Tag Archives: Metadata
MDM: Build Or Buy?
On the publication of my new Informatica white paper, titled “Master Data Management: Building a Foundation for Success,” I’ve been talking to several clients and vendors wanting more information about the build-versus-buy decision. In fact when I was writing the paper I was in the process of evaluating three MDM vendor solutions on behalf of a high-technology firm we work with, while at the same time counseling another firm not to jump too quickly into the MDM fray without first examining its incumbent technology solutions. As with most strategic IT solutions, when it comes to MDM one size doesn’t fit all. (more…)
Building A Foundation For MDM
Since recently attending the Gartner MDM Summit, reading the latest report on MDM Trends from Forrester, and speaking with several customers, a few trends are starting to emerge:
- There is no one single technology that will help organizations solve all of their MDM challenges
- While some MDM products are supporting multiple domains, they are still either customer-centric or product-centric
- Analytical style of MDM is gaining in importance, and
- The common challenges across all data domains and hub styles are data integration and data quality
Good SOA Begins With Healthy Data
I count many SOA projects amongst my journeys. Within those projects are common patterns of SOA success, and common patterns of SOA failure.
The common patterns of failure are around projects that ignore the data, and typically work from the services or application behavior, back to the data. This means defining and designing services without good metadata context, which leads to constant redevelopment of those services as the project progresses and the data is better understood. (more…)
Data Integration Platforms: Not Just “What”, but “How” – Part 1
In my last posting, I listed the functional criteria that data integration platforms must support in order to address the comprehensive needs of most organizations. But it’s not only important to consider what the platform can do—it’s important to think about how things get done. One key aspect is how unified the platform is, as unification can radically simplify deployment and management of the platform.
What does “unified” mean when it comes to a data integration platform? There are a lot of ways to define this, but the most important is from the viewpoint of the users of the platform. You can have an extremely elegant, unified technical architecture underneath a platform, but if users still have a disjointed experience, that architectural elegance doesn’t really matter. A unified user experience is a product of both the design of the user tools, as well as how metadata is shared.
From a tools perspective, a common look and feel, and cross-tool integration, is key to making it easy for users to ramp up on the tools, and to reuse assets across them. On the other hand, a unified experience does not mean trying to cram every single function or capability into a single tool.
That is not practical because there are many different roles involved in data integration—from stewards and analysts to architects and developers—and they each have different tasks to do, and bring different skills to the table. So the tools have to be tailored for each role, but still foster collaboration across the different users and roles. (more…)
Is Having One Enterprise Business Glossary Practical In Real World Data Governance Practices?
Business glossaries are comprehensive lists of common business vocabulary that enable a common language between business and IT.They provide the foundation for data governance initiatives that brings together cross-functional teams to make interdependent rules or to resolve issues or to provide services to data stakeholders.
By giving business context to technical artifacts (technical metadata), the business glossary makes it possible to catalog, govern and use valuable corporate data in a trusted, consistent and efficient manner.
While it would be hard to find someone to disagree on the value of a business glossary, I’ve heard mixed opinions on the tactical implementation of it–particularly in the context of large enterprises. Specifically, whether or not having just one enterprise business glossary to govern valuable corporate data is practical and timely enough to implement and quickly benefit from. (more…)