is an organisational model for data in which each business domain owns its datasets and offers them as products. It breaks with th...
Read definitionData minimisation
Data minimisation means collecting and keeping only the personal data you actually need for a specific, stated purpose. It is a core GDPR pr...
Read definitionData observability
Data observability is continuous monitoring of data health: freshness, volume, schema, distribution, and lineage. It helps teams detect brok...
Read definitionData orchestration
Data orchestration schedules, orders, runs, retries, and monitors data tasks as one chain: loads, transformations, quality checks, notebooks...
Read definitionData ownership
Data ownership means that a person or team is formally responsible for a dataset: its definition, quality, access rules, lifecycle, and prio...
Read definitionData pipeline
A data pipeline is an automated chain that moves data from a source to a destination: extracting, transforming, loading, scheduling, logging...
Read definitionData product
A data product is a dataset, semantic model, API, or reporting layer that a team owns and supports for others to use, with a defined consume...
Read definitionData profiling
Data profiling means systematically inspecting a dataset before you build on it: which values occur, how many fields are empty, whether keys...
Read definitionData quality
Data quality is the degree to which data is fit for the purpose you use it for. Addresses, VAT numbers, customer IDs, dates, and product cod...
Read definitionData reconciliation
Data reconciliation is the systematic comparison of two datasets or systems to confirm that they match, and to find exactly where they do no...
Read definitionData replication
Data replication is copying data and keeping those copies in sync across more than one system or location. Teams do it for three reasons: to...
Read definitionData residency
Data residency is the physical country, region, or geography where data is stored and processed. In cloud platforms it is usually controlled...
Read definitionData retention
Data retention is the set of rules that decide how long you keep each type of data and what happens when that time is up: delete, archive, o...
Read definitionData sampling
Data sampling means working with a subset of a dataset instead of all of it, either to move faster and cheaper or to estimate a property of ...
Read definitionData sharing agreement
A data sharing agreement is the written deal between organisations that share data: what moves, to whom, for what purpose, on what legal bas...
Read definitionData skew
Data skew is when rows spread unevenly across partitions, so one task in a distributed engine like Apache Spark does most of the work while ...
Read definitionData sovereignty
Data sovereignty is the question of which laws, authorities, and jurisdictions can affect your data. Physical location matters, but the prov...
Read definitionData steward
A data steward looks after the quality and meaning of a specific area of data, such as customer, product, or finance data. In an SME it is u...
Read definitionData storytelling
Data storytelling is explaining what your data means by combining the numbers, the right visual, and a plain narrative, so an audience under...
Read definitionData testing
Data testing means running automated checks that verify whether data follows rules you defined in advance: no empty keys, no duplicate IDs, ...
Read definitionData transformation
Data transformation is any operation that changes data on its way from a raw source to a form fit for analysis: casting types, cleaning valu...
Read definitionData vault
A data vault is a data warehouse modelling method, introduced by Dan Linstedt, that stores historised and auditable source data in hubs, lin...
Read definitionData virtualization
Data virtualization lets you query and combine data from several systems through a logical layer, without first copying all of it into a cen...
Read definitionData warehouse
A data warehouse is a central database that collects data from many source systems and structures it for reporting and analysis. It's optimi...
Read definitionData wrangling
Data wrangling is the hands-on work of turning messy raw data into a clean, structured form you can analyse: parsing, cleaning, reshaping an...
Read definitionDatabase index
A database index is a separate, sorted structure a database keeps next to a table, so it can find rows without scanning every one. Reads on ...
Read definitionDatabase normalisation
Database normalisation organises data into related tables so each fact is stored once. It keeps operational systems consistent, while report...
Read definitionDataflow Gen2 (Microsoft Fabric)
Dataflow Gen2 is Microsoft Fabric's self-service ETL and data-preparation item. You transform data with Power Query in the browser and write...
Read definitionDataOps
DataOps brings software delivery habits into data work: version control, automated tests, separate environments, CI/CD, monitoring, and clos...
Read definitionDataverse business rule
A Dataverse business rule applies simple logic to a table, such as setting a value, requiring a field, or blocking an invalid save, without ...
Read definitionDataverse column
A Dataverse column defines a single data element on the records of a table, including its data type, required level, format and behaviour. C...
Read definitionDataverse plug-in
A Dataverse plug-in is server-side code that runs when Dataverse processes a registered data operation. A step ties a .NET class to a messag...
Read definitionDataverse relationship
A Dataverse relationship links records across tables and controls navigation, referencing and sometimes cascade behaviour. Dataverse support...
Read definitionDataverse security role
A Dataverse security role bundles privileges and access levels for tables, apps and platform features within one environment. Multiple roles...
Read definitionDataverse table
A Dataverse table defines a type of business record with its columns, relationships, ownership, keys and security. Tables are the data found...
Read definitionDataverse virtual table
A Dataverse virtual table shows data from an external system as Dataverse records without copying it in. A data provider translates Datavers...
Read definitionDAX (Data Analysis Expressions)
DAX is the formula language behind Power BI, Excel Power Pivot and Analysis Services. You use it to build calculations like totals, margins ...
Read definitiondbt (data build tool)
dbt is a SQL-first transformation tool for analytics teams. You write SELECT statements, and dbt handles dependencies, materialisation, test...
Read definitionDead-letter queue
A dead-letter queue (DLQ) is a separate queue where a message lands after it fails processing too many times or expires, so one poison messa...
Read definitionDeadlock
A deadlock is a standoff between two database transactions, each holding a lock the other needs, so neither can move. The database breaks th...
Read definitionDebezium
Debezium is an open-source platform for log-based change data capture. It reads database transaction logs and emits inserts, updates, and de...
Read definitionDecision table
A decision table sets out business logic as a grid: each row is a rule, the condition columns say when it applies, and the outcome columns s...
Read definitionDeclarative process model
A declarative process model describes a process through rules about what must, may, or must not happen, instead of drawing one fixed sequenc...
