This is carried out using the Save changes to Audience Definitions toolbar button. Any changes you have made to definitions are validated, and any validation errors are advised in a dialog. You may not proceed with the Save until they are resolved.
Following a successful save, all audience definition changes you have made are persisted. All audience definitions' states are updated to Unchanged. Any Deleted audience definitions are removed from display.
A validation error is raised at save if offer history tables are unable to be created.
When a save occurs, and the orange informational message is displayed above the audience definition’s properties, a warning message is shown.
If you elect to proceed with the save, create or modify actions may be undertaken against the following database tables as defined within the audience definition:
•Offer History
•Offer History Meta
If you have specified that one or more of an audience definition's table names are the same as existing data warehouse tables, the columns specified within the audience definition are added to the existing tables.
In addition to the creation of offer history and offer history meta tables, two extra ‘sandbox’ tables are created at the same time (being named in accordance with the other tables, but with the suffix ‘_SandBox’ appended to the table name). These tables store the results of interaction execution in test mode (in contrast to production mode, in which results are stored in the original three tables).
The following tables are also created for a new audience definition:
•[Offer History Table Name]_Content: used for email and SMS offers; stores the specific version of offer content received by an offer target.
•[Offer History Table Name]_Details: provides a synopsis of a specific fulfillment activity’s execution (useful for reporting purposes).
•[Offer History Table Name]_States: persists historical details of any events undertaken by an offer target post-receipt of the offer: e.g. clicking on a hyperlink, sharing to a social site.
Note that, if you make changes to an audience definition’s tables’ name(s), new tables are created alongside the existing tables – the original tables are not renamed.
Joins are also created to link the new offer history tables to the resolution level's table.
If any database updates fail then the audience definition is not saved and you are advised accordingly.
The actions above are carried out by a Validate audience definitions job, which is displayed in the My Jobs Dialog on invocation of Save. Full details of the job and Dialog can be found in the My Jobs documentation.
Note that any changes to links to files from the audience definition will be picked up by the Execution Service within an hour of being saved (or immediately at service restart).