The delta alert is a specific feature customized for iTunes EMAs with delivery enabled. The delta alert gives clients the ability to be notified when significant changes have been made to the file. This will allow users to validate if these changes are accurate before delivery begins.
What is an EMA?
EMA is an abbreviation for the "Entertainment Merchants Association", supporting several industry workgroups for recommended asset structures and schemas for the entertainment industry. They are commonly used specifically to reference dedicated asset structures and data types.
-entmerch.org/digitalema
For Storefront, an EMA represents the initial set of clearances, price tiers, to set up a territory for a specific retailer/platform. Another name for an EMA is an "Avail".
If the delta alert is triggered during the Delta check, the avail ingest will be paused, and an email notification will be sent out to users for review.
How it works
Delta checks will occur upon receiving an iTunes EMA, and it will compare the latest file with the previous iTunes EMA to see if there are significant changes to a given territory.
If the delta checks pick up a 20% or more change for an individual territory, an Alert will be sent out to users outlining that ingest has been halted for review. The alert will outline the territory or territories as well as will have a report that outlines what was changed from the prior EMA Avail.
Delta Checks specifically look at the following metadata attributes:
- Price Tier
- VID (e.g., SMAT Vendor ID)
- Start / End date
- and Rating
Taking Action
Once the Delta Alert goes out, the user will need to review and will need to either “Approve” Or “Reject” the file. The Delta alert will not trigger when changes are made to the 'AssetLanguages' field.
- If approved, the file will proceed with ingest, and the changes will be delivered to the platform.
- If Rejected, then the file will be disregarded, and a new EMA Avail will need to be delivered by the client.
For more information on how to navigate the Delta Alert / Review the report, click here.