flatfiles instead of direct connection?

[Former Member]

Hi experts...

I observed that in our BI,we have many different source systems.But Our BI is not directly connected to Source systems...Instead all these source systems generate some files...and we load data from these flatfiles into our BI.

My doubt is why do we need to do like this...Is there any benefit by doing like this?

Thanks .

S Haywards.

[former_member188011 · Accepted solution]

Hi S Haywards:

One benefit is that you don't need to configure the additional required intefaces to extract data from the variety of sources (see below).

1. File Interface - To extract from flat files (CSV or ASCII).

2. DB Connect - To extract from Relational Databases (Oracle, SQL Server, DB2, etc).

3. UD Connect - To extract from Relational Databases ( Oracle, SQL Server, DB2, etc) or Multi-Dimensional Sources (Analysis Services, SAS, Hyperion, etc).

4. BI SAPI - To extract data from SAP Systems (CRM, R/3, BW, etc).

5. Web Service - To extract data from XML files.

6. BAPI - To extract data from Legacy Applications using ETL Tools like DataStage or IPC.

Regards,

Francisco Milán.