In general a transformation is considered an "active" transformation if it changes

the flow of data (not individual "fields" = ports but the flow of records). This is
the case if a transformation fulfils one or more of the following conditions:

1.It can change the number of records (e.g. a Filter or a Normalizer or an

Aggregator , Rank ).
2.It can change the order of records (e.g. a Sorter).
3.It can change the Insert/Update/Delete status of records (e.g. the Update
Strategy)
4.It can change the status of the current transaction (e.g. the Transaction
Control)
5.It has more than one input group and/or more than one output group (e.g. Union or
Router transformations).