Relabel, never revalue

The line between cleaning data and authoring it. You may change what a row is called: normalize a name, unify a date format, classify it, join it to a reference, drop a proven duplicate. You may never change what a row says. After cleaning, the anchor must still tie, because relabelling cannot move a sum.

Principle 7 · Clean by relabelling, never by revaluing

Where does Relabel, never revalue come from?

Principle 7 of the Kymira doctrine, Clean by relabelling, never by revaluing. Relabel, never revalue is the name the doctrine gives to what that principle requires in practice.

What failure is Relabel, never revalue named after?

The substring that misfiles a customer. Channel classification by name matching, until a person's surname contains a retailer's name and an account lands in the wrong channel.

What does it look like on a real file?

Merging two spellings of Meridian Journal Group into one name is fair; back filling a blank subscription price is not.

Not for

Not a ban on computing what a suspect value would mean. A conditional figure computed by code and labelled as conditional is disclosure.

Nearest terms

Reconciliation anchorA total the source file states about itself, a printed grand total, a totals row, a stated...What-if branchA labelled figure computed by code under each open reading of a flagged value, one branch per...Join coverageThe share of rows that found a match when a table was joined to a reference

Last updated 2026-09-02 · Dylan, founder · one of 40 terms in the Kymira glossary, each one named after something we watched go wrong in a real build or in our own audits.

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