Manage Sharing of Query Results

Alation Cloud Service Applies to Alation Cloud Service instances of Alation

Customer Managed Applies to customer-managed instances of Alation

By default query results are private to the person who ran the query. Query results can be shared publicly or privately.

  • Public means everyone can see the query results, as long as they have access to the underlying data source and view access to the query itself.

  • Private means only the individuals or groups you specify can see the query results.

Based on your organization’s policies, you may want to disable public sharing or query results or disable sharing completely.

In 2023.3 and newer, Data Source Admins can control how query results are shared for individual data sources. In 2023.1.7 and older, Server Admins can control how query results are shared the entire catalog.

Sharing settings apply anywhere query results can be shared:

  • In the Results tab in Compose

  • On the query results catalog page

  • On the Scheduled Query Settings modal

The way to manage sharing of query results depends on the version of Alation.

2023.3 and Newer

Data Source Admins can control how query results are shared for individual data sources:

  1. Go to the data source settings page:

    • Click on Apps > Sources.

    • Click Manage Settings, then click the wrench icon for the data source.

  2. Click the Compose tab if there is one (OCF data sources), otherwise click the General Settings tab (native data sources).

  3. Find the Query Result Sharing section and choose what level of sharing you’d like for this data source.

    • No Sharing Allowed—The sharing option will be completely disabled everywhere. Query results will always be private to the user who ran the query.

    • Allow Private Sharing Of Compose Results only—The Public sharing option will be disabled everywhere. Query results can still be shared privately with specific users or groups.

    • Allow Private and Public Sharing Of Compose Results—The Public and Private options will both be enabled everywhere. This is the default.

2023.1.7 and Older

Alation Cloud Service customers can request this change by submitting a ticket to Alation Support.

Server Admins for on-premises (customer managed) instances of Alation can use the instructions below:

  1. In Alation, click on the Settings gear icon in the top right corner. This opens the Admin Settings page.

  2. Click Compose Settings.

  3. Click the Allow Public Sharing Of Compose Results toggle to enable or disable public sharing.

Upgrading to 2023.3

Upon upgrading to 2023.3 or later, the global Allow Public Sharing Of Compose Results toggle in the Admin Settings will be removed and will no longer be used. All data sources will have the Query Result Sharing setting automatically set based on the value of Allow Public Sharing Of Compose Results at the time of the upgrade:

  • If the toggle is enabled (this is the default), then Allow Public Sharing Of Compose Results will be set to Allow Private and Public Sharing Of Compose Results for all data sources.

  • If the toggle is disabled, then Allow Public Sharing Of Compose Results will be set to Allow Private Sharing Of Compose Results only for all data sources.

After the upgrade, Data Source Admins can freely set Query Result Sharing for each of their data sources. See above for instructions.