From SAS Viya stable cadence 2021.1.1, a SAS Administrator can create custom groups and a set of custom rules. These will enable the business users in those groups to work almost independently with the SAS Information Catalog. The administrator can empower the business users in three steps: 1. manage authorizations; 2. empower users to manage the catalog; 3. empower users to update asset description and statuses.
The SAS Administrator can "delegate" two items to users which are closer to the business: discovery agents management and assets description / status.
Let us assume the business needs of several users, from the Finance department:
This step is a pre-requisite. The SAS administrator has to authorize the Finance group with (at least) a read access to the caslib. Otherwise, the users in this group won’t see the desired data source (SAMPGEL caslib).
If the users connect to the SAS Information Catalog, even if their new caslib was catalogued by an administrator, they won't be able to open the catalog metrics. Without the proper authorizations, they will receive the message "...you are not authorized".
To remediate the authorization issue, the SAS administrator has to grant the Finance group (at least a) read access to the new caslib (in SAS Environment Manager > Data > Edit Authorization).
The Finance group, can now access the data source.
Business need: Fernanda needs to index and catalog information assets from the new data source.
To solve the business need, the SAS administrator needs to:
Create the group -> Catalog Maintainers.
The SAS documentation is very explicit about the set of authorization rules needed for this custom group:
With these rules applied to the Catalog Maintainers group, Fernanda can now define and run a discovery agent:
After the discovery agent has finished running, the catalogued information assets can then be consulted by the Finance users.
Business need: Fiona needs to assess and review the catalogued information assets. By doing so, she tells other users if the asset can be used for the intended purpose.
To solve the business need, the SAS administrator needs to:
Create the group, for example, Catalog Reviewers.
The SAS documentation is very explicit about the set of authorization rules needed for this custom group:
Fiona can now update the descriptions and the status. She can guide the other Finance users if data is fit for purpose.
The SAS administrator can empower the business users to work independently with the SAS Information Catalog, in three steps:
Thank you Nancy Rausch, Kumar Thangamuthu and Vincent Rejany.
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