SCD stands for Slowly Changing Dimension, a common concept in data warehousing. It describes:
How to manage changes to dimension data (e.g., customer address, product category) over time.
Ensuring that historical facts are correctly associated with the appropriate version of the dimension at the time of the transaction.
Common SCD types (Type 1, Type 2, etc.) define:
Whether old values are overwritten (Type 1),
Or historical records are preserved with new rows and effective dates (Type 2),
Or a combination of methods.
This aligns with “a technique used to manage historical data changes” in dimensional data, especially in star schemas.
Why other options are incorrect:
Data profiling (A): SCD is not used for profiling; profiling examines structure/quality of existing data.
Sorting large data sets (B): Sorting is unrelated to SCD logic.
Archiving data (C): Archiving moves old data to long-term storage; SCD manages changes within dimensions, not general archival.
Therefore, SCD is best defined as “a technique used to manage historical data changes” (D).
CompTIA Data+ Reference (concept alignment):
DA0-001 Exam Objectives – Data concepts and environments: dimensional modeling and Slowly Changing Dimensions (SCD).
Standard warehouse design content on SCD Types 1/2/3 as methods to handle historical changes in dimension tables.
