Use the domain seeds carefully

What you'll do

Adapt a draft domain seed into a cited process worksheet and identify what still needs review. Use synthetic Sales and Accounts Payable examples. The output is a decision log with open questions, rather than a client-approved model or a generated pipeline.

Treat a seed as a starting hypothesis

The spine supplies five draft process starting points: Sales, Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, General Ledger and Inventory. They help structure discovery. Their existence does not establish the meaning of a particular organisation's orders, payments, postings or stock balances.

Read a seed as a collection of candidate definitions. For each useful statement, retain its source and state whether local evidence confirms it. A term can sound familiar while hiding a different timing rule. "Sales" might refer to orders, shipments or recognised revenue. "Paid" might describe a payment event or a cumulative invoice balance.

Do not fill unknown answers with the most convenient interpretation. Mark them unresolved and explain which downstream artifacts depend on them. That keeps a useful draft moving without disguising uncertainty.

Compare flow and snapshot questions

Synthetic Sales line amounts of 60, 40 and 50 describe a flow over included transactions. An AP balance of 90 at one period end and 70 at the next describes two observations of a balance. Adding 90 and 70 does not produce the second period's payable balance. A measure specification must declare the intended time behaviour.

The documented AP path distinguishes AP Balance, selecting the last visible complete period, from Paid Amount, summing payment flow. Use that distinction to ask better questions. It does not authorise copying an AP formula into a different process or claiming a live AP qualification. AP and Import delivery retain preview limitations and separate execution evidence requirements.

Seed statement: candidate AP balance definition
Local evidence: approved period-close explanation
Decision: pending reviewer confirmation
Effect: do not finalise the balance measure

Design conformity deliberately

A conformed dimension uses agreed keys and definitions across processes. Matching column names is insufficient. Compare the calendar's date roles, bounds, unknown-member treatment and fiscal definitions before proposing reuse. Two tables both called Date may encode different business meanings.

For a Sales/AP exercise, write the shared calendar definition separately from each process's fact definition. Record which date role filters each fact. The package distinguishes logical conformance from physical publication bindings; agreement about a calendar does not prove that two deployed processes currently use the same qualified physical generation.

Preserve the review trail

Create a short process record with the seed reference, local supporting evidence, adapted definition, unresolved choices and reviewer. Use public or synthetic examples in the academy. Keep client definitions and values in their approved custody. Never submit a copied client seed worksheet as a public exercise.

Before drafting a Gold contract, ask another reader to explain the fact grain and aggregation rules using only your worksheet. If they cannot distinguish an invoice, payment and period-end balance, revise the definition. The failure case is a polished model that answers a question nobody agreed to ask.

Finish by marking the worksheet "draft for review." This lesson develops process meaning; it does not execute source reads, compile Gold, deploy a model or confer reporting certification.

Check your understanding

1. Why can a correct AP balance still be wrong when summed across dates?
2. What must agree before two calendars count as conformed?
3. Which parts of a seed adaptation remain pending human review?