An Entity is the most important concept in The Qliktag Platform. An Entity represents a class of Things. An Entity definition consists of:
- a Qliktag which is a unique identifier in the Qliktag system to locate a Thing (item)
- a Data Model that defines the attributes of the Things being represented by the Entity.
- list of the key attributes (other than the Qliktag) that uniquely identify an instance of the Entity
- relationships to other Entities
An Entity can be defined to be quite narrow, such as All Shirts or can be broad such as All Clothes. Depending on how an Entity is defined will determine the data model to use. For example, an Entity that represents All Shirts, an attribute such “Type of Clothing” may not be needed as the type of clothing is inherent in the definition of the Entity. However, if the Entity represents All Clothes, then an attribute such as “Type of Clothing” would be very appropriate.
Furthermore, an Entity can represent real world Things or abstract Things. As in the above example of an Entity called All Shirts, if the intent was to represent the different kinds of Shirts available in the marketplace, then the Entity would be representing an abstract Thing in the sense that an instance of the Entity is not an actual individual shirt I can touch or feel but the collection of all shirts of the same type. Similarly, for example, in the food industry, we can define an Entity to represent a batch of items of the same type produced in a single manufacturing run.
