A database or Data Vault archive folder contains Data Vault tables. The Data Vault tables are classified based on the type of data files they contain.
A database can contain the following types of tables:
Updatable
Updatable tables contain data with associated metafield columns. When you archive data and add additional information such as tags and legal holds, the Data Vault Service adds metafields to store the information. The Data Vault Service does not update data columns but can update metafields columns.
Each partition in an updatable table contains the following types of files:
Archive file. Contains the archived data. The archive file name has a suffix of
_a
.
Update file. Contains the metadata for the archived data. The Data Vault Service modifies this file when you set tags or legal holds on the archived data or when you delete a logical entity. The file name has a suffix of
_u
.
Archive
Archive tables contain data that do not have associated metafields. When you archive data without adding tag or other metadata, the Data Vault Service does not add metafields to the table. A partition in an archive table contains archive files but does not contain update files.