Building The Data Warehouse

CONTENTS
Preface for the Second Edition xiii
Preface for the Third Edition xiv
Acknowledgments xix
About the Author xx
Chapter 1 Evolution of Decision Support Systems 1
The Evolution 2
The Advent of DASD 4
PC/4GL Technology 4
Enter the Extract Program 5
The Spider Web 6
Problems with the Naturally Evolving Architecture 6
Lack of Data Credibility 6
Problems with Productivity 9
From Data to Information 12
A Change in Approach 15
The Architected Environment 16
Data Integration in the Architected Environment 19
Who Is the User? 19
The Development Life Cycle 21
Patterns of Hardware Utilization 22
Setting the Stage for Reengineering 23
Monitoring the Data Warehouse Environment 25
Summary 28
Chapter 2 The Data Warehouse Environment 31
The Structure of the Data Warehouse 35
Subject Orientation 36
Day 1-Day n Phenomenon 41
Granularity 43
The Benefits of Granularity 45
An Example of Granularity 46
Dual Levels of Granularity 49
Exploration and Data Mining 53
Living Sample Database 53
Partitioning as a Design Approach 55
Partitioning of Data 56
Structuring Data in the Data Warehouse 59
Data Warehouse: The Standards Manual 64
Auditing and the Data Warehouse 64
Cost Justification 65
Justifying Your Data Warehouse 66
Data Homogeneity/Heterogeneity 69
Purging Warehouse Data 72
Reporting and the Architected Environment 73
The Operational Window of Opportunity 74
Incorrect Data in the Data Warehouse 76
Summary 77
Chapter 3 The Data Warehouse and Design 81
Beginning with Operational Data 82
Data/Process Models and the Architected Environment 87
The Data Warehouse and Data Models 89
The Data Warehouse Data Model 92
The Midlevel Data Model 94
The Physical Data Model 98
The Data Model and Iterative Development 102
Normalization/Denormalization 102
Snapshots in the Data Warehouse 110
Meta Data 113
Managing Reference Tables in a Data Warehouse 113
Cyclicity of Data-The Wrinkle of Time 115
Complexity of Transformation and Integration 118
Triggering the Data Warehouse Record 122
Events 122
Components of the Snapshot 123
Some Examples 123
Profile Records 124
Managing Volume 126
Creating Multiple Profile Records 127
Going from the Data Warehouse to the Operational
Environment 128
Direct Access of Data Warehouse Data 129
Indirect Access of Data Warehouse Data 130
An Airline Commission Calculation System 130
A Retail Personalization System 132
Credit Scoring 133
Indirect Use of Data Warehouse Data 136
Star Joins 137
Supporting the ODS 143
Summary 145
Chapter 4 Granularity in the Data Warehouse 147
Raw Estimates 148
Input to the Planning Process 149
Data in Overflow? 149
Overflow Storage 151
What the Levels of Granularity Will Be 155
Some Feedback Loop Techniques 156
Levels of Granularity-Banking Environment 158
Summary 165
Chapter 5 The Data Warehouse and Technology 167
Managing Large Amounts of Data 167
Managing Multiple Media 169
Index/Monitor Data 169
Interfaces to Many Technologies 170
Programmer/Designer Control of Data Placement 171
Parallel Storage/Management of Data 171
Meta Data Management 171
Language Interface 173
Efficient Loading of Data 173
Efficient Index Utilization 175
Compaction of Data 175
Compound Keys 176
Variable-Length Data 176
Lock Management 176
Index-Only Processing 178
Fast Restore 178
Other Technological Features 178
DBMS Types and the Data Warehouse 179
Changing DBMS Technology 181
Multidimensional DBMS and the Data Warehouse 182
Data Warehousing across Multiple Storage Media 188
Meta Data in the Data Warehouse Environment 189
Context and Content 192
Three Types of Contextual Information 193
Capturing and Managing Contextual Information 194
Looking at the Past 195
Refreshing the Data Warehouse 195
Testing 198
Summary 198
Chapter 6 The Distributed Data Warehouse 201
Types of Distributed Data Warehouses 202
Local and Global Data Warehouses 202
The Technologically Distributed Data Warehouse 220
The Independently Evolving Distributed Data Warehouse 221
The Nature of the Development Efforts 222
Completely Unrelated Warehouses 224
Distributed Data Warehouse Development 226
Coordinating Development across Distributed Locations 227
The Corporate Data Model-Distributed 228
Meta Data in the Distributed Warehouse 232
Building the Warehouse on Multiple Levels 232
Multiple Groups Building the Current Level of Detail 235
Different Requirements at Different Levels 238
Other Types of Detailed Data 239
Meta Data 244
Multiple Platforms for Common Detail Data 244
Summary 245
Chapter 7 Executive Information Systems and the Data Warehouse 247
EIS-The Promise 248
A Simple Example 248
Drill-Down Analysis 251
Supporting the Drill-Down Process 253
The Data Warehouse as a Basis for EIS 254
Where to Turn 256
Event Mapping 258
Detailed Data and EIS 261
Keeping Only Summary Data in the EIS 262
Summary 263
Chapter 8 External/Unstructured Data and the Data Warehouse 265
External/Unstructured Data in the Data Warehouse 268
Meta Data and External Data 269
Storing External/Unstructured Data 271
Different Components of External/Unstructured Data 272
Modeling and External/Unstructured Data 273
Secondary Reports 274
Archiving External Data 275
Comparing Internal Data to External Data 275
Summary 276
Chapter 9 Migration to the Architected Environment 277
A Migration Plan 278
The Feedback Loop 286
Strategic Considerations 287
Methodology and Migration 289
A Data-Driven Development Methodology 291
Data-Driven Methodology 293
System Development Life Cycles 294
A Philosophical Observation 294
Operational Development/DSS Development 294
Summary 295
Chapter 10 The Data Warehouse and the Web 297
Supporting the Ebusiness Environment 307
Moving Data from the Web to the Data Warehouse 307
Moving Data from the Data Warehouse to the Web 308
Web Support 309
Summary 310
Chapter 11 ERP and the Data Warehouse 311
ERP Applications Outside the Data Warehouse 312
Building the Data Warehouse inside the ERP Environment 314
Feeding the Data Warehouse through ERP and Non-ERP
Systems 314
The ERP-Oriented Corporate Data Warehouse 318
Summary 320
Chapter 12 Data Warehouse Design Review Checklist 321
When to Do Design Review 322
Who Should Be in the Design Review? 323
What Should the Agenda Be? 323
The Results 323
Administering the Review 324
A Typical Data Warehouse Design Review 324
Summary 342
Appendix 343
Glossary 385
Reference 397
Index 407

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