Getting started with Data Warehousing

[wbodger]

I am starting to look into Data Warehousing and determining if it will indeed work for my company (or rather if it is needed). I have read a number of articles online, but was wondering if anybody here had any great suggestions for what to read or where to start.

Thanks in advance,
Willie Bodger

 

[RiverGuy]

I can't think of any literature right off hand with the theme of selling the concept of a data warehouse to a company, although I am sure something is out there. I think data warehousing is mature enough that most articles I see are geared towards those already decided.

This is a good website to get some information on data warehousing:

http://kimballgroup.com/

Also, the Kimball book "The Data Warehouse Toolkit" will come in handy if and when you decide to plan a data warehouse (and if you are using dimensional modeling).

In my opinion, a data warehouse is needed if your company has multiple systems, it's difficult to get a single version of the truth, and IT spends a lot of time making reports for users instead of providing a mechanism for the users to create their own analysis.

 

[wbodger]

Thanks for the link and book suggestion. I'm not really looking for something to persuade the higher-ups, really looking for info to get me started on setting up a proof of concept for them. Something to show them what we can do with a data warehouse to consolidate data from 5-6 different systems.

Again, thank you for your help.

Willie

 

[RiverGuy]

The book I mentioned deals mostly with data modeling -- how to design your data stores for particular subject matter types. As far as consolidation is concerned, you might also be interested in ETL techniques. For that, I would recommend "The Data Warehouse ETL Toolkit."

 

[wbodger]

Great, I will have a look at those, thank you so much for your time!

Willie