Read definitionDeduplication
Deduplication finds records that refer to the same customer, product, supplier, or other entity, then merges or removes the duplicates so on...
Read definitionDeep learning
Deep learning is machine learning with neural networks that have many layers. Those layers learn increasingly abstract patterns in images, s...
Read definitionDegenerate dimension
A degenerate dimension is a dimension key that stays in the fact table without its own dimension table, such as an order number, invoice num...
Read definitionDelta Lake
Delta Lake is an open storage format that extends plain Parquet files with transactions, schema enforcement, and time travel. It forms the f...
Read definitionDenormalisation
Denormalisation deliberately stores data redundantly, in wider tables and repeated values, so reports read faster with fewer joins. You acce...
Read definitionDeployment pipeline
A deployment pipeline is the built-in ALM tool of Microsoft Fabric. You build in a Development workspace, test in a Test workspace, and roll...
Read definitionDerivation rule
A derivation rule defines how a field is calculated from other data instead of stored or copied directly. It pins down the inputs, the formu...
Read definitionDesktop flow
A desktop flow is a Power Automate automation that operates Windows programs and websites through their user interface. Built in Power Autom...
Read definitionDeviation analysis (process mining)
Deviation analysis examines where process runs differ from a norm, an expected pattern, or a comparison group. It shows which step is missin...
Read definitionDifferential privacy
Differential privacy is a mathematical privacy guarantee: an analysis should give almost the same result whether one person's data is includ...
Read definitionDigital twin
A digital twin is a digital copy of a physical object, process, or system, fed by live data. You use it to run simulations, test scenarios, ...
Read definitionDigital worker
A digital worker is a software robot packaged to carry out a role's tasks end to end, combining workflow, APIs, RPA, and sometimes AI skills...
Read definitionDimension table
A dimension table holds the descriptive attributes, like customer, product, date, region or channel, that give context to the numbers in a f...
Read definitionDimensional modelling (Kimball method)
Dimensional modelling is Ralph Kimball's design method for analytics: fact tables for events, dimension tables for context, usually arranged...
Read definitionDirect Lake
Direct Lake is a storage mode for Power BI that reads straight from Delta tables in OneLake. You get the speed of Import without the refresh...
Read definitionDirectly-Follows Graph (DFG)
A Directly-Follows Graph is the simplest process map: a diagram showing which activities happen straight after which others. It is quick to ...
Read definitionDirectQuery
DirectQuery is a storage mode in Power BI and Fabric that keeps no copy of the data and instead sends every query straight to the source. Yo...
Read definitionDisaster recovery (RPO/RTO)
Disaster recovery is the plan to bring systems and data back after a major failure. RPO sets how much data you can afford to lose, counted b...
Read definitionDocument automation
Document automation lets software generate, receive, route, validate, sign, and archive documents. It covers both template-based output that...
Read definitionDPIA (Data Protection Impact Assessment)
A DPIA is a structured risk analysis you run on a data project before you build it, when the processing is likely to create a high risk to p...
Read definitionDrillthrough (Power BI)
Drillthrough in Power BI is a report interaction that jumps from a summary visual to a separate detail page filtered to whatever you selecte...
Read definitionEmbeddings
Embeddings turn words, sentences, or images into numbers that capture their meaning. Neural networks learn them from huge amounts of text. T...
Read definitionEntity resolution
Entity resolution decides which records refer to the same real-world person, company, product, or asset across different systems. It links J...
Read definitionERP (Enterprise Resource Planning)
An ERP system records a company's core processes: sales, purchasing, stock, production, projects, invoicing, and accounting. For reporting, ...
Read definitionETL / ELT
ETL and ELT stand for Extract, Transform, Load and Extract, Load, Transform. They are two ways of moving data from source systems into a cen...
Read definitionEvals (LLM evaluation)
Evals are structured tests for measuring the quality of a language model or AI application. They give you a repeatable way to compare prompt...
Read definitionEvent correlation
Event correlation decides which events belong to the same process instance or business objects. Keys, time, relationships, and domain rules ...
Read definitionEvent data
Event data records that something happened at a particular moment, usually with an activity, a case or object it relates to, and extra attri...
Read definitionEvent log
An event log is the foundation of process mining. It records every step that happens in a process, showing what was done, when, and to which...
Read definitionEvent log quality
Event log quality is how well event data fits a specific process-mining question. Completeness, correctness, consistency, timestamps, correl...
Read definitionEvent sourcing
Event sourcing stores every change to your data as an ordered sequence of events and treats that log as the source of truth. Instead of keep...
Read definitionEvent-driven architecture
In event-driven architecture, services talk by emitting events like order.placed instead of calling each other directly, and anything intere...
Read definitionEventstream (Microsoft Fabric)
An Eventstream is the Microsoft Fabric item that captures real-time events, applies light transformations, and routes them to destinations s...
Read definitionExactly-once processing
Exactly-once processing means every event has exactly one effect in the result, even if messages are retried after failures. It is less abou...
Read definitionException handling
Exception handling is how a system or process detects, classifies, and responds to things that go wrong. It decides whether work should retr...
Read definitionExecution plan
An execution plan is the tree of operators a database runs to answer a query: the scans, joins, sorts, and aggregates the query optimizer ch...
Read definitionExperiment tracking
Experiment tracking records every model training run with its parameters, code version, dataset version, metrics, and output files. It lets ...
Read definitionExplainable AI (XAI)
Explainable AI is a set of methods that make a model's decisions understandable to people. Instead of a black-box score, you get to see whic...
Read definitionExponential backoff
Exponential backoff is a retry strategy where you double the wait after each failed attempt, up to a maximum delay, so a struggling service ...
Read definitionFabric capacity (F-SKU)
A Fabric capacity is the compute pool that Power BI, lakehouses, notebooks and pipelines run on in Microsoft Fabric. The F-SKUs run from F2 ...
Read definitionFact table
A fact table stores the numbers a business measures, such as orders, invoice lines, payments, or stock counts, with one row per event and fo...
