Lineage Builder Agent
The Lineage Builder Agent helps data stewards and catalog administrators manage data lineage end-to-end. It can view upstream/downstream lineage, create manual lineage paths between tables and BI objects, delete incorrect lineage, and diagnose why lineage is missing.
How it works
Section titled “How it works”The agent follows this workflow:
- Identifies what the user wants to do (view, create, delete, or debug).
- Resolves object names to IDs by searching the catalog.
- Routes to the appropriate skill based on the request:
- For “what feeds / what depends on this?” questions, it fetches the lineage graph.
- For “create lineage between X and Y” requests, it walks through discovery, confirmation, and creation.
- For “delete lineage” requests, it identifies the path and confirms before removing.
- For “why is lineage missing?” questions, it runs a staged diagnostic.
- For create and delete operations, shows exactly what will change and waits for user approval before executing.
Input parameters
Section titled “Input parameters”Required:
message(string): The lineage request or question.
Available skills
Section titled “Available skills”- lineage-read: Fetches upstream or downstream lineage graphs, views SQL for edges, and traces column-level transformations.
- lineage-create: Creates or deletes manual lineage between tables, columns, or BI objects. Supports warehouse auto-discovery for Snowflake.
- lineage-debug: Runs a multi-stage diagnostic to identify why lineage is missing — checks QLI jobs, probes the warehouse, and inspects parser behavior.
- explore: Searches the catalog to find tables, columns, or BI objects by name.
Behavior notes
Section titled “Behavior notes”- Create and delete operations require Server Admin, Catalog Admin, or Source Admin permissions. The agent returns a clear error on 403 Forbidden.
- Before any create or delete, the agent shows exactly what will change and waits for explicit user approval.
- When lineage is missing, the agent suggests debugging first — automatic lineage via QLI configuration changes may be possible without manual creation.
- Before creating lineage, the agent optionally checks if lineage already exists to avoid duplicates.
- Uses mermaid flowcharts for lineage visualization.
- Object IDs are shown alongside names for unambiguous reference.