Data Discovery Guide > Part I: Introduction to Data Discovery > Introduction to Profiling > Profiling Architecture
  

Profiling Architecture

The profiling architecture consists of tools, services, and databases. The tools component consists of client applications. The services component has application services required to manage the tools, perform the data integration tasks, and manage the metadata of profile objects. The databases component consists of the Model repository and profiling warehouse.
The following image shows the architecture components for profiling:
When you run a profile, the Analyst Service or Developer tool receives the profile definition from the Model Repository Service. Then, the Analyst Service or Developer tool invokes the profiling plug-in in the Data Integration Service. Next, the profiling plug-in processes the profile job and submits the job to the Data Integration Service. The Data Integration Service generates the profiling results. The Data Integration Service then writes the profiling results to the profiling warehouse.
Discovery search uses the Search Service. The Search Service performs each search on a search index instead of the Model repository or profiling warehouse. The Search Service generates the search index based on content in the Model repository and profiling warehouse. The Search Service contains extractors to extract content from each repository.
The following table describes the architecture components:
Component
Description
Informatica Analyst
A web-based client application that you can use to discover, analyze, and report on data and metadata of data sources.
Informatica Developer
A client application that you use to perform advanced data discovery, such as primary key discovery, foreign key discovery, and enterprise discovery.
Analyst Service
An application service that runs the Analyst tool and manages connections between service components and Analyst tool users.
Search Service
An application service that manages search in the Analyst tool. By default, the Search Service returns search results from the Model repository, such as data objects, profiles, mapping specifications, reference tables, rules, and scorecards.
Search Index
A file system in a custom directory that stores indexed content that the Search Service extracts from the Model repository and profiling warehouse.
Model Repository Service
An application service that manages the Model repository.
Data Integration Service
An application service that performs data integration tasks for the Analyst tool, the Developer tool, and external clients.
Model repository
A relational database that stores the metadata for projects created in the Analyst tool or Developer tool.
Profiling warehouse
A database that stores profiling information, such as profile results and scorecard results.