Read definitionFactless fact table
A factless fact table is a fact table without numeric measures. It stores only keys to dimensions, recording that an event happened or that ...
Read definitionFeature engineering
Feature engineering turns raw columns into the inputs a model can learn from. From an orders table you build a feature like the number of or...
Read definitionFeature store
A feature store is a governed place to define, store, share, and serve machine-learning features. Its job is to keep training and inference ...
Read definitionFew-shot prompting
Few-shot prompting means showing a language model a few worked examples before asking the real question. Instead of explaining every rule, y...
Read definitionField parameters (Power BI)
Field parameters are a Power BI feature that lets report readers switch which fields or measures a visual shows, using a slicer. One chart c...
Read definitionFilter context and row context
Filter context and row context are the two evaluation contexts in DAX. Row context is the current row a formula is working on; filter contex...
Read definitionFine-tuning
Fine-tuning is the practice of further training an existing AI model on your own data so it handles a specific task, tone, or domain better....
Read definitionFinOps
FinOps is the practice of managing cloud, data, and AI spending as a shared responsibility between engineering, finance, and business teams....
Read definitionFitness (process mining)
Fitness measures how well a process model can reproduce the behaviour recorded in an event log. It is one of the quality scores used in conf...
Read definitionForeign key
A foreign key is a column whose values must match an existing row in another table, usually that table's primary key. It is how a relational...
Read definitionFoundation model
A foundation model is a large AI model trained on broad, general data that can then be adapted to many specific tasks. Instead of building a...
Read definitionGDPR (General Data Protection Regulation)
GDPR is the European regulation that governs how organisations process personal data. It does not ban data use, but it requires a clear purp...
Read definitionGenerative AI
Generative AI (GenAI) is technology that produces new content on its own, things like text, images, code, or music. It learns patterns from ...
Read definitionGit (version control)
Git is a distributed version control system that records changes to files over time. Teams use it to track who changed what, review work bef...
Read definitionGolden record
A golden record is the resolved, best-value version of one business entity, such as a customer or product, assembled from many source system...
Read definitionGPU
A GPU is a powerful chip built for fast, parallel calculations. It runs thousands of small operations at the same time, which makes it ideal...
Read definitionGranularity (grain)
Granularity, or grain, is the level of detail in a table: what does one row represent? Declaring the grain first prevents double counting, m...
Read definitionGrounding
Grounding is the property of an AI answer being tied to source material you supply, a document, a database record, a tool result, so each cl...
Read definitionGuardrails (AI)
AI guardrails are the protective layers around an AI application: input checks, system prompts, output filters, moderation services, tool pe...
Read definitionHallucination
A hallucination is when an AI model says something that sounds plausible but isn't true. The model invents details that aren't in any source...
Read definitionHappy path
The happy path is the ideal route through a process or system, without exceptions, errors or detours. It describes what happens when everyth...
Read definitionHeadless BI
Headless BI separates the layer that defines business metrics from the tool that visualises them. Revenue, active customers, or churn are de...
Read definitionHeuristics Miner
The Heuristics Miner is a process discovery algorithm built for messy data. It counts how often activities follow each other and uses adjust...
Read definitionHuman-in-the-Loop (HITL)
Human-in-the-loop (HITL) means that people stay actively involved in decisions and processes that are partly handled by AI. They review, cor...
Read definitionHybrid search
Hybrid search combines keyword search, often BM25, with vector search over embeddings. It returns exact matches and semantic matches in one ...
Read definitionHyperautomation
Hyperautomation is the coordinated use of process mining, RPA, workflow, integration, and AI to automate as many processes as possible in a ...
Read definitionHyperparameter
A hyperparameter is a setting you choose before training a model that shapes how the training runs, like the learning rate, a tree's depth, ...
Read definitionIdempotence
An operation is idempotent when running it once or many times leaves the system in the same final state. Idempotence makes retries safe afte...
Read definitionImport mode (Power BI)
Import mode is Power BI's default storage mode. On refresh, the semantic model copies data from the source, compresses it with VertiPaq, and...
Read definitionIncremental load
An incremental load moves only the rows that changed since the last successful run, instead of rereading the whole source. It keeps pipeline...
Read definitionIncremental refresh
Incremental refresh is the Power BI and Fabric feature that processes only new or changed data at refresh time instead of reloading the whol...
Read definitionInductive Miner
The Inductive Miner is the modern default for process discovery. It splits an event log again and again to build a process tree, and it guar...
Read definitionInference
Inference is the moment a trained AI model is used: new input goes in, a prediction, classification, image, or answer comes out. Training is...
Read definitionInstant cloud flow
An instant cloud flow starts on explicit request, for example from a button, a Power Apps control, or another flow. The person or calling ap...
Read definitionIntelligent Document Processing (IDP)
Intelligent Document Processing combines OCR, machine learning, and validation to turn documents like invoices and contracts into structured...
Read definitionIntelligent Process Automation (IPA)
Intelligent Process Automation (IPA) combines automation with artificial intelligence to make business processes smarter and more efficient....
Read definitioniPaaS (Integration Platform as a Service)
An iPaaS is a cloud platform for connecting business applications through managed connectors, workflows, transformations, scheduling, monito...
Read definitionJevons paradox
Jevons paradox is the idea that when something becomes more efficient, we often end up using more of it instead of less.
Read definitionJSON
JSON is a text format for exchanging structured data between systems. It is readable enough for humans, strict enough for machines, and show...
Read definitionJunk dimension
A junk dimension is a small dimension table that groups loose low-cardinality flags, indicators, and status codes. It keeps the fact table n...
Read definitionKimball bus matrix
The Kimball bus matrix is a planning grid that lists a company's business processes down the rows and its shared, conformed dimensions acros...
Read definitionKnowledge cutoff
A knowledge cutoff is the date after which a language model learned nothing new. Everything that happened later is invisible to it, so it an...
Read definitionKnowledge graph
A knowledge graph stores information as entities and named relationships instead of only rows and columns. It is useful when the question is...
