Renowned Industry Expert Wayne Eckerson Publishes “Checklist” For Using Data Federation Optimally
In a Composite Software-Sponsored Report, TDWI’s Expert Explains When to Use and When Not to Use Data Virtualization
SAN MATEO, CALIF. — November 16, 2009 — Composite Software, Inc., the data virtualization leader, announced today the availability of the “TDWI Checklist Report: Data Federation,” http://www.tdwi.org/Research/display.aspx?id=9417, by Wayne Eckerson, director of Research, The Data Warehousing Institute™ (TDWI). Sponsored by Composite Software, the report defines data federation, and explains when and how enterprises should use data federation middleware to fulfill critical information needs, faster with fewer resources. The report also includes a section about when not to use data federation.
According to the report, data federation integrates information from multiple, disparate sources inside or outside the organization on the fly. It offers business users and application developers a single, easy-to-use interface to access heterogeneous sources, making remote data appear as if it resides in a single local database. Because data federation shields users and application developers from the complexities of distributed SQL query calls and back-end data sources, it is also called “data virtualization” software.
“Data federation is an important tool in a comprehensive data integration portfolio,” explains Eckerson. “Today’s advanced data federation or data virtualization is appealing and has a greater breadth of functionality than previous generations, and therefore should be on the short list of every enterprise IT team.”
Eckerson’s report identifies that data federation is ideally suited for cases where IT teams must deliver unified access to data in multiple systems via high-performance distributed queries, such as data warehousing, reporting, dashboards, mash-ups, portals, master data management (MDM), data services in a service-oriented architecture (SOA), post acquisition systems integration and cloud computing.
Unlike traditional methods of building queries that require the creation of a data warehouse or data mart and typically take three months or more, data federation is quicker to build and deploy, thus reducing time, costs and risks for enterprise IT teams and the business users who use the information to make business-critical decisions.
In addition to faster development, the report lists four ways that data federation augments existing data warehouses, and introduces flexibility to meet ever-changing business needs. And the Checklist report cites four business intelligence (BI) use cases, including accelerating the deployment of BI solutions, prototyping new BI solutions, creating analytic sandboxes and consolidating BI tool sets.
Data federation can also be used to create 360-degree views of customers, employees, products or suppliers as a complement to MDM and to service critical data requirements in SOA, cloud computing and real-time data initiatives.
The section that describes when not to use data federation provides guidance on technical and use case constraints that favor traditional data integration approaches including data consolidation or replication.
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ABOUT WAYNE ECKERSON: Wayne Eckerson is the director of TDWI Research. Eckerson is an industry analyst and educator who has covered data warehousing and business intelligence since 1995. Eckerson is the author of numerous in-depth, groundbreaking reports; a columnist for several business technology magazines; and a noted speaker and consultant. He is the author of Performance Dashboards: Measuring, Monitoring, and Managing Your Business (John Wiley & Sons, 2005) and the creator of TDWI’s BI Maturity Model and Benchmarking Assessment service. He can be reached at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
ABOUT COMPOSITE SOFTWARE, INC.: Composite Software, Inc. is the only company that focuses solely on data virtualization. Global organizations faced with disparate, complex data environments, including ten of the top 20 banks, six of the top ten pharmaceutical companies, four of the top five energy firms, major media and technology organizations as well as government agencies, have chosen Composite’s proven data virtualization platform to fulfill critical information needs, faster with fewer resources. Scaling from project to enterprise, Composite’s middleware enables data federation, data warehouse extension, data sharing, real-time and cloud computing data integration. Founded in 2002, Composite Software is a privately held, venture-funded corporation based in Silicon Valley. For more information, please visit http://www.compositesw.com. Or follow Composite on http://twitter.com/compositesw.
Composite Software is a registered trademark of Composite Software, Inc. All other trademarks or registered trademarks belong to their respective companies. Copyright © Composite Software, Inc. 2009.
