The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit [Paperback]

Ralph Kimball (Author), Margy Ross (Author), Warren Thornthwaite (Author), Joy Mundy (Author), Bob Becker (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0470149779 | ISBN-13: 978-0470149775 | Publication Date: January 10, 2008 | Edition: 2

A thorough update to the industry standard for designing, developing, and deploying data warehouse and business intelligence systems

The world of data warehousing has changed remarkably since the first edition of The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit was published in 1998. In that time, the data warehouse industry has reached full maturity and acceptance, hardware and software have made staggering advances, and the techniques promoted in the premiere edition of this book have been adopted by nearly all data warehouse vendors and practitioners. In addition, the term "business intelligence" emerged to reflect the mission of the data warehouse: wrangling the data out of source systems, cleaning it, and delivering it to add value to the business.

Ralph Kimball and his colleagues have refined the original set of Lifecycle methods and techniques based on their consulting and training experience. The authors understand first-hand that a data warehousing/business intelligence (DW/BI) system needs to change as fast as its surrounding organization evolves. To that end, they walk you through the detailed steps of designing, developing, and deploying a DW/BI system. You'll learn to create adaptable systems that deliver data and analyses to business users so they can make better business decisions.

With substantial new and updated content, this second edition of The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit again sets the standard in data warehousing for the next decade. It shows you how to:

• Identify and prioritize data warehouse opportunities
• Create an architecture plan and select products
• Design a powerful, flexible, dimensional model
• Build a robust ETL system
• Develop BI applications to deliver data to business users
• Deploy and sustain a healthy DW/BI environment

The authors are members of the Kimball Group. Each has focused on data warehousing and business intelligence consulting and education for more than 15 years; most have written other books in the Toolkit series. Learn more about the Kimball Group and Kimball University at www.kimballgroup.com.

This book is also available as part of the Kimball's Data Warehouse Toolkit Classics Box Set (ISBN: 9780470479575) with the following 3 books:

• The Data Warehouse Toolkit, 2nd Edition (9780471200246)
• The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit, 2nd Edition (9780470149775)
• The Data Warehouse ETL Toolkit (9780764567575)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit, authors Ralph Kimball, Laura Reeves, Margy Ross, and Warren Thornthwaite present a structure for undertaking the awesome task of implementing a data warehouse. As part of a rather select group of professionals actually experienced in building data warehouses, the authors attempt to convey their expertise about how to approach the job. The book focuses on the "Star Lifecycle"--a high-level project-planning approach to evolving existing information systems into an ever-changing data-warehouse solution. --Stephen Plain --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

(...)
Das Buch richtet sich primdr an Designer und Informations-Manager im Umfeld von Data-Warehouse-Anwendungen. Diese Zielgruppe erhdlt Ratschldge und Handlungsanleitungen, um deren Anforderungen optimal zu bewdltigen. Dabei ist der ganzheitliche Ansatz zu betonen, der eine evolutiondre Weiterentwicklung besser als singuldre Schnellsch]sse unterst]tzen kann. auch der zugrundeliegende Architekturcharakter trdgt zur Festigung dieser Intension bei. Zu knapp werden die Themen Data Mining und Parallelverarbeitung angesprochen; ebenfalls fehlen zur Vertiefung weiterf]hrende Literaturhinweise. Insbesondere SMP und MPP bieten f]r die praktische Realisierung wichtige Unterst]tzungshilfen. Wobei zur Verbesserung der Performance die Fdhigkeit einiger DBMS Abfragen zu optimieren und parallel zu verarbeiten n]tzlich ist.
IT-Director 10/2000

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 672 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 2 edition (January 10, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470149779
• ISBN-13: 978-0470149775
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 7.3 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (57 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #35,139 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #13 in Books > Computers & Technology > Databases > Data Warehousing
  • #25 in Books > Computers & Technology > Computer Science > Systems Analysis & Design
  • #25 in Books > Computers & Technology > Computer Science > Modeling & Simulation

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

119 of 119 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Everything you ever wanted to know about DW ...., September 30, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit : Expert Methods for Designing, Developing, and Deploying Data Warehouses (Paperback)

but were afraid to ask. This is the definitive book on the DW lifecycle. After having worked on two not-so-perfect data warehousing projects, I found myself on more than one occasion seeing in print many of the ideas that I have either arrived at by trial and error or had a hunch were the right way to go. I would have given this book five stars, except for one thing: you really need to have read Kimball's first book, The Data Warehouse Toolkit, to get the proper foundation for reading the DW Lifecylcle Toolkit. I bought the DW Lifecycle Toolkit first thinking that I could jump right ahead. Not so. Much to my chagrin, I ended up buying the DW Toolkit and reading it first. These books really should be offered with the option to be purchased together. That way, the reader will know up front that both books are a must read.

29 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good book, but could've been better, May 20, 1999

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit : Expert Methods for Designing, Developing, and Deploying Data Warehouses (Paperback)

Not enough examples....they keep referring to other books. The book would've been awesome if it had more examples (specially designing star schema models and aggregations). I don't like to spend $40-50 each on two books just to get the examples and lot of the repeat information. The book companies and the authors are making more money by doing this, but they're not winning fans (Wiley books and Kimball)

27 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is clearly the BEST Data Warehouse book I've read!!, May 18, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit : Expert Methods for Designing, Developing, and Deploying Data Warehouses (Paperback)

Our organization has implemented a very successful Data Warehouse, due largely to following the design and deployment principles from Dr. Kimball's two textbooks. The key to a successful Data Warehouse is providing all business users an easy to use and high performance queryable system. The dimensional design is, without a doubt, the defacto standard for Queryable Data Warehouses, and the author does a superb job motivating its use and explaining how to develop your integrated, dimensional data warehouse. In addition, the author gives valuable advice on many, many other aspects of the process, such as assessing your readiness for proceeding with a warehouse effort. This book is a "must read" for anyone involved in a Data Warehouse project. You will have an excellent chance of succeeding with even a most complicated Data Warehouse System if you follow the wisdom in this book.