Transcript 10 Ways To Cut Integration Costs Taking control of the

10 Ways To Cut Integration Costs
Taking control of the integration process
March 2008
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Metadata Solutions
Dan McCreary
President
Dan McCreary & Associates
[email protected]
(952) 931-9198
Overview
We live in a world of ever-increasing expectations from our stakeholders. Driven
by the ability of web technologies to not only make communication more efficient
but, also, to make it possible to build on-line communities. Most nonprofits need
to cost effectively integrate a variety of applications with web sites, web content
management systems and member/donor/client management systems, not to
mention their accounting HR system/s and others. Giving vendors a blank check
to build an integrated solution can reach well beyond the budget of most
nonprofits.
In this presentation we will discuss 10 pro-active steps organizations can take to
lower the cost of building a seamless experience for their members. These steps
include not just a listing of technologies but actionable tasks for project managers
responsible for integrating many systems.
Dan McCreary is a technology strategy development consulting firm that has
recently worked statewide to help organizations share data on a variety of projects.
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Dan McCreary & Associates
• Recent Project Challenges:
– CriMNet – get 1,100 systems to agree on ways to
exchange criminal justice data
– Minnesota Department of Education – Create a
process and systems to support a data warehouse for the
No Child Left Behind Act (50 million test results)
– Minnesota Department of Revenue – Get 87 counties
to agree on 250 data elements for real estate property
sales
– Non-profit religious financial institution – Create
standards for life and health insurance products
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Common Themes
• Know your data
• Write clear data definitions
• It’s more that just database tables and
columns
• Start simple – glossary of terms
• Keep things simple
• Make you definitions searchable
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Top 10 Suggestions
1. Document and review your data definitions
2. Build a metadata registry - Excel, Access, Open-source metadata tools
3. Create data maps for all your data transfers into and out of your
systems
4. For each "code", clarify the semantics or meaning
Give codes meaningful names
5. Document ambiguous or specialized business terms
6. Express your processes and business rules using the terms in the
metadata registry
7. Document your process flows using precise business rules
8. Work with vendors that are familiar with the business semantics of
your organization
9. Promote data quality (GIGO)
10.Consider cost effective analytic solutions (Excel pivot tables,
OpenSource, 3rd party services)
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Definitions
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Data Definition
• The meaning or semantics of your data
• Definition that is:
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precise
concise
distinct
non-circular
unencumbered with rules
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_element_definition
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Metadata Registry
• A place where people go to find the
definition of all your data elements
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Tables
Columns
Codes
File formats
Services
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Data Maps
• Create graphical mappings between your
systems
• Start with simple spreadsheets
• Use PowerPoint
• Use Visio
• Use Altova MapForce
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Sample Data Map
System A
First Name
Last Name
Middle Name
City
State
Zip
System B
GivenName
MiddleName
FamilyName
CityName
StateCode
PostalCode
“Last Name” in System A maps to “FamilyName” in System B
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$300 to Look Like a Pro!
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Give your Codes Names
• For each "code“ in a table, clarify the
semantics or meaning
not-so-good
Gender=1
Gender=2
Gender=3
better
PersonSexCode=f
PersonGenderCode=m
PersonGenderCode=u
best
PersonGenderCode=‘female’
PersonGenderCode=‘male’
PersonGenderCode=‘unknown’
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Specialized Business Terms
Carefully document ambiguous or highly
specialized business terms
Make sure you have at least three people
agree on the definitions
Document who and when they agreed
(traceability)
Give these terms to your integration
consultants
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Sample “Catchwords”
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Customer
Member
Household
Status
Type
Code
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Process and Rules
• Express your processes and business
rules using terms in your metadata
registry
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Process
Receive
Membership
Application
EligibilityStatus
Indicator
Registry
No
• Define processes
that are consistent
with your data
element terms and
definitions
Yes
Send
Welcome
Letter
Send
Rejection
Letter
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Business Rules
If
EligibilityStatusIndicator=‘true’
Then
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Search
Benefit
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Thank You!
Please contact me for more information:
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Metadata Management Services
Web Services
Service Oriented Architectures
Business Intelligence and Data Warehouse
Metadata Registries
Semantic Web
Dan McCreary, President
Dan McCreary & Associates
Metadata Strategy Development
[email protected]
(952) 931-9198
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