Data, Data Lakes, & Databases – IDS 200 CH1

Vocabulary flashcards summarizing key terms and definitions from the lecture on data, data lakes, and databases.

Data

Raw facts generated by business events such as purchases, shipments, or employee actions.

Record

A single representation of an event or thing, composed of a set of fields.

Field

An individual attribute or piece of information stored within a record.

Information

Data that has been processed into a usable form, such as a single record, subset, or aggregate.

Information System

A system designed to store specific kinds of data and provide standard methods for access and use.

Operational Data

Data created and used to perform day-to-day business operations, typically stored for quick lookups.

Analytical Data

Regrouped operational data used to answer performance questions rather than run daily operations.

Structured Data

Data in which every record has the same predefined set of fields, e.g., customer accounts.

Unstructured Data

Data whose records do not share identical fields, e.g., webpages or email documents.

Semi-Structured Data

Data with consistent groups of fields but varying counts or formats within those groups (e.g., orders with variable line items).

Scale (Volume & Velocity)

The growth in amount and speed of data that requires automated processing, often reaching gigabytes, terabytes, or petabytes.

Aggregate

A combined measure—such as a sum, average, minimum, or maximum—derived from multiple records.

Data Lake

A repository holding all operational data in varied formats—structured and unstructured—for later processing.

ETL (Extract, Transform, Load)

The process of pulling data from a lake, converting it as needed, and loading it into end systems or databases.

Database

An application that lets users record, modify, delete, and query data, often fed by the data lake.

Table

A set of records of the same type stored together within a database.

Primary Key

A unique identifier assigned to each record in a table to distinguish it from others.

Relational Database

A database model that stores data in related tables allowing multi-table queries; best suited for structured data.

Relationship (Database)

A linkage between tables based on common fields (e.g., Customer.zip = ZipCode.zip) enabling combined queries.

Non-Relational Database (NoSQL)

A database model focused on single-table lookups, sacrificing some query flexibility for speed or storage efficiency.

Eventual Consistency

A design principle in many NoSQL systems where temporary data conflicts are tolerated to gain performance or capacity.

Database Design

The planning process that determines what data to collect, how to store and group it, and how users will access it.