Data Scrubbing

For effective real time data analysis, the data being made available should be as error free as possible. Databases by their nature are rarely without mistakes and ideally these mistakes, duplicated data and incomplete data should be eliminated before the data reaches the data analysis stage. This process is known as data scrubbing.

Despite our best efforts, computers have not yet developed superior intelligence. While a human would spot that an individual on a database with the first name of Smith and the last name of John is most likely really named John Smith, a computer database has no way of knowing this.

Granted, an error like the one in the example above isn't going to bring a whole system to its knees. However, enough of these thrown in with repeated content, missing information and other errors could have the potential to lead to larger database problems that are not so easy to deal with and may interfere with reporting and analyzing the data.

And as databases and data analysis has become more complex, the existence of 'dirty data' in databases has become more problematic. These problems can become particularly troublesome when data is sent to a data warehouse or a real time data analysis application.

There are a few common causes for bad data to enter systems. These include people leaving fields blank when filling out online forms; poor data entry by data entry clerks; and attempting merge incompatible databases.

In fact, 'dirty data' is a fact of life in the database world and thus the need for data scrubbing. As you might imagine, trying to fix these errors by hand would be a tedious process. Luckily, there are a few software applications that will take care of this automatically.

Many companies tend to build their own data scrubbing solutions, because every company has specific issues in its database. However, there are plenty of commercial solutions out there as well. These do not come cheap, and can cost you thousands of dollars. In addition, they can often take a good deal of customization before serving the particular needs of an organization. Once it is configured, the data scrubbing software will use algorithms to correct errors, remove duplicate content and consolidate data.

Regular data scrubbing is essential for the smooth running of any database, and the bigger the database is the more necessary it becomes. While it may be a little expensive, it will prevent more serious problems in the long run.

 

Written by: David C Skul - CEO

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