Databases Reference
In-Depth Information
Weighing Technology Options
The data warehousing technology trends are very cyclical. The industry
swings between an interest in having a single vendor provide end-to-end
functionality and an interest in having multiple vendors each provide the ''best
of breed'' functions. This trend is about more than just how customers purchase
hardware and software; it is also reflected in product ownership. When the
industry swings toward best of breed, there are many small companies that
develop specialized products. The interest in end-to-end solutions is reflected
by a consolidation in the market. Smaller companies merge or the larger,
established companies buy up the companies with niche products. There is
also a fairly consistent level of interest in building and deploying the data
warehouse in house, without purchasing any specialized tools.
Best of Breed
Considerations for buying best of breed products include the following:
The ability to get the richest set of capabilities for the purpose.
Products are often finely tuned specifically for data warehouse use.
The product may or may not work well (or at all) with other products.
The complexity of problem resolution increases because the offending
vendor must first acknowledge the problem. There can be a lot of finger-
pointing before you get down to debugging and resolving the problem.
End-to-End Solutions
Considerations for buying end-to-end solutions include the following:
Increased purchasing power with a single vendor.
Product integration should be solid.
You will not have the newest breakthrough technology in all areas.
Usually, there will be one or two critical areas in which you will gain
significant capabilities. These are likely the reason for the interest in using
this vendor's products in the first place.
NOTE
Some end-to-end vendor solutions are created through acquisition and
not by technical design. Tool integration may be rough initially, but usually
improves over time.
