Asset interchange

You can use command line export and import to move assets between the metadata repositories of different installations and to migrate between versions of InfoSphere® Information Server. For example, you can move assets from a development environment to a test, production, or source control environment.

InfoSphere Information Server is a suite of components that together provide a single unified platform that enables companies to understand, cleanse, transform, and deliver information.

Each of the components has a set of assets that are stored in the shared metadata repository. A single asset might be used by more than one of the suite components. For example, security assets are the users and groups that are defined in the suite and granted access to suite components. Asset interchange provides command-line interface commands that you can use to write these assets to an archive. You can then back up the archive to preserve your InfoSphere Information Server assets, or you can move the archive to a different system and import the assets from the archive. You can also submit the archive file to a source code control system to provide version controlling of your assets.

You can use the asset interchange istool command-line interface to move individual assets, or large groups of assets. You can build the asset interchange commands into scripts to facilitate the routine back-up or movement of large groups of assets. The speed of the import or export process depends on the size of the project.

The following table lists the asset categories, and the individual assets they contain.

Table 1. Assets that can be moved by using asset interchange
Product or asset category	Assets
Common metadata assets	Business intelligence (BI) assets: BI models BI collections Cubes BI reports BI report queries BI folders BI servers Implemented data resources: Host computers Databases Database schemas Database domains Database tables Stored procedures Data file folders Data file definitions Data file definition structures Data file definition domains Data files Data file structures Data file domains Data item definitions Data connections Logical data model assets: Logical data models Logical entities Logical relationships Entity generalization hierarchies Logical domains Subject areas InfoSphere Master Data Management models Physical data model assets: Physical data models Design tables Design stored procedures Physical domains Miscellaneous assets Custom attributes Contact libraries Data classes Data collection analyses Data connections
InfoSphere Data Click	Activities
InfoSphere DataStage® and QualityStage®	Custom folders (external files in the project directory) Data connections Data elements Data quality specifications (lookup tables, rule sets, and match specifications) Jobs (parallel, sequence, and server) Job executables Match specifications Parameter sets Routines (parallel, and server) Shared containers (parallel and server) Stage types Standardization rules Table definitions Transforms Shared tables and related common metadata assets that are associated with table definitions
InfoSphere FastTrack	Mapping components Mapping compositions Mapping specifications Project templates Projects Role assignments, reports, common metadata, glossary assets, and InfoSphere DataStage and QualityStage assets that are associated with a project
Information Governance Catalog	Categories Terms Information governance rules Information governance policies Extension mapping documents Extended data sources
InfoSphere Information Analyzer	Projects, including the assets that are associated with them, such as analysis results, data rules, and data classes All data classes, regardless of which project they are associated with Reports and common metadata that are associated with a project Data collection and data field analyses
InfoSphere Metadata Asset Manager	Import areas
InfoSphere Streams	Endpoints
Reporting assets	Reports Report results
Security assets	Users, with or without roles, credentials, and credential mapping Groups, with or without roles

You can use a GUI-based tool, InfoSphere Information Server Manager, for transferring InfoSphere DataStage and QualityStage assets:

You can use InfoSphere Information Server Manager to build deployment packages of assets and move these packages between InfoSphere Information Server systems, or submit the packages to a source code control system.
You can use the InfoSphere Information Server Manager and the asset interchange commands in conjunction with one another by browsing a tree of InfoSphere DataStage and QualityStage assets in InfoSphere Information Server Manager, and selecting which assets to include in a package. You can then define a script of asset interchange commands that regularly rebuilds the specified package and deploys the package to a target system or project, ensuring that the target has an up-to-date version of those assets.