Domains in Fabric – new enhancements
Microsoft Fabric’s data mesh architecture supports organizing data into domains, enabling data consumers to filter and discover content from the domains most relevant to them. It also enables federated governance, meaning that some governance functions that would otherwise be controlled centrally, at the tenant level, can instead be delegated to domain-level control. This enables each business unit or department to define its own rules and restrictions to fit its specific business needs. As a result, enterprises are empowered with the tools to structure their data estate along the principles of a data mesh.
For more information about getting started with domains, click here.
We’ve also outlined best practices and guiding principles you can leverage for establishing domains: Domains best practices
Delegate your tenant settings for better governance
Tenant admins can now delegate some tenant settings to the domain and subdomain levels. Once a setting is delegated, domain admins in your organization will be empowered to modify the tenant defaults to better meet the specific requirements of the domains they administer.
Delegating information protection settings (preview)
Previously, organizations using sensitivity labels in Fabric could only set default sensitivity labels for their users from the Purview security portal. With this latest enhancement, Fabric administrators can permit domain admins in their organization to configure a default sensitivity label for their domain. This ensures that new items created in any workspace associated to a domain automatically receive its default sensitivity label.
Note, currently this feature supports only Fabric item types (such as Notebook, Lakehouse etc.) we are working to support more item types.
Tenant settings to control delegation to domain
A new setting added under ‘Information Protection’ section, allows tenant admins to enable/disable default sensitivity label definition on domain level.
The setting is ‘disabled’ by default.
How to apply it to a domain:
Once the tenant enabled delegation to domain, from the domain’s settings, click Delegated settings > Information protection and select the relevant sensitivity label for the domain. At any point you can revert to the tenant’s default information protection settings.
Read more about sensitivity labels.
Delegated export and sharing settings (preview)
Domain-level export settings for Excel, CSV, PDF, etc. allow you to turn these options on or off for all the items within a domain. Alternatively, you can permit only specific users or security groups to export items in a domain. You can also further delegate this control by allowing workspace admins to change this setting at the level of the workspaces they own which are associated to a particular domain.
How to apply it to a domain:
From domain settings, click Delegated settings > Export and sharing, then configure the settings to match the requirements of your domain. Note, to see this setting in your domain, delegation must be turned on by the Fabric admin.
Learn more about delegated setting in this announcement blog
Domain insights for Fabric admins (preview)
To help you understand how your tenant is structured, and which workspaces are associated to domains, Microsoft Purview hub (preview) now includes domain level insights. The Purview hub report also provides valuable information on your sensitivity label and endorsement coverage and gives you the ability to slice and dice the information per the filters and dimensions that are most important for you.
How to find it:
You can access Microsoft Purview from the top right side of the Microsoft Fabric header by clicking Settings > Microsoft Purview hub (preview).
Click on the Domains tab to see how your data estate in Fabric is structured, and for more domain-level insights.
Enhanced consumption and discoverability for domains and subdomains in Fabric
Domains and subdomains help data consumers understand item hierarchy and facilitate quicker data discovery through enhanced search and filtering behaviors.
Domains and subdomains have now been added as part of the item location path. This information is displayed across multiple surfaces within Fabric.
Item details
Item flyout card
Global search results
Search results now show an additional Location column. As with the item details and flyout card, domain and subdomain are part of the item’s location path.
Workspaces list
Finally, data owners and users can now filter the list of available workspaces by selecting specific domains and/or subdomains to quickly find the data they need.
To further discuss the capabilities of the domains feature and the challenges it can solve for your organization, please reach out to us at Fabric Domains – Feedback