Read definitionKPI (Key Performance Indicator)
A KPI is a measurable indicator of progress toward an important goal. It is not just any metric. A good KPI has a clear definition, owner, t...
Read definitionKQL (Kusto Query Language)
KQL, short for Kusto Query Language, is Microsoft's query language for time-series and log data. You meet KQL inside Azure Data Explorer, Fa...
Read definitionLakehouse
A lakehouse combines the flexibility of a data lake with the structure and performance of a data warehouse. You store raw and processed data...
Read definitionLanding zone
A landing zone is the first place ingested data arrives in a data lake or lakehouse, stored exactly as it came from the source with no clean...
Read definitionLarge Language Model (LLM)
A Large Language Model (LLM) is an AI model trained on enormous amounts of text that understands and generates language. LLMs are the engine...
Read definitionLate arriving dimensions
Late arriving dimensions occur when a fact reaches the warehouse before the matching dimension row exists. Kimball's standard fix is an infe...
Read definitionLeast privilege
Least privilege means every identity, human or machine, gets the minimum access it needs to do its job, and no more. It limits the damage wh...
Read definitionLifecycle transition
A lifecycle transition records an activity instance moving between execution states, such as schedule, start, suspend, resume, and complete....
Read definitionLow-code and no-code
Low-code and no-code tools let people build apps, automations, dashboards, and data transformations with visual building blocks instead of t...
Read definitionMachine learning
Machine learning is software that learns patterns from examples instead of following hand-written rules. You train a model on historical dat...
Read definitionManaged solution (Power Platform)
A managed solution is a packaged, deployable Power Platform release that you install into test and production environments. Its components s...
Read definitionMapping rule
A mapping rule is the part of a source-to-target mapping that says how a value gets from a source field to a target field: a direct copy, a ...
Read definitionMaster Data Management (MDM)
Master Data Management (MDM) is the discipline of keeping one trusted version of core business data, such as customers, products, suppliers,...
Read definitionMaterialized view
A materialized view is a query whose result is stored as a table, so reads are fast, at the cost of freshness: the data is only as current a...
Read definitionMCP (Model Context Protocol)
MCP, short for Model Context Protocol, is an open standard from Anthropic that lets AI models talk to tools and data in a uniform way. One p...
Read definitionMedallion architecture
Medallion architecture organises a lakehouse into three layers: bronze for raw data, silver for cleaned data, and gold for business-ready ta...
Read definitionMessage queue
A message queue sits between two systems: a producer drops a message in, and a consumer picks it up when it is ready. That decouples the two...
Read definitionMetadata
Metadata is data about data: the information that explains what a dataset is, where it came from, how fresh it is, who owns it, and how it m...
Read definitionMetrics layer
A metrics layer is the central place where business metrics such as revenue, active customers, margin, and churn are defined once, then reus...
Read definitionMicrosoft Copilot
Microsoft Copilot is the family name for every AI assistant Microsoft builds into its products, from Word and Excel through to Power BI and ...
Read definitionMicrosoft Copilot Studio
Microsoft Copilot Studio is a low-code tool for building AI agents and chatbots, the successor to Power Virtual Agents. You combine instruct...
Read definitionMicrosoft Dataverse
Microsoft Dataverse is the managed data platform behind Power Platform and Dynamics 365. It stores business data in tables and adds relation...
Read definitionMicrosoft Fabric
Microsoft Fabric is an all-in-one cloud platform that brings data storage, transformation, and reporting together in one place. It connects ...
Read definitionMicrosoft Power Platform
Microsoft Power Platform is Microsoft's family of low-code products for building apps, automating workflows, analyzing data, publishing webs...
Read definitionMicrosoft Purview
Microsoft Purview is Microsoft's platform for data governance, data security, and compliance. It helps organisations see what data they have...
Read definitionMixture of experts (MoE)
A mixture of experts is a model design that splits one large neural network into many smaller specialist sub-networks called experts. A smal...
Read definitionMLOps
MLOps is the way of working that brings machine learning models reliably into production and keeps them healthy there. It combines elements ...
Read definitionModel distillation
Model distillation trains a smaller student model to imitate a larger teacher model. The student learns from the teacher's outputs, so it ca...
Read definitionModel drift
Model drift happens when an AI model gets worse at predicting because data or real-world patterns shift over time. Regular retraining and co...
Read definitionModel registry
A model registry is a versioned catalogue of trained machine learning models. Each version records which data, code and run produced it, so ...
Read definitionModel serving
Model serving is how a trained machine learning model is made available to return predictions, either as a real-time endpoint that answers e...
Read definitionModel-driven app
A model-driven app is a type of Power Apps app whose interface comes from a Dataverse data model. Tables, relationships, forms, views and pr...
Read definitionMulti-perspective process mining
Multi-perspective process mining looks at a process from several angles at once: not only the order of activities, but also timing, case dat...
Read definitionMultimodal model
A multimodal model is an AI model that can work with more than one type of input, such as text, images, audio, and video. Some models can al...
Read definitionNatural Language Processing (NLP)
Natural Language Processing (NLP) is the umbrella name for techniques that let computers understand human language. You use it every day wit...
Read definitionNeural network
A neural network is a computer model that learns by working through examples, loosely inspired by the human brain. It is built from layers o...
Read definitionNL2SQL
NL2SQL turns a plain-language question into a SQL query against a known schema. The demo looks like magic, but getting the joins, column mea...
Read definitionNon-determinism (LLM output)
Non-determinism is what you have when the same prompt, sent twice with the same settings, gives you two different answers. Some of it comes ...
Read definitionNotebook (data)
A data notebook is an interactive work document with code, explanation, and results in cells. Analysts and data scientists use notebooks to ...
Read definitionOAuth
OAuth is the protocol behind buttons like "Sign in with Google" and "Allow access to your Drive". It lets an app get limited, revocable acce...
Read definitionObject Level Security
Object Level Security hides entire tables or columns in your data model from specific users. When sensitive fields like salaries, margins or...
