Implementation

Once the Planning and Design stages are complete, the project to implement the current Data Warehouse iteration can proceed quickly. Necessary hardware, software and middleware components are purchased and installed, the development and test environment is established, and the configuration management processes are implemented.

Programs are developed to extract, cleanse, transform and load the source data and to periodically refresh the existing data in the Warehouse, and the programs are individually unit tested against a test database with sample source data. Metrics are captured for the load process.

The metadata repository is loaded with transformational and business user metadata. Canned production reports are developed and sample ad-hoc queries are run against the test database, and the validity of the output is measured. User access to the data in the Warehouse is established.

Once the programs have been developed and unit tested and the components are in place, system functionality and user acceptance testing is conducted for the complete integrated Data Warehouse system. System support processes of database security, system backup and recovery, system disaster recovery, and data archiving are implemented and tested as the system is prepared for deployment.

The final step is to conduct the Production Readiness Review prior to transitioning the Data Warehouse system into production. During this review, the system is evaluated for acceptance by the customer organization.