Curation Automation

Alation Cloud Service Applies to Alation Cloud Service instances of Alation

Overview

Applies from Alation version 2026.2.1.0

Alation’s Curation Automation is an AI-powered curation capability that automates governance rather than relying on manual processes. Curation Automation enables Catalog Admins and Server Admins to define rules that curate large volumes of data assets from a central hub. This approach shifts the data management focus from manual, individual edits to a standardized rule-based system. Admins can now define governance standards centrally, rather than editing assets individually. These standards are automatically and consistently applied to all current and future assets that match the rules.

Catalog admins can now define and apply standards, monitor, and scale metadata automatically across the catalog lifecycle, enabling faster adoption of trusted data products, measurable regulatory compliance, and AI agents that run on curated, reliable data. Additionally, admins can preview AI recommendations before applying them, and rely on audit logs for complete transparency.

Before you create a curation rule, familiarize yourself with the key concepts in Curation Automation and understand the various building blocks that make a rule:

Key Concepts in Curation Automation

Understand some of the key concepts of Curation Automation to help you get started with creating your first rule.

Curation Rule

A Rule is a saved set of instructions defining a specific curation task:

  • Purpose: Explains why the rule exists.

  • Scope: Identifies which assets are affected.

  • Fields: Specifies which metadata fields to populate.

  • Value Source: Determines whether values are Deterministic (fixed) or AI-generated (with required confidence).

  • Reporting and Audit: Measures the rule’s impact on alignment with standards.

Scope

The Scope is a flexible selection of RDBMS data source objects, allowing assets to be included or excluded by:

  • Schema

  • Table

  • Column

Value Sources

Value Sources define how the metadata values are derived:

  • Manual or Fixed - You provide exact, fixed values. For example, Set the Steward field to the value <user/group>. Recommended for ownership or stewardship.

  • AI-generated - Curation agents generate values using catalog context (objects, tags, source comments). Results include a confidence score. Recommended descriptions and classifications with clear instructions.

AI Agents

In Alation Curation Automation, AI Agents act as your automated stewards. They act as specialized automation components that take your specific curation knowledge, such as how to describe a table or how to flag sensitive data, and transform it into a repeatable, auditable, and explainable capability. While you establish the governing logic through AI instructions, the AI Agents execute these standards by automatically populating and maintaining metadata across your entire catalog at scale

AI Actions

For curation automation, Alation defines an AI action as: an Alation AI Agent filling an AI-generated value for a single field in a single object in a rule. Before running a rule, based on the defined object scope and the number of empty fields within that scope, Curation Automation approximately calculates and displays the maximum AI Action count on the Preview screen. After the rule completes successfully, the actual AI action is calculated based on the number of fields successfully updated by AI, and the remaining balance is also displayed.

Alation does not treat manually curated fields as AI actions. The fields that you populate using fixed value sources do not count towards your AI action balance. You can create rules that combine both AI-generated and manual fields; only the successfully updated AI-generated fields will be deducted from your free AI action allotment. In case a rule fails mid-run, only completed updates are counted.

Get Started with Curation Automation

Curation Automation is available in the New User Experience on Alation Cloud Service instances starting with version 2026.2.1.0.

The Curation Automation option is enabled by default.

Note

If you do not see this feature, contact Alation Support to enable it.

Important

Each tenant is provided with 100,000 free AI Actions, meaning the first 100,000 are free, and Alation will charge for each AI action thereafter. For more information on pricing details, contact your Alation Account Manager. If you don’t have enough AI actions to run a curation rule, Alation prevents you from executing the rule by displaying a message with the number of actions required versus your available balance. You can still create, edit, save, and preview curation rules; however, you cannot execute rules that require AI-generated curation until you replenish your balance. To replenish your AI action balance, contact your Alation Account Manager. Rules that use only manual curation methods are not affected, and you can still execute those rules.

Access Curation Automation

To access Curation Automation:

  1. Click the Curate and Govern icon from the left-side navigation panel of Alation user interface to open the Governance page.

    ../../../_images/curation_automation_nav.png

  2. Select the Curation Automation option from the Curate section.

    ../../../_images/curation_automation_GovernancePage.png

    The Curation Automation page opens.

    ../../../_images/CurationAutomation-CreateRule.png