Read definitionObject-Centric Event Log (OCEL)
An object-centric event log, or OCEL, records events that relate to several business objects at once instead of forcing each event onto a si...
Read definitionObject-centric process mining (OCPM)
Object-centric process mining is an approach where events are not tied to a single case but to several business objects at once: an order, t...
Read definitionOCR (Optical Character Recognition)
OCR, short for Optical Character Recognition, is technology that reads text inside an image or scanned document. It turns letters and number...
Read definitionOLTP and OLAP
OLTP systems run day-to-day transactions such as orders, payments, and stock changes. OLAP systems analyse that data over time. The differen...
Read definitionOn-premises data gateway
An on-premises data gateway is a Windows service that connects Microsoft cloud services such as Power BI, Fabric, Power Automate, and Power ...
Read definitionOneLake
OneLake is Microsoft’s central data storage system within Microsoft Fabric. It serves as the single, unified location where all business dat...
Read definitionOneLake shortcut
A OneLake shortcut is a pointer from your Fabric lakehouse or KQL database to data that lives somewhere else, without copying it. Internal O...
Read definitionOntology
An ontology is a formal shared model of the concepts in a domain: what kinds of things exist, which properties they have, and how they relat...
Read definitionOpen-weight model
An open-weight model is an AI model whose trained weights can be downloaded and run outside the vendor's hosted API. The licence still decid...
Read definitionOperational data store (ODS)
An operational data store is a database that brings together current data from several source systems into one integrated place, so teams ca...
Read definitionOrganisational mining
Organisational mining uses event data to see how people, teams and systems really work together in a process. It maps the division of work, ...
Read definitionOverfitting and underfitting
Overfitting and underfitting are the two ways a machine learning model fits its data badly. Overfitting means the model learns the training ...
Read definitionPaginated report
A paginated report is a pixel-precise report designed for printing, PDF export, or formal distribution. It has fixed pages, headers, footers...
Read definitionpandas
pandas is the Python library many analysts use for tabular data work. Its Series and DataFrame objects let you read, clean, join, reshape, a...
Read definitionParametric knowledge
Parametric knowledge is what a language model absorbed into its weights during training and carries with no source attached. Contextual know...
Read definitionParquet
Apache Parquet is a columnar file format designed for analytical queries on large datasets. It is the storage layer under almost every moder...
Read definitionPartitioning
Partitioning splits a large table into smaller physical parts based on a column such as date, month, region, or tenant. When queries filter ...
Read definitionPetri net
A Petri net is a formal way to draw a process using places, transitions, and tokens. Unlike a simple flow chart it can precisely describe ch...
Read definitionPII (Personally Identifiable Information)
PII, or personally identifiable information, is any data that can single out a specific person, directly or indirectly. In Europe the term t...
Read definitionPower Apps
Power Apps is Microsoft's low-code platform for building business apps with visual designers, connectors and the Power Fx formula language. ...
Read definitionPower Apps Component Framework (PCF)
Power Apps Component Framework lets developers build reusable code components for canvas and model-driven apps. A component pairs a manifest...
Read definitionPower Apps component library
A Power Apps component library is a central place to build and share reusable canvas components. The owner publishes versions, and apps that...
Read definitionPower Apps delegation
Delegation is how Power Apps hands a Power Fx query to the data source to run, instead of pulling records to the device first. When a formul...
Read definitionPower Automate
Power Automate is a Microsoft tool that lets you automate repetitive tasks and processes without writing code. You build flows visually that...
Read definitionPower Automate action
An action is a step that does work inside a Power Automate flow. After the trigger starts a run, actions get data, change a record, send a m...
Read definitionPower Automate Desktop
Power Automate Desktop is the Windows app for building and running desktop flows, the robotic process automation side of Power Automate. A f...
Read definitionPower Automate trigger
A trigger is the event that starts a Power Automate flow. It decides when a new run begins and hands the flow its first piece of data. Every...
Read definitionPower Bi
Power BI is Microsoft’s business intelligence tool that helps people understand their data through interactive dashboards and reports. It co...
Read definitionPower BI Embedded
Power BI Embedded lets you build Power BI reports straight into your own software or website, so users see insights without ever opening Pow...
Read definitionPower BI Enhanced Report Format (PBIR)
PBIR is the new default file format for Power BI reports. Instead of storing everything in one large JSON file, a report is now split into m...
Read definitionPower BI Project (PBIP)
PBIP is the folder-based project format for Power BI. Instead of storing everything in one PBIX file, a PBIP project splits the semantic mod...
Read definitionPower Fx
Power Fx is Microsoft's low-code language for Power Platform. You write short, Excel-like formulas that the platform recalculates on its own...
Read definitionPower Pages
Power Pages is Microsoft's low-code platform for external-facing business websites that read and write Dataverse data. It combines visual we...
Read definitionPower Platform admin center
The Power Platform admin center is Microsoft's central console for managing Power Platform environments, capacity, data policies, analytics,...
Read definitionPower Platform Application Lifecycle Management (ALM)
Power Platform ALM is the organised way to run an app across its whole life, from planning and building through deployment, operation, and r...
Read definitionPower Platform CLI
Power Platform CLI is Microsoft's command-line tool for Power Platform development and administration. The pac command covers authentication...
Read definitionPower Platform Data Loss Prevention (DLP)
Power Platform Data Loss Prevention, or DLP, is a set of data policies that classify connectors as business, non-business or blocked so risk...
Read definitionPower Platform environment
A Power Platform environment is a bounded space where an organisation stores and runs its apps, flows, agents, connections and, optionally, ...
Read definitionPower Platform environment variable
A Power Platform environment variable keeps configuration that differs per environment out of your apps and flows. A definition sets the typ...
Read definitionPower Platform pipelines
Power Platform pipelines are the built-in way to deploy solutions from development to test and production across environments. A host enviro...
Read definitionPower Platform solution
A Power Platform solution is the package that holds apps, flows, Dataverse components and configuration so you can move a business applicati...
