Introduction
There are many ways to design, configure and operate your Data Mart. Since different approaches are valid in context, it is not possible to define best practices for every task. However, there are some useful lessons from the experience of Eagle and its clients with Data Mart. This document assumes that you are familiar with how to use Data Mart. The information in this section does not cover basic concepts, but instead recommends specific choices of tools and techniques which lead to better results.
When to Use Data Mart
Eagle Information Delivery Buildouts Should Incorporate Data Mart
If you are an Eagle client in the process of building your information delivery solution, we recommend you use Data Mart. Data Mart is at the core of Eagle’s information delivery strategy. As Eagle develops and integrates additional tools for information delivery and portfolio analysis, Data Mart is the default data source for them. For example:
Third-party reporting tools and applications can source from Data Mart, because the Mart is an open database platform.
Data Mart offers a simplification of reporting configuration relative to prior tools.
The Data Mart achieves efficiencies as a “write once, read many” information resource.
Eagle Portal is closely integrated with Data Mart.
Eagle Mart, Eagle’s platform for delivering standard out-of-box reporting, performance and Portal content is based on Data Mart.
Data sources outside the Eagle warehouse can often be integrated with Data Mart tables to provide a more comprehensive view of the firm.
Note that Eagle’s Advanced reporting solution based on the Active reports platform can use Data Mart as its source, as can Classic Portal that precedes the new user interface Eagle Portal (V11.0 and later).
Using Data Mart if You Implemented Before Eagle Data Mart
If you built your information delivery around Eagle before Data Mart, you have the same reasons as implementing clients to use Data Mart. New information delivery initiatives would do well to source from Data Mart.
A more complex question is whether to convert existing reporting to Data Mart. This involves a unique cost/benefit calculation facing each company. Some key considerations are:
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Conversion is easier/harder if existing reports have less/more program logic beyond just displaying values of field attributes.
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All meta data (field attributes, date rules, source rules, range rules and dictionaries) is reusable in configuration of Data Mart.
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Real-Time Reporting
Most Eagle clients design data workflow to follow a daily cycle:
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Data Mart encourages standardization of field definitions and helps reduce unintended duplication of field attributes that sometimes accompanies OLAP report development. See “Field Standardization” for additional information.
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Data in structures not supported by OLAPs. The Eagle data model is very flexible and supports a wide range of data structures. You can build custom tables and join them to core tables to permit access by the OLAPs. You can also create database views and build field attributes to report their contents. However, there may be instances where data is loaded to the Eagle warehouse for which OLAP access is not readily available and cannot easily be provided.
Report-ready, single-use data loaded in high volume. Even in the case of single use data, Eagle recommends as a best practice that all data is stored in the warehouse followed by Data Mart running the OLAP processes to move a set of values from one warehouse schema to the Data Mart schema. This is the best approach if you want to load data from an external source such as report-ready performance data.
Data Moved in Anticipation of a Future Release Enhancement. You may need to deliver a type of information that is supported in Data Mart only in a future release due to a product enhancement. Release upgrade may not be practical before the information is required. If the nature of the enhancement is to enable a new type of field to be built into existing Mart tables, a temporary workaround strategy may be available. Refer to “Direct Loads to Future Table Extensions” for additional information.
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Direct Loads to Reserved Columns of Mart Tables
The Selective Fields enhancement in V9.0 Data Mart allows you to directly load fields to Data Mart tables as long as you can populate all rows of those tables by a regular Data Mart Submit. You could reserve some fields in the tables that need supplemental data from direct loads. To do this, create and select a set of dummy field attributes for the model to create columns in the table to receive the external load. Selective fields are then used to avoid populating those fields in the regular build, reserving them for the external load. Eagle recommends you create and populate an extension since the Mart does not delete data, but simply updates it.
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When more than one type of data must be reported in more than one source hierarchy, the number of required source rules can proliferate and lead to several snapshots and heavy duplication of data. For this reason, you should make choices to limit the required list of snapshots. See “Sharing of Security Details Among Snapshots” for additional information.
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