Jaco van der Laan

How I Organize My Writing on Data Modeling, Engineering & Knowledge Systems

04/10/2025  ·  Data Architecture  ·  Data Engineering  ·  Data Modeling

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My writing spans several connected themes: data modeling, metadata-driven automation, business-friendly communication, and knowledge systems.

To keep things easy to navigate, I publish in focused Medium publications. You can:

  • 👤 Follow me (you’ll see everything I publish across all topics).
  • 🗂️ Follow individual publications (you’ll get updates only for that topic).

Tip: Open any publication below and click Follow to tailor your feed to your interests.

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🔹 Model-Driven (Engineering, Automation & Quality)

  • Model Driven Data Engineering — Practical insights for building scalable, metadata-driven platforms.
  • Model-Driven Diagrams & Documentation — From models and patterns to living ERDs, lineage, mappings, and docs.
  • Model Driven Migrations — Controlled migrations of platforms, modeling styles (e.g., Data Vault → 3NF), and sources.
  • Model-Driven Data Quality — Automating data quality rules and checks from models, metadata, and patterns.

🟧 Business-Friendly (Clarity for Stakeholders)

🌍 Universal Patterns & Metadata

🧠 Thinking Systems & PKM

  • Systemic Knowledge — Organize, connect, and use your personal knowledge (Obsidian, Notion, workflows, spaced repetition, mental models, clear thinking).
    (placeholder — articles coming Q4 2025)

🤖 AI/GenAI & the future of modeling

How to follow (and get the right updates)

  • 👤 Follow me if you want everything across modeling, engineering, business, AI, and PKM.
  • 🗂️ Follow specific publications to receive topic-specific updates (e.g., only Business-Friendly content or only Model-Driven pieces).
  • 🔔 On any publication, you can also turn on notifications to get alerts when a new story goes live.

Where to start

Thanks for reading — and however you choose to follow, I hope the content stays useful, practical, and clear.