Pillar 2: Semantic Compatibility
Derisk complex migration processes and accelerate feature development using Omniscient's "semantic models" to seamlessly automate schema generation and configuration migration.
What is Semantic Compatibility?
In an ever more connected and interdependent world, the ability of systems and subsystems to remain compatible with each other as they evolve is critical. The current industry standard, which we'll refer to as "schematic compatibility", is for systems to require data to conform to a set of rules (a "schema") that ensures the data is processed correctly. As the system is developed and this schema changes (known as "schema evolution"), legacy data that conformed to the previous version of the system is only schematically compatible if it also conforms to the new schema. Businesses encounter enormous complexity and risk when they need to evolve their schemas in ways that do not maintain schematic compatibility.
At Omniscient, we know that the key to unblocking this barrier to faster, more reliable systems is to leverage the understanding of how and why the data model has evolved to automate both schema evolution and data migration from a single source of truth. This enables systems to work with configuration in any representation that it understands how to migrate to the representation it needs. This ability to transcend individual schemas and understand how they are connected is what we call semantic compatibility.
Introducing JSON Migrate
At Omniscient, we are passionate about making our systems as open and transparent as possible. We believe this helps us all work together to solve society's problems as quickly and effectively as possible.
To that end, we are developing the JSON Migrate open standard to underpin our approach to semantic compatibility. It is still a work in progress, so as with everything else we are doing we would welcome your feedback!
How does Omni CLM implement Semantic Compatibility?
Omni CLM's approach to semantic compatibility revolves around the creation and maintenance of a so-called "semantic model". These models represent a set of related schemas by defining an initial "base" schema and a set of migrations that define how the data model has evolved from the initial schema. This model is used to perform two key tasks:
- Schema Generation - Omni CLM applies the migrations sequentially from the base schema to automatically derive schemas for other versions of your data model.
- Configuration Migration - Omni CLM uses the same set of migrations to determine how to migrate your configurations between different schemas.
Watch the video opposite for a simple demonstration of semantic models in action, or download the beta and work through our Getting Started tutorial to try it out for yourself!