What You Need to Know About An Operational Data Store
Having the right data is crucial, but it holds less value if the way you store, manage, and retrieve it is not optimized. Operational data stores can help you stay up to date across previously isolated systems, getting the most out of your data. But how do they work?
What is an Operational Data Store?
An operational data store (ODS) is a central database that provides real-time data for an organization. It gives a snapshot of what is happening across several production systems.
Using an ODS means that organizations can view data in near real-time. These databases are typically used with high-volume, high-frequency applications like those that can be found in finance, telecom or for utilities.
ODS vs Data warehouse
A data warehouse is not the same as an operational data store. As mentioned above, an operational data store shows near real-time values. This means that the data is volatile and has a short life cycle (i.e., it could be overwritten by new data at any time).
Meanwhile, a data warehouse is more stable and allows for historical searches. The data is static and can help with strategic analysis. As we explained in our recent article, a data warehouse acts a bit like a physical warehouse with organized shelves and a record-keeping system; you can extract useful information exactly when you need it.
Extra ODS uses
Clearly, an ODS is not an alternative to a data warehouse, but you may find that your ODS can act as a staging area for data going to a data warehouse.
It may also help with business intelligence, allowing you to analyze near real-time data rather than only data accumulated over a long period.
You might also use an operational data store as a backup for other systems or for testing and development.
Advantages of ODS
An operational data store comes with several advantages, including:
• Sophisticated reporting
Your ODS can bring together data from various sources, creating easy-to-understand operational data reports that do not leave you having to look at each source individually.
• Up-to-date and near-real-time data
An ODS provides near real-time updates and accompanying analytics, so you know what is happening almost as it happens.
• Wider reporting capabilities
Allowing everyone in the organization to access data stores can be problematic. You can configure your ODS so that a wider group can access reporting.
• Scalable solutions
The system can handle data from a variety of sources, meaning that it can grow alongside your business
Data storage management
Storing data in a useful way can seem like a challenge. But once your business analyses which methods suit their data, everything becomes a lot clearer. For example, you need to consider data management regulations, your capacity, flexibility, storage systems, and more.
With good systems and processes, you can confidently and reliably work with your data knowing that disaster recovery systems are in place, too.
At InspireIT, we offer expert data management and business intelligence services, linked to data warehousing, operational datastores, and more. We work across Europe, the Middle East, and the CIS region and have implemented many successful projects.
Our "Inspire Report Loader" solution for the Operational Data Store (ODS) layer, helps company reporting teams to store, query near real-time almost thousands of operational daily reports from the "Data lake" environment. Additional features include automatic report dependencies resolution, fine-tuning report scheduling settings and parallel working mechanisms.
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