Read definitionPower Query
Power Query is Microsoft's transformation language for data. You use it visually in Power BI, Excel, and Fabric Dataflows, with M as the und...
Read definitionPrecision (process mining)
Precision measures whether a process model allows little behaviour beyond what the event log actually shows. It is the counterweight to fitn...
Read definitionPrecision and recall
Precision and recall are two scores that grade a classification model. Precision is the share of flagged cases that were right, TP / (TP + F...
Read definitionPredicate pushdown
Predicate pushdown pushes a query's filter down to the data source or file reader, so rows that fail the condition are never read. In Parque...
Read definitionPredictive analytics
Predictive analytics uses historical data to estimate what is likely to happen next: future sales, churn risk, late payment, stock needs, or...
Read definitionPredictive process monitoring
Predictive process monitoring estimates how a running case is likely to end by reading the events recorded so far. Typical targets are the f...
Read definitionPrescriptive process monitoring
Prescriptive process monitoring recommends, during a running case, the action most likely to improve the outcome. It goes beyond prediction ...
Read definitionPrimary key
A primary key is the column, or set of columns, that uniquely identifies every row in a table. The database enforces two rules on it: the va...
Read definitionPrivacy-preserving process mining
Privacy-preserving process mining analyses how a process runs while limiting what it can reveal about individuals, cases and sensitive busin...
Read definitionProcess automation
Process automation is the use of software to take over repetitive tasks that people would normally do by hand. It connects systems, moves da...
Read definitionProcess discovery
Process discovery is the step in process mining that automatically draws a process map from your event log. No workshops or interviews, just...
Read definitionProcess drift
Process drift is when a process changes over time, so a model you discovered earlier no longer matches what is really happening. Activities,...
Read definitionProcess instance
A process instance is one run of a process from start to finish: one order, one claim, one support ticket. In classic process mining it is t...
Read definitionProcess intelligence
Process intelligence is the practice of using system data, process models and domain knowledge to see how processes really run, why results ...
Read definitionProcess mining
Process mining helps companies see how their processes truly run by using real data from their systems. It turns digital traces from tools l...
Read definitionProcess model
A process model is a simplified picture of how a process runs, showing activities, order, choices and parallel paths. It can be hand-drawn i...
Read definitionProcess optimisation
Process optimisation is improving a process against measurable outcomes like speed, cost, quality and risk. It runs as a repeating cycle of ...
Read definitionProcess orchestration
Process orchestration coordinates people, systems, services and automations across one end-to-end process. An orchestrator holds the state o...
Read definitionProcess owner
A process owner is the person accountable end to end for a business process: its performance, its design and its improvement. The role cuts ...
Read definitionProcess standardisation
Process standardisation agrees on a common baseline way of working, with roles, data, and controls, for a repeated task. It cuts variants an...
Read definitionProcess trace
A process trace is the ordered sequence of events recorded for a single case in an event log. It shows which activities were registered and ...
Read definitionProcess variant
A process variant is one distinct path through a process, a unique sequence of activities that a group of cases all followed. Variants let p...
Read definitionPrompt caching
Prompt caching lets a provider store the processed front section of your prompt and reuse it on the next call, so you pay a fraction of the ...
Read definitionPrompt engineering
Prompt engineering is the craft of writing instructions for an AI model so it produces useful output. A good prompt largely decides whether ...
Read definitionPrompt injection
Prompt injection is an attack where a user or external content tricks a language model into ignoring, overriding, or leaking its instruction...
Read definitionPrompt template
A prompt template is a reusable prompt with named placeholders that get filled at runtime, so one set of instructions runs over many inputs....
Read definitionPurpose limitation
Purpose limitation is the GDPR principle that you decide and state why you are collecting personal data before you collect it, then do not r...
Read definitionQuantisation
Quantisation makes an AI model smaller by storing its weights with fewer bits, often 8-bit or 4-bit instead of 16-bit. It reduces memory use...
Read definitionQuery folding
Query folding is what lets Power Query turn your transformation steps into a single query that the data source runs itself, so filters, colu...
Read definitionQuery optimizer
A query optimizer is the part of a database that decides how a SQL query actually runs: which indexes to use, how to join the tables, and in...
Read definitionRAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation)
RAG or Retrieval-Augmented Generation is a technique where an AI model first looks up relevant information in a dedicated knowledge base bef...
Read definitionRate limit
A rate limit is a cap on how many requests a client can send to an API within a set time window, such as 5,000 per hour or 100 per second. P...
Read definitionRBAC (Role-Based Access Control)
RBAC attaches permissions to roles and gives people roles, so access follows job function instead of a list kept per person. Add someone to ...
Read definitionRead replica
A read replica is a read-only copy of a database that serves reports, exports and dashboards so the primary can focus on writes. Replication...
Read definitionReasoning effort
Reasoning effort is the runtime setting that decides how long a model thinks before it answers. Raise it and the model works through the pro...
Read definitionReference data
Reference data is the set of shared, mostly standardised lookup values that give other data meaning: country codes, currencies, order status...
Read definitionReferential integrity
Referential integrity is the database guarantee that a foreign key value always points to a row that exists. It is enforced by foreign key c...
Read definitionReinforcement learning
Reinforcement learning is a form of machine learning where systems learn by experience. They try things, get feedback, and gradually get bet...
Read definitionReranking
Reranking is a second scoring step in search and RAG. A fast search retrieves a broad candidate list, then a slower reranker compares each c...
Read definitionResponsible AI
Responsible AI is the practice of building and running AI systems so they are fair, transparent, accountable, safe, and respectful of privac...
Read definitionRetry policy
A retry policy is the set of rules a system follows when an operation fails: which errors to retry, how many attempts, how long to wait, and...
Read definitionReturn on Automation (ROA)
Return on Automation, or ROA, measures what an automation returns against what it costs across its whole life. It goes beyond simple time sa...
