Custom Categorical

A version of the Categorical generator that selects from values that you provide instead of shuffling the original values.

Characteristics

Consistency

Yes, can be made self-consistent or consistent with another column.

Linking

Yes, can be linked.

Differential privacy

Yes, if consistency is not enabled.

Data-free

Yes, if consistency is not enabled.

Allowed for primary keys

No

Allowed for unique columns

No

Uses format-preserving encryption (FPE)

No

Privacy ranking

  • 1 if not consistent

  • 4 if consistent

Generator ID (for the API)

How to configure

To configure the generator:

  1. From the Link To dropdown list, select the columns to link this column to. You can only select other columns that use the Custom Categorical generator.

  2. In the Custom Categories text area, enter the list of values that the generator can choose from. Put each value on a separate line. To add a NULL value to the list, use the keyword {NULL}.

  3. Toggle the Consistency setting to indicate whether to make the column consistent. By default, consistency is disabled.

  4. If you enable consistency, then by default the generator is self-consistent. To make the generator consistent with another column, from the Consistent to dropdown list, select the column. When a generator is self-consistent, then a given value in the source database is always mapped to the same value in the destination database. When a generator is consistent with another column, then a given source value in that column always results in the same value for the current column in the destination database. For example, a department column is consistent with a username column. For each instance of User1 in the source database, the value in the department column is the same.

  5. If Structural data encryption is enabled, then to use it for this column, toggle Use data encryption process to the on position.

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