Who or what business process changed the data? What tool or technology made the change? How was the data changed? Was it changed by an algorithm, a data flow, an API call, or someone entering data into a form? What were the changes to records, documents, nodes, fields, or attributes? When was the change made, and if done by a person, where were they geographically? Why was the change made? What was the context? Data lineage explained Data lineage is comprised of methodologies and tools that expose data’s life cycle and help answer questions around who, when, where, why, and how data changes. It’s a discipline within metadata management and is often a featured capability of data catalogs that allow data consumers to understand the context of data they are utilizing for decision-making and other business purposes.