A hierarchy is non-uniform if one or more of the branches do not have the same number of levels.

The following figure shows a sample non-uniform hierarchy:

In this example, Tech Co is the root node. There is a level between Division and Employee ID that represents Department. The Sales Division branches directly to Employee ID.

When the PowerCenter Integration Service extracts data for this hierarchy, it inserts NULLs in the Department level and SetID columns associated with Sales. Some nodes do not have descriptions, but all nodes have SetIDs. If a node does not have a description, the PowerCenter Integration Service inserts NULLs in that column, and it extracts the SetID into the associated SetID column.