Building the Data Warehouse, 2nd Edition [Paperback]

W. H. Inmon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 27, 1996 | ISBN-10: 0471141615 | ISBN-13: 978-0471141617 | Edition: 2

Everything you need to know to design, develop, and build your data warehouse

The data warehouse solves the problem of getting information out of legacy systems quickly and efficiently. If designed and built right, data warehouses can provide significant freedom of access to data, thereby delivering enormous benefits to any organization. In this unique handbook, W. H. Inmon, "the father of the data warehouse," provides detailed discussion and analysis of all major issues related to the design and construction of the data ware-house, including granularity of data, partitioning data, metadata, lack of creditability of decision support systems (DSS) data, the system of record, migration, and more.

This Second Edition of Building the Data Warehouse is revised and expanded to include new techniques and applications of data warehouse technology and update existing topics to reflect the latest thinking. It includes a useful review checklist to help evaluate the effectiveness of the design and explains
* How to design and build a data warehouse-including step-by-step guidelines
* Migration to the data warehouse from existing architectures
* Techniques for using the data warehouse to provide companies with a powerful competitive edge
* How to monitor the data warehouse
* The role of the data warehouse in reengineering
* How to get the most from both star joins and data models
* How data marts and OLAP fit with data warehousing techniques
* And much more

Find out what a data warehouse can do for your company and how to build one tailored to your organization's needs in Building the Data Warehouse, Second Edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"W.H. Inmon, the father of the data warehouse, provides detailed discussion and analysis of all major issues related to the design and construction of the date warehouse...the second edition of Building the Data Warehouse is revised and expanded to include new techniques and applications of data warehouse technology and update existing topics to reflect the latest thinking." (Fatbrain.com; Ganthead.com, 9/01)

From the Publisher

The definitive guide on how to build a data warehouse; it provides a nuts-and-bolts guide to design and development. Expanded to include sections on new techniques and applications of data warehouse technology. Includes a useful review checklist to evaluate the effectiveness of the design and provides a step-by-step plan for migrating to the data warehouse from existing data architectures. Methods described can be used in any computing environment.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 401 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 2 edition (March 27, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0471141615
• ISBN-13: 978-0471141617
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.7 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,171,344 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Sound guidance from the father of Data Warehousing, November 18, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Building the Data Warehouse, 2nd Edition (Paperback)

Hello

If you don't know anything about Data Warehousing and want to know or maybe have some incorrect and preconceived ideas about building a Data Warehouse then this book is for you.

The book is deceptively simplistic. Because I would imagine Bill Inmon wanted to be as unabiguous as possible it does become a little tedious at times. Nonetheless, if one were to buy only one book on data warehousing I would say that it would be quite possibly this one.

Some critics say that this book is not worth much and cite other authors who have written about Warehousing data. My only comment on this count would be perhaps that people have not understood the content of the book, bought the book by mistake thinking that it was about warehousing something else or know it all i.e. they are Bill Inmon.

So yes, if you really want to get the best introduction to building a Data Warehouse then buy this book.

Regards

Martyn R Jones Director, iniciativa

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Easy reading, great manual, May 22, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Building the Data Warehouse, 2nd Edition (Paperback)

Inmon's approach is obviously born out of experience and consequently displays tremendous insight into the issues of data warehousing. His "design review checklist" is intuitive and makes essential reading for DSS analysts. Nonetheless, some of his diagrams are confusing and tend to be ignored. I would recommend this book to anyone involved in data warehousing as it serves to focus on the issues involved, defines many key terms and makes easy reading.

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars outdated DW book, academic, November 8, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Building the Data Warehouse, 2nd Edition (Paperback)

I have read Ralph Kimball's Tool Kit as well as Nicholas Galemmo's Mastering Data Warehouse Design books recently - both are excellent for techno-functional professionals. This book reminds me of a textbook they made you read to have an overview of EDP about 30 years ago...