I am not an end-user of Ab Initio and cannot really speak to its capabilities as an ETL tool. I manage the infrastructure that delivers Ab Initio to our end-users so my perspective is only on those aspects which I touch. As far as managing installation and patching and maintaining the software, the processes are a bit legacy. However, one of the projects we're working with our support representatives is modernizing that, so that's definitely on their plates as something they're working on. But that's the main thing that makes Ab Initio so great is the relationship they maintain with us, which has been nothing but phenomenal the entire time I've been on the project and this is echoed by others who have been on the project much longer than me. Ab Initio truly makes us feel like a customer where most other vendors just don't.

As a user, I absolutely love the idea, but you can only get out as much as you have put into it. Our IT teams most of the time just import the the technical table and column attributes without any descriptions, which then defeats the purpose of the tool. Searching and navigating the metadata feels awkward and counter-intuitive, especially in a large company with hundreds of databases. We do have a dedicated team working on enhancing the user experience one step at a time.