The Discoverer Administrator

We cannot tell you everything that the Discoverer administrator does, but in this section we will try to give you a brief glimpse behind the scenes. We hope this will give you a better understanding and insight into the job that this person does. Later in this section, we will outline just what the Discoverer administrator can do for you. Here, you will find a list of all of the things that your Discoverer administrator can change on your behalf.

The Discoverer Administrator’s Role

As far as Discoverer is concerned, the most important person that you will come into contact with is your Discoverer administrator. Without this person, there will be no Discoverer. The role of the Discoverer administrator is a very specialized role indeed. Each company has at least one, and all of the users are thankful that he or she is there. The Discoverer administrator understands how to design business areas that support your company’s way of doing things. At least one of the Discoverer administrators is also a database guru. This is the person who knows all there is about your company’s databases—where they are located, how they are stored, and how the data is all linked together. It is not required that every Discoverer administrator be a database guru or even a DBA. The only prerequisite is that they understand the portion of data (tables, views, and joins) for which they are responsible. In addition, users who understand the data can share some of the responsibilities of administering the Discoverer End User Layer. For example, a user who understands the business terms used by the rest of the user community could be responsible for defining descriptions for folders and items.