Introduction to

Business Intelligence
Lecture One

Ejada Internal Use Only By Eng. Ahmed Abdelhakim

 Agenda
1) Lecture Objectives

2) Data Management

3) Business Intelligence

4) OLTP and OLAP Systems

5) Data Warehouse Modeling

6) Summary

7) Appendix & Resources

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 Lecture Objectives
By the end of the lecture, you will be able to:

✓ Understand what is Data Management and Business Intelligence

✓ Identify The Characteristics and Role of OLTP and OLAP Systems

✓ Understand the Differences Between Data Warehouse, Lake, and Mart

✓ Get Familiar with Data Warehouses and Dimensional Modelling

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 Data Management
Data management is the practice of collecting, organizing, managing, securing and
accessing data to support productivity, efficiency, and decision-making.
In this era, a modern data management platform are essential for every company

Data Management plays crucial role in these workflows:

❖ Digital Transformation

❖ Business Intelligence

❖ Machine Learning and AI

❖ Big Data Processing

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 Business Intelligence
Business intelligence is a process that combines data integration, business analytics,
tools & infrastructure, and best practices to help organizations monitor their business
and make more data-driven decisions

Enterprise BI Workflow
Build Generate
Data Integration
Analytical Reports and
(ETL)
Layer Dashboard
• OLTP Systems • OLAP System
• Requirements • Reports &
Dashboards

▪ Data Warehouse and Analytical Layer are considered the OLAP Backbone
▪ Data Engineer Role is to provide a stable OLAP system
▪ Data Analyst and Business Users Consume Analytical Layer To Generate Reports and Dashboards

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 What is OLTP
Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) is a type of data processing that enable the
real-time execution of large numbers of database transactions by large numbers of
people in the context of business operation to be done.
(e.g., online banking, e-commerce, ,chatting systems, and order entry)

OLTP Systems Characteristics:

• Used For Daily Transactional Operations • Read and Write Queries are Used

• Highly Normalized (Usually in 3NF) • Maintain Current Data Only

• Fast Writing and Processing • Frequent Inserts and Updates

• Relatively Lower Storage • High Availability and Reliably

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 Analysis on OLTP Systems ?
Analysis shouldn’t be performed on OLTP Systems for many reasons, including:
× Writing Useful Analytics Queries will contain many joins therefore Inefficient (Data Model is 3NF)
× Does not maintain the History, Only Current Data can be queried
× Operational and Analytics Queries will be an Overhead on the OLTP Server
× Data may require Processing to clean, formalize and decode data before Analyse

Therefore, An Efficient Analysis have to address these problems with the following:
✓ Independent Isolated System
✓ New Data Model optimized for Reading Queries
✓ Maintain the History of the Data
✓ Cleaned and Consistent Data

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 Introducing OLAP
Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) is a type of data processing that involve
querying many or all records in a database for analytical purposes like monitoring
and reporting for a better business decision-making.
(e.g., Sales, Marketing, and Management reporting)

OLAP Systems Characteristics:

• Used For Analytics and Monitoring Purposes • Relatively Higher Storage

• Denormalized (Usually in Dimensional Form) • Read Queries are Used Solely

• Enables Efficient Fast Reading Queries • Maintain Current and Historical Data

• Data is Cleaned, Readable, and Consistent

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 OLAP System Storage Layer
Some of the most common implementation of OLAP Storages:

Data Warehouse Data Lake Data Lakehouse

▪ Structured Data ▪ Unstructured Data ▪ Structured & Unstructured
▪ Commonly Used In Business ▪ Commonly Used in Big Data, ▪ Modern Hybrid System
Intelligence Applications Streaming and RT Analysis (Warehouses and Data Lakes)
▪ SQL Server, Snowflake, BigQuery ▪ Hadoop, S3, Azure Data Lake ▪ Microsoft Fabric Lakehouse

• Data Mart is a Subset of Data Warehouses that focus on specific Business Aspect/Unit
• On-Premises and Cloud Solutions of these Storage Layers are Available
• On-Premises Relational Data Warehouse will be the Focus

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 Data Warehouse Modeling
Some of Popular Modeling Techniques are:

❖ Dimensional Modelling [Kimball’s Approach]

❖ Enterprise Data Warehouse [Inmon’s Approach]

❖ Bottom-Up Data Mart

❖ Data Vault

• Most Used Approach is Dimensional Model and hence will be our Focus
• EDW Building Complexity and Time Consuming are Crucial Concerns
• Bottom-Up Data Mart is Time Consuming and Duplicative Approach

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 Non-Dimensional Modeling
Third-Normalization Form Model Fully Denormalized Table

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 Dimensional Modeling
• Fact and Dimensions
• How to address query efficiency with minimal storage load
• Star Schema Vs Snowflake

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 Dimensional Modeling (Cont.)
• Natural Key vs Surrogate Key
• How To Maintain History (SCD)

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 Summary
❑ Data Management is essential in many data-driven workflows, Business Intelligence is one
of them that focus on derive useful insights and optimize decision making.

❑ OLTP System is Optimized for Fast Writing and is Required For Business Process to Work
Properly while OLAP System is a Dedicated Analytics System, Optimized for Fast Reading
and Complex Analytics Queries, and is Used For Decision Making.

❑ Data Warehouse is used in BI Solutions and Dimensional Model Introduced By Kimball is

Most Used Approach For Modeling in DW, simplicity and fast development are keys.

❑ Fact, Dimension Tables, Star, Snowflake Schemas, Natural and Surrogate keys
are fundamental concepts of Dimensional Modelling

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 Appendix & Resources

Topic Resources

Database Normalization
Database normalization description - Microsoft 365 Apps | Microsoft Learn
(Apdx.)

SQL Language Learn SQL in 1 Hour - SQL Basics for Beginners (youtube.com)
(Apdx.)

Data Warehouse Tutorials Playlist – YouTube

Data Warehouse Kimball The Data Warehouse Toolkit 3rd Book

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 Any Questions?

Feel Free To Contact us on Teams!

Thank You
Ejada Systems Company Limited ‫شركة إجادة للنظم المحدودة‬
www.ejada.com [email protected]

www.ejada.com | [email protected]
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