Stored Values

Why should I store values?

By default, we do not store your data.

However, we have seen increased performance when distinct string or enum values are stored and indexed. These values are typically non-sensitive values such us product names, categories, event types, etc.

A good example of this is if a user asks the question, “Show me our macbook m2 sales” but the product is stored in your database as m2_mcbk. The query generated by Buster would likely be incorrect because the user asked for “macbook m2”.

Without storing these values, your users would have to know exactly how the value is stored in your database (and reference it as such).

You should only store values that your users are likely to reference. Irrelevant or additional columns/values will reduce the performance of your model.

We’ve found that PII (Personally Identifiable Information) rarely needs to be stored. If a user question involves PII, it will typically be referenced specifically (i.e a birthday, address, email, or name).

How to store values

To store a column’s values, simply toggle on the column. Once a column is toggled on, we will start storing it’s values. Only columns containing string values are displayed (as we will only store unique string values).

Depending on how many distinct values are stored in your database, this step will vary in completion time from a few minutes to a few hours. You will still be able to ask questions of your data, but may be lacking the values needed for accurate queries.