Read definitionReverse ETL
Reverse ETL syncs modelled data from a warehouse or lakehouse back into operational tools such as CRM, marketing automation, support, and ad...
Read definitionRework loop
A rework loop is a pattern where the same activity runs more than once within a single case: an invoice that gets re-created, a file that go...
Read definitionRight to erasure
The right to erasure, set out in Article 17 of the GDPR and known as the right to be forgotten, lets a person ask an organisation to delete ...
Read definitionRLHF (Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedback)
RLHF is a training method that teaches an AI model to match human preferences. People rank the model's answers, those rankings train a rewar...
Read definitionROC curve and AUC
A ROC curve plots a classification model's true positive rate against its false positive rate at every threshold, so it measures ranking qua...
Read definitionRole-playing dimension
A role-playing dimension is one dimension table used several times by the same fact table, each time in a different role. The classic exampl...
Read definitionRoot cause analysis
Root cause analysis is the structured practice of finding the underlying cause of a problem instead of its symptoms, using methods like the ...
Read definitionRow Level Security (RLS)
Row Level Security makes sure users only see the rows of your dataset they are allowed to see. It is a clean way to share one dataset safely...
Read definitionRPA (Robotic Process Automation)
RPA, or Robotic Process Automation, is a technology that uses software bots to perform repetitive computer tasks automatically. It helps bus...
Read definitionRunbook
A runbook is a written procedure for a recurring operational task or a known failure, written so that someone who did not build the system c...
Read definitionSaga pattern
The saga pattern runs a business process that spans several services as a sequence of local transactions, each paired with a compensating ac...
Read definitionScheduled cloud flow
A scheduled cloud flow runs on a start time and repeat you set. It suits periodic checks, reports, and batch work for which no separate trig...
Read definitionSchema drift
Schema drift happens when the structure of a source changes over time: columns are added, removed, renamed, reordered, or change type. Pipel...
Read definitionSchema evolution
Schema evolution is how you change the shape of a table or message stream over time, adding a column, renaming one, or changing a type, with...
Read definitionSchema registry
A schema registry is a central store for the message schemas on a streaming platform. It versions every schema and checks each new one again...
Read definitionScreen scraping
Screen scraping reads data straight from what an application shows on screen, using text extraction or OCR, when there is no API, export, or...
Read definitionSecret management
Secret management is how you store and control access to credentials, API keys, connection strings, and certificates outside your code, then...
Read definitionSelf-service analytics
Self-service analytics gives people in the business the tools to work with data themselves, without depending on IT for every question. With...
Read definitionSemantic model
A semantic model is a layer on top of your data that translates tables, relationships, and calculations into business language. It's the bri...
Read definitionSemantic search
Semantic search finds results by meaning rather than exact words. It turns your query and your documents into vectors that capture meaning, ...
Read definitionSemi-additive measure
A semi-additive measure is a number you can sum across some dimensions but not across others, most often not across time. Account balances a...
Read definitionSensitivity label
A sensitivity label is a metadata tag that records how sensitive a file or dataset is and can enforce protection such as encryption and acce...
Read definitionService Level Objective (SLO)
A service level objective, or SLO, is an internal target for how reliable a service has to be, written as a measurable number over a time wi...
Read definitionSingle source of truth (SSOT)
A single source of truth (SSOT) is the agreement that every fact in your organisation has one authoritative place everyone reads from, so re...
Read definitionSlowly Changing Dimensions (SCD)
Slowly Changing Dimensions (SCD) is the set of patterns for storing changes in dimension data (customers move, products change category) cor...
Read definitionSmall files problem
The small files problem is when a data lake or lakehouse table ends up spread across thousands of tiny files. The query engine then spends m...
Read definitionSmall Language Model (SLM)
A small language model (SLM) is a language model compact enough to run on modest hardware you control: a single GPU, a laptop, sometimes a p...
Read definitionSnapshot fact table
A snapshot fact table records the state of something at a fixed moment instead of the individual events behind it. It is one of Kimball's th...
Read definitionSnowflake
Snowflake is a modern cloud-based data warehouse that helps organisations store and analyse large volumes of data efficiently. It separates ...
Read definitionSnowflake schema
A snowflake schema is a dimensional model where dimension tables are normalised into linked sub-dimensions, so a single entity like product ...
Read definitionSoft delete
A soft delete marks a row as deleted with a flag or timestamp instead of removing it, so the record stays in the database for recovery and h...
Read definitionSolution layering (Power Platform)
Solution layering is how Power Platform decides which definition of a component is active at runtime when the system, managed, and unmanaged...
Read definitionSource field
A source field is a field exactly as it exists in the system that produced it, with its own name, data type, length and encoding, before any...
Read definitionSpeech-to-text (STT)
Speech-to-text (STT) turns spoken words into readable text. You can use it to convert calls, recordings, or meetings into notes and reports ...
Read definitionSQL (Structured Query Language)
SQL is the standard language for querying and managing relational databases. You describe the result you want, and the database engine works...
Read definitionStaging area
A staging area is the intermediate landing zone in an ETL or ELT pipeline where raw extracted data sits before it is cleaned, transformed, a...
Read definitionStar schema
A star schema is a data model where one central fact table is surrounded by dimension tables. It is the standard pattern for BI and delivers...
Read definitionStateless (LLM API)
A language model API is stateless: it keeps nothing between calls. The memory you experience in a chat is the application resending the whol...
Read definitionStored procedure
A stored procedure is a named routine of SQL statements saved inside the database. You call it by name, pass parameters, and the database ru...
Read definitionStraight-through processing (STP)
Straight-through processing (STP) handles a transaction from entry to result entirely by systems, with no manual step in between. Anything t...
Read definitionStreaming data
Streaming data is data processed continuously as each event arrives, not gathered into scheduled batches. It brings its own concepts: event ...
Read definitionStructured output
Structured output means making a model return machine-readable data that fits a schema, usually JSON, instead of free text. Modern APIs can ...
Read definitionSubagent
A subagent is a second AI agent that a main agent starts to handle one scoped piece of work in its own fresh context window, returning only ...
