The Oracle data warehouse at University of Maryland (UMD) is restricted to users who have been approved by Data Managers to access certain subsets of data. Once a user is approved by a Data Manager to access the data warehouse, certain reports, tables, and views are made available for the user to view and query. The user may wish to use various reports on reporting platforms such as reports.umd.edu, or the user may need to perform ad hoc queries for reporting and analysis.
Almost all users at UMD are limited to seeing and using data only for their own HR unit, financial account, School or Division, or major or program. We do this by using roles in Oracle. A role may grant a user the ability to see a report online, or to query a table or a view from the database.
We further limit access to warehouse data within schemas. A schema is a group of database tables for one data domain or subset, such as SIS for student data, PHR for HR data, or SFA for student financial aid data.
A database table is a collection of columns (data elements) and rows (information about a unit, student, person, course, etc.). Tables will usually contain data about all schools and colleges, or all HR units, or all financial accounts.
A database view is an abbreviated version of a table devised for a particular use in reporting and analysis. It may not contain all of the data elements that the table has, or it may not contain all of the rows that the table has. A view is a custom version of the table. Users are restricted in their access to data in any of the following ways:
- PHR Department, College, or unit code
- SIS School, major or program code, or course prefix
- FAS Department, account, school or college
- FRS Executive, Division, Account, Department, or Sub-Department
The attached spreadsheet lists the schemas, tables, and views that are granted to a user once they have been approved by the appropriate Data Manager. The spreadsheet lists only the usual access given according to a particular data subset.
Roles are rarely updated. As tables are updated, roles must be reevaluated to be sure that access by the users is still appropriate.
If you should have any questions about UMD data warehouse security roles, please contact ODA at
data-admin@umd.edu.
