Key concepts

The words you’ll see in Orcabase, from data sources and schemas to metrics, widgets and API tokens, each explained in plain words.

Most of Orcabase is built from a handful of ideas. Here’s each one, in the order you’ll meet them. The names in bold are what you’ll see in the app.

Your workspace

Term	What it means
Organization	Your company’s space in Orcabase. Data sources, queries, dashboards and metrics all belong to one organization, and nobody outside it can see them. You can belong to more than one and switch between them.
Member	A person in an organization. Members sign in with Google and have one of two roles: Member or Admin. See Members and roles.
Admin	A member who can also change the organization’s name and URL, set up the agent, and manage synced sources and hosted servers.
Invite link	How someone joins an organization. An admin or member creates it and sends it; Orcabase doesn’t send email.

Term	What it means
Data source	One database Orcabase can query: PostgreSQL, Google BigQuery or DuckDB. See Connect your data.
Hosted by Orcabase	A database Orcabase runs for you: a Postgres server or a DuckDB warehouse. You connect it the same way as a database you run yourself, with its address and login (or, for DuckDB, its URL and token).
Warehouse	A database built for analysis. In Orcabase, usually a hosted DuckDB warehouse that synced and uploaded data lands in.
Schema	A group of tables inside a database, like a folder. BigQuery calls these datasets.
Table and column	A table holds rows, like a spreadsheet tab. Columns are its fields: order date, amount, plan.
Sync	A copy of data from somewhere Orcabase can’t query directly (Google Sheets, MySQL, apps via Fivetran), refreshed on a schedule. See Sync data.

Term	What it means
Query	A saved question for one data source: either SQL, or a metric query that asks for metrics by name. See Queries.
Result	What a query returns: columns and rows, up to 5,000. Orcabase keeps the latest result of each saved query, which is what dashboards show.
Parameter	A blank in a query, written `{{ name }}`, that you fill in before running it, like a date or a country.
Chart	How a query’s result is drawn. Each query has at most one chart, in one of 16 types. See Charts.
Notebook	A scrolling document of SQL cells, charts and notes, for working through an analysis in one place.
Dashboard	A page of widgets on a free-form grid. What your team looks at every week.
Widget	One tile on a dashboard: a query’s chart, or a text note.
Share link	A dashboard’s public, read-only link. Anyone with it can view the dashboard without an account.

Term	What it means
Semantic layer	The place where you write down what your data means, so every chart and every AI answer uses the same definitions. In Orcabase it’s made of data models and metrics. See How metrics work.
Data model	A description of one table (or one SQL statement): its dimensions, measures and joins.
Dimension	Something you group or filter by: order date, plan, country.
Measure	Something you add up or count: order amount, number of orders, number of buyers.
Join	How two data models connect, like each order belonging to one customer.
Metric	A named business number built from a measure, like Revenue, Average order value or Net revenue.
Certified	A metric a person has checked and vouched for. Certified metrics show a check mark, and the agent prefers them.
Draft and deprecated	A draft metric isn’t vouched for yet. A deprecated one still works, but is marked as on its way out.
Time grain	The step a time series moves in: day, week, month, quarter or year.

Term	What it means
Data Agent	Orcabase’s built-in AI analyst. It reads your data with the same tools you have, and can create charts, dashboards and draft metrics, but never edit or delete. See Data Agent.
Chat	A conversation with the agent. Chats are saved, private to you, and keep answering if you leave the page.
Model	The AI model that writes an answer, like Claude or GPT. Admins choose which ones your organization can use.
Orcabase AI or your own key	The two ways to run the agent: on Orcabase’s AI account with a credit for your organization, or on your own OpenRouter or Vercel AI Gateway key. See Set up the agent.
MCP	Model Context Protocol, a standard way for AI assistants like Claude and ChatGPT to use outside tools. Orcabase speaks it, so your assistant can query your data. See Connect AI.
API token	A secret that lets an AI assistant or script reach one organization’s data. You can revoke it anytime.

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