Read definitionSupervised learning
Supervised learning is a way for computers to learn from examples that already include the right answer. The model studies thousands of labe...
Read definitionSurrogate key
A surrogate key is an artificial, meaningless integer that your warehouse assigns to every row in a dimension table. It becomes the dimensio...
Read definitionSycophancy (AI)
Sycophancy is the tendency of an AI model to agree with you, validate your premise, and abandon a correct answer as soon as you push back. I...
Read definitionSynthetic data
Synthetic data is artificially generated records that copy the statistical shape of a real dataset without being real people. You use it for...
Read definitionSystem of record
A system of record is the application your organisation treats as authoritative for a specific kind of data, such as the ERP for invoices or...
Read definitionSystem prompt
A system prompt is the instruction an application gives a language model before the conversation starts, setting its role, scope, tone, outp...
Read definitionTable compaction
Table compaction rewrites the many small files a lakehouse table piles up into fewer, larger ones, so scans stop paying per-file overhead. D...
Read definitionTarget field
A target field is the column in a destination schema that receives a value after a source field is mapped, transformed, or derived. Unlike t...
Read definitionTask mining
Task mining captures how work happens on the desktop: mouse clicks, keystrokes, window switches and application use at the employee's own ma...
Read definitionTemperature (LLM parameter)
Temperature is the sampling setting that controls how random a large language model's output is. It scales the token scores before the softm...
Read definitionText-to-speech (TTS)
Text-to-speech (TTS) turns written text into spoken audio. It evolved from clunky mechanical machines to modern AI voices that sound almost ...
Read definitionThird normal form (3NF)
Third normal form is a database design level where every non-key column depends on the primary key, the whole key, and nothing but the key. ...
Read definitionThroughput time
Throughput time is the time between the start event and the end event of a case: the full clock on an order, request or ticket, including ev...
Read definitionTime intelligence
Time intelligence is the group of DAX functions that shift and compare calculations over dates: year-to-date, the same period last year, rol...
Read definitionTime travel (data versioning)
Time travel lets you query a table as it looked at an earlier version or timestamp. Delta Lake and Apache Iceberg keep the older versions th...
Read definitionToken-based replay
Token-based replay plays a recorded process trace step by step on a Petri net. Missing and left-over token markings show where the recorded ...
Read definitionTokens
A token is the smallest unit of text an AI model processes, usually half a word or a punctuation mark. Tokens drive both the bill on every A...
Read definitionTool use (function calling)
Tool use, which most model vendors call function calling, lets a language model do more than write text. You describe a set of tools and the...
Read definitionTrain-test split
A train-test split holds part of your data back from training so a model is scored on examples it never saw. That test score estimates how i...
Read definitionTransaction isolation
Transaction isolation decides how much one running database transaction can see of others that are still in flight. It is the I in ACID, and...
Read definitionTransactional outbox
A transactional outbox writes an outgoing event into a table in the same database transaction as the business change, so the two commit toge...
Read definitionTransfer learning
Transfer learning is reusing a model trained on one task as the starting point for a related task. Instead of training from scratch, you tak...
Read definitionTransformer architecture
The transformer architecture is the engine behind modern AI. It processes text, images and sound by understanding the relationships between ...
Read definitionUI automation
UI automation drives software through its own screens and controls, the way a person would. The automation finds fields and buttons and perf...
Read definitionUI automation selector
A UI automation selector is the description an automation uses to find one specific control, like a window, field or button, in a desktop ap...
Read definitionUnmanaged solution (Power Platform)
An unmanaged solution is an editable Power Platform container used for development. Its component changes become part of the environment's s...
Read definitionUnsupervised learning
Unsupervised learning is a form of machine learning where computers find patterns in data on their own, without anyone telling them what is ...
Read definitionUpsert
An upsert is a single database write that inserts a row when it does not exist and updates it when it does, matched on a key you name. Data ...
Read definitionValidation rule
A validation rule is a test that judges a value or a row and returns pass or fail, without changing the data. It turns data quality into som...
Read definitionVariant analysis
Variant analysis shows how many different routes the same process actually takes. You see which sequence of steps is most common, how long e...
Read definitionVector database
A vector database stores embeddings and searches them at high speed on meaning rather than exact words. They form the memory layer under RAG...
Read definitionVector search (ANN)
Vector search finds the items whose vectors sit closest to a query vector, ranking results by meaning instead of exact words. Exact search c...
Read definitionVertiPaq
VertiPaq is the in-memory columnar engine behind Power BI import mode, Analysis Services Tabular, and Excel Power Pivot. It copies your data...
Read definitionVibe coding
Vibe coding is building software by describing what you want in plain language, accepting the generated code without reading it, and judging...
Read definitionWatermark
In stream processing, a watermark is the engine's assertion about how far event time has advanced, used to decide when a time window can clo...
Read definitionWebhook
A webhook is an HTTP callback a provider sends to your URL the moment an event happens, so you stop polling for changes. The receiver's job ...
Read definitionWindow function
A window function computes a value across a set of related rows, such as a running total or a rank, without collapsing them the way GROUP BY...
Read definitionWork queue
A work queue holds individual work items that automations claim and process one at a time. Status, priority, retry rules, and exception deta...
Read definitionWorkflow automation
Workflow automation has software run a sequence of tasks, decisions, and handoffs along a defined route. It decides who or which system gets...
Read definitionWorkflow engine
A workflow engine is software that runs business processes step by step in a reliable way. It tracks where each process is, decides what sho...
Read definitionZ-ordering (data clustering)
Z-ordering rearranges a Delta Lake table so that rows you often query together share the same Parquet files. That lets data skipping drop fi...
Read definitionZero-shot prompting
Zero-shot prompting is asking a language model to do a task without giving it any worked examples. You write the instruction in plain langua...
Read definitionZero-trust data architecture
Zero-trust data architecture is a security model that trusts nobody by default. Every user and every application has to prove themselves aga...
Read definition