When you create a masking task, the task imports the source and target metadata. Over time, you might update the Salesforce objects and add or delete objects. You might also add or delete objects in the masking task.
Because of changes to Salesforce objects or objects in the task, the metadata imported when you created the task can get outdated.
If you run the same masking task at regular intervals, the metadata imported in the task might not be the latest. The masking task requires the latest metadata to define relationships between objects and to determine fields that you can mask.
A masking task might fail if it does not use the updated metadata in the Salesforce source and target.
You can refresh the metadata before you run a masking task to ensure that the source and target metadata in the task is up to date. The time required for a metadata refresh might differ based on the number of objects, latency, and the Salesforce API response time.
You can refresh the metadata in a masking task in one of the following ways:
Refresh the metadata without editing a task
When you refresh the metadata without editing the task, the refresh runs as a separate job. You cannot run an instance of a masking task and a metadata refresh of the task at the same time. If the refresh job fails at any point, the metadata does not update. So the source metadata and target metadata remain consistent.
Refresh the metadata without editing the task from the list of tasks on the Explore page or from the task view page. View the progress and status of the refresh job from the My Jobs page.
Refresh the metadata from within a masking task
You can refresh the source and target fields from within a masking task when you create or update a masking task. The Target page in the create task and edit task workflows includes an option to refresh fields. You cannot view the progress of the refresh or perform other tasks during the refresh. You can continue to create or update and save the masking task after the refresh finishes. The refresh process might take some time, based on the number of objects and the size of the metadata.
Choose how you want to refresh the metadata based on the number of objects to refresh. As a best practice, if you need to update many objects, it is recommended that you refresh the metadata without editing the task. To update fewer objects or less metadata, you can edit the metadata from within the task.