Data warehouses are needed to consolidate data from different sources, so that this combined data can be used for business intelligence. All data is collected in a data warehouse and made clear. This makes it easier to access and analyze the data. Unlike source systems, a data warehouse considers changes in data from these systems. In this way, it is possible to establish the most reliable table possible and the performance can be analyzed from a historical perspective.

A data warehouse, DWH for short, is a database. Its difference from an ordinary database is the architecture and storage of data. So what exactly is Database Data Warehouse? What is it for, what is its importance today and in the future?

What is a Data Warehouse?

A data warehouse (often abbreviated as DW or DWH) is a centralized “data warehouse” capable of integrating a variety of sources. It provides a separate environment from operational systems. As a result, you do not keep operating systems busy due to the burden of retrieving data. Basically, a data warehouse helps solve the problem of quickly and efficiently extracting your data from your systems. After the successful implementation of the data warehouse in the system, the organization receives a large number of improvements and positive earnings.

Data warehouse is also a data management system specifically developed to support BI activities. It is often used for decision support and business intelligence purposes. It provides a (secure) platform where data can be centrally managed and consulted by authorized users. BI stands for Business Intelligence and refers to all operational and strategic decisions made within a company. The data warehouse contains a huge amount of historical data. In addition to allowing you to keep a detailed historical record, it can be carefully analyzed by the system, answering many questions and supporting decision-making. Most importantly, the data contained in the data warehouse comes from multiple sources and is imported automatically. The growth of data, greater digitalization and the growth of organizations in data literacy lead to an increased need for a centralized data warehouse.

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Why is Data Warehousing Important?

If it is necessary to use data from different source systems for analysis, this data must first be collected in a centralized system. A data warehouse is this central system. ERP or CRM systems can be resource systems. Data from these systems is packaged, aggregated and made available for analysis in the data warehouse.

The use of the data warehouse makes it possible to constantly improve the quality of an organization's data. Because, automatic corrections or incorrect, missing data are detected by the data warehouse. Then the problem can be solved in the welding system. The use of data warehouse allows alleviating the burden of operational systems. Thus, systems continue to operate without the risk of slowdowns or crashes while performing extensive or complex analyses.

What Are the Types of Data Warehouses?

A data warehouse is a subject-oriented, integrated, time-ordered and non-volatile collection of data to support management decision making. A data warehouse can be used to analyze a specific area. For example, sales of an organization can be such an area. At the same time, the data warehouse integrates data from multiple data sources. Source a and source b can have different ways of identifying a product. But there is only one way to identify the product in a data warehouse.

Historical data is stored in a data warehouse. For example, information from data in a data warehouse can be obtained from three months, one or two years ago, and even earlier. But it contradicts a processing system in which only the latest data is kept. A standard system stores only the current address of the customer, while a data warehouse stores all the addresses that a customer had at that time. However, the data does not change after entering the data warehouse. Thus, the historical data in a data warehouse will never be changed. Data warehouse types can be listed as follows:

· Operational Data Warehouse (ODS): The ODS contains all the operational data of an organization and is therefore the source of the data warehouse. It is a temporary, cost-effective way to access data that is otherwise difficult to obtain.

· Standard Data Warehouse: The data warehouse contains all the historical data of an organization. It is a central place where all relevant data is stored. Data is usually collected and checked to guarantee data quality.

Enterprise Data Warehouses (EDW): The EDW (Enterprise Data Warehouse) contains all of an organization's data, both operational and historical. It is a central place where all relevant data is stored and is therefore an important resource for reporting and dashboard. It differs from the data warehouse in that it also contains operational data. This data makes EDW a powerful tool for decisions at the tactical and strategic level.

Different data warehouse systems have different structures. Some have an ODS (operational data store), while others have multiple data markets. Some have a small amount of data sources, while others have a lot of data sources. In general, the data warehouse consists of the following layers:

· Data source layer

· Data extraction layer

· Preparatory environment

· ETL (subtract, convert, load) layer

· Data storage layer

· Data logic layer

· Data presentation layer

· Metadata layer

· System process layer

What Are the Benefits of a Data Warehouse?

Data warehouses are optimized to have fast response time with large amounts of data. A data warehouse is essential to be able to quickly analyze information about an organization. The system is designed in such a way that users can easily learn about business operations and KPIs, although a large amount of data is used for this. Other advantages of the data warehouse are:

· Allows you to get more out of your company information. Better insights can be generated through better access to information. Managers no longer have to make important decisions based on limited data and their own “instincts”.

· Provides better system and query performance. In addition to being able to store a large amount of data, the data warehouse is also quite fast in reaching this data.

· You can access data from multiple sources. Many organizations have multiple systems for different departments. For example, HR has its payroll system, Finance's accounting suite, and the Sales department has its own CRM application. The data warehouse can establish multiple connections with your different systems and store all this data in one place.

· Data warehouses often contain many years of data that cannot be easily stored or reported in the processing system. Trading systems can usually only display a limited amount of historical information.

· By connecting your data warehouse to your processing systems, you can automatically synchronize data at any time of the day.

Why Data Warehouses Are More Important in the Future

Data warehousing is an increasingly popular technology, but modernization is needed as concepts and architectures have been implemented more or less unchanged since the 1990s. Especially in rapidly changing markets, decision support systems should support the fastest possible growth of information. Because new ways of working with analytics and data also create new requirements that go beyond traditional concepts. Data warehouse modernization is possible with cloud-based data warehouse. Infinite storage is ideal for avoiding problems encountered in the past and backing up reliable and accessible data. The primary modernization approach is data warehouse/ETL automation, which helps promote broad use of the data warehouse but can only partially improve efficiency in data management processes.

The four main challenges that companies face when modernizing their data warehouse environments are essentially organizational: processes are not agile enough, there is a lack of business and IT skills, and poor data management leads to increased complexity. However, changes in these areas cannot really be realized without management support, which is again lacking. When data is prioritized, it becomes easier to deal with growing company data. Because almost every organization needs to store data on many topics, and in all business processes it needs this information repeatedly. This data may include information about customer experiences, product features developed, management. Therefore, the fact that a company can exist in the future is closely related to the correct management of this data. Without a data warehouse, making data-driven decisions, the final stage of business intelligence, is quite difficult. If you also want to make your data more accessible and use the data warehouse in your company's method, you can use Komtaş services.

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