The Data Definition stage

The Data Definition stage provides you with settings to set up the application, before you start to allocate expenses.

These sections are presented:

• Working Set: Select the fiscal period that you want to work with. Fiscal periods are automatically created based on the financial data that you import. As you progress through the workbench, only the expenses that were incurred during the fiscal period that you select here are available to you. You can also select a cost model you want to work with and clone one from the selected cost model.
  • Use the clone this cost model () icon to clone a cost model from an existing one.
  • Use the download () icon to download the cost model for the purpose of uploading it to, or deploying it in another instance to do cost modeling in a different pre-production environment. You can later move the cost model to other production environments.
  • When you open the workbench and if the fiscal period is not displayed with current one or when you switch between different cost models and the fiscal period is not refreshed, then click the refresh fiscal periods for cost models () icon to display the current fiscal period.
• Hierarchy of Segments: View the segments in the hierarchy of segments and their positions in the hierarchy for the cost model you are dealing with.
• Expense Summary: See whether or not there are records in the staged and groomed general ledger tables, and if there are allocation lines.

Figure 1. The data definition on the workbench

• Choose a working set
  A working set refers to the set of expenses that you want to use in the workbench as you pass through all the stages.
• Clone a cost model in the workbench
  Use the preconfigured cost models or clone one from the base cost models for your financial model activities. By cloning you can map your financial data source to the cost model as per your business requirements without affecting the original cost model.
• Expense summary
  The Data Definition stage of the workbench shows a summary of the expenses in the application. Icons for each type of expense and for each fiscal period shows you the state of allocation records.

Related concepts

• The Data Cleansing stage
• The Bucketing stage
• Allocation Setup stage
• The Allocation Review stage
• The Cost Models tab
• The Configuration tab

Related reference

• Missing money logs factoring tips