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Our consultants have plenty of hands-on experience in Data Modelling for a variety of industry sectors, including Retail, Telecoms, Utilities, Finance, Insurance, Defence, Transport, Pharmaceuticals and Healthcare.
Our philosophy here is "Keep It Simple!". Any unnecessary complexity in a Data Model will cascade into much more unnecessary complexity in software designed and built to access your database. In our experience it is worth taking the trouble to get a Data Model right. You might like to visit our Health Checks page to see how we could help you by carrying out an independent review of your existing Data Model.
First DBS Ltd favours the use of tools such as Oracle Designer or ERwin when carrying out Data Modelling work. If you wish, we can take a Data Model all the way from Business Analysis to efficient implementation within Oracle or another Relational Database Management System.
First DBS Ltd is able to offer advice and practical assistance with the implementation of Datawarehouse and Business Intelligence systems. These systems typically present their own brand of unforeseen difficulty, and there can be great benefit in talking to somebody who has been there before.
When constructing an integrated view of data from a variety of sources, transforming the data to a common representation can be quite a challenge. Typically, discussions need to take place with representatives of the business to determine the most appropriate trade-off between the goals of consistent presentation and the availability of the fullest possible detail in reporting. The arrangements made need to support the intended analysis by business users of the system without introducing unnecessary complexity or inconsistency.
First DBS Ltd has experience of the design and implementation of Extract Transformation and Load (ETL) arrangements using ETL products such as Ascential DataStage and Informatica PowerCenter/PowerMart. Where load performance considerations or special processing has required it, we have also successfully delivered approaches employing Oracle PL/SQL and C coding.
Special techniques are applicable to constructing the Database Schemas used to support both adhoc queries and regular reporting in Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence systems. Data marts commonly use the star schema, as recommended by the data warehousing guru Ralph Kimball. This arrangement uses a central high volume "fact" table with many-to-one relationships to lower volume static "dimension" tables. It is often possible to retain an acceptable interactive response even with enormous data volumes using this approach. Current Relational Database Management System (RDBMS) products, including Oracle 9i & 10g, provide facilities to optimise query performance using star schemas. Pre-calculated aggregates can also be worthwhile in some situations, and it can be arranged that these are used automatically without the business user having to be concerned with the mechanisms "under the covers". First DBS Ltd can advise on the suitability of the various techniques.
The appropriate overall data architecture is important to establish when an organisation first embarks on a data warehousing project. Depending on the number of data sources and analysis environments ultimately envisaged, it can be appropriate to employ a common staging area or Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW). The number of ETL interfaces required can be reduced by this means, and with an EDW in place new data marts can be produced without repeating data source ETL work. There is no one-size-fits-all architecture, however. First DBS is able to help organisations select the data architecture best able to support its planned data warehousing project(s).
First DBS Ltd has experience of a variety of user interface and query tools applicable to Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence systems, including Business Objects (Webintelligence, Broadcast Agent, Universe Design), COGNOS Impromptu and Powerplay, Brio and Oracle Discoverer.
First DBS Ltd has experience in Troubleshooting and Performance Tuning systems which use the latest Oracle software, 8i and 9i.
Our approach here is to check the basics first. Are the right tools being used? Are the algorithms in any bespoke code sensible? Is the Data Model appropriate and with suitable indexes defined? It is often possible to achieve a dramatic improvement by looking at these basics.
Writing SQL and PL/SQL to achieve good performance can be somewhat counter-intuitive. We can help here, and indeed, you may wish to take a look at our page on Training and Mentoring to see how you could achieve an improvement to your system and a skills transfer to your own staff at the same time.
The last few percent can usually be squeezed from an Oracle database by careful tuning of the various parameters which control such things as the use of buffers and the Systems Global Area (SGA). We can help here too, though we do not recommend this as the first port of call when performance problems are encountered.
Our consultants have a passion for good User Interface design which can be traced to their earlier work in Computer Graphics. First DBS Ltd has extensive experience using Oracle Forms and Oracle Graphics, and more recently with dynamic web pages using other tools and techniques. As is usually the case with design work, trade-offs and compromises are usually necessary. You may rest assured that we do not believe in technology for technology's sake - should you engage us we would aim for an appropriate level of sophistication to meet your business need.
The web deployment of database applications is, of course, of increasing interest to everybody as the Internet continues to grow. The challenge of providing a fast and appealing user interface while keeping network traffic and server loading to an acceptable level is a tough one. First DBS Ltd is, however, well placed to help you with our strong appreciation of the underlying technologies and architecture options.
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