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 InstituteT (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 [email protected].
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 www.compositesw.com
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 C Composite Software, Inc. 2009.
