The rapid development of data science and data mining techniques enables companies to enhance their understanding of customers, streamline operations, and gain insight into the capabilities and constraints of each department.
Prioritizing the analysis process requires extracting and appropriately formatting the data, then saving it for future use. Netflix’s data warehouse contains approximately 60 petabytes of information that require processing and categorization. Corporate data warehouses are commonly used by businesses to manage large amounts of information.
This article will explore the enterprise data warehouse, including its components and the steps to create one for a company.
The Essence of EDW
The Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW) is a centralized storage system designed to organize and manage a company’s data for analysis and reporting purposes. Data can be gathered from different sources, including ERP, CRM, and physical recordings. Using a data warehouse, enterprises can efficiently handle large data sets without the need to manage multiple databases after the completion of the enterprise mobile app development.
The following are the most sought-after EDW solutions that fulfill essential data warehousing criteria: storage resource expandability, advanced performance, availability, and high security.
- Amazon Redshift
- Google BigQuery
- Snowflake
How the EDW System is Architectured
Enterprise data warehouses have a multifaceted structure, as they are responsible for transmitting, cleaning, storing, and analyzing data. A distinct layer is necessary for each function to handle its specific task.
The typical structure of an EDW data pipeline involves three layers.
- Single-tier architecture. The client, database, and server reside on the same machine.
- Two-tier architecture. The characteristic feature of this type is the direct communication between the user and the server. The two-tier system consists of client applications and server databases.
- Three-tier architecture. This is the most widely used enterprise data warehouse architecture type.
The concept of a three-tier architecture: how it is functioning
Data Warehouse Types
Now, it is necessary to explore the technical aspects of EDW and become familiar with various data warehouse types.
Major types of data warehouses
Enterprise Data Warehouse, or EDW is a widely used and established type of data warehouse. Companies utilize EDW databases to consolidate data from different sources into one location. Once the ETL process is completed, the data becomes available for trend analysis and reporting. The enterprise data warehouse stores information from various subject areas, making it a unique type of data warehouse.
Operational Data Stores differ from enterprise data warehouse solutions by collecting and retaining short-term data. The ODS information undergoes real-time updates with a shorter data retention period than EDW. This storage option is appropriate for analyzing daily tasks and conducting surface-level employee performance evaluations.
Data Mart is almost like an enterprise data warehouse but with a difference. EDM saves all company data, while Data Mart stores only departmental information. Two separate data marts will be created for marketing and sales. This storage is perfect for tracking department performance with precision.
Data Lake is a useful location for efficient access to raw, structured, and unstructured data for future cleaning and organization. The alternate term for it is “data on demand.” The data subgroup is selected based on particular criteria and then presented to the data analysts once the necessary information has been requested. The data lake serves the primary function of managing and interpreting data from various sources.
How to Develop an EDW Software?
First, starting to build an EDW system, you should find a programmer or a team of skilled specialists. One of the best variants is to apply to an experienced outsourcing software development vendor for help. They will offer you a professional staff to put your product concept to life.
How will it be? While creating the EDW platform, the specialists apply to Extraction-Transformation-Creation (ETL) process. Let’s consider its very essence in the image below.
ETL workflow activities to know about
Wrapping Up
EDW creation for business requires a profound expertise to deliver the solution entirely fitting your company’s needs. A professional outsourcing software development company can help you deal with it. The specialists will carefully guide you through all the development processes and provide you with a robust, profitable, and modern solution boosting your business performance.
Author bio
Yuliya Melnik is a technical writer at Cleveroad. She is passionate about innovative technologies that make the world a better place and loves creating content that evokes vivid emotions.
