2.6.5 Information Warehouse
Figure 40. Information Warehouse
Key Points
This foil shows the general structure of the Information Warehouse Architecture.
Security management is part of the common services offered by the
infrastructure.
Presentation Script
The IBM Information Warehouse (IW) architecture provides a unifying and
technical approach for building products and services that interoperate with each
other to make it easy for customers to access data anywhere in their
enterprises.
The Information Warehouse provides a lot of capabilities in support of
informational applications and their end users (known as knowledge workers):
Information provided to end users about what data is available and how to
access them
A programming interface to formatted relational and non-relational data to
facilitate the development of informational applications
Location-transparent direct access to herogeneous data
Chapter 2. IBM Security Strategy and Architecture 83
Periodic extracts of heterogeneous data (typically into relational tables) for
access by multiple end users
Creation and refresh of reconciled and derived data
Update of reconciled or derived data via data changes
Distribution of data to multiple locations
Integration of the administration of the above capabilities
The Information Warehouse architecture is composed of five major components,
each corresponding to a box in the IW architecture foil:
Applications
This box shows informational application with an end-user interface. The IBM
Visualizer family of products is an example of such applications. It enables
business professionals to access and analyze data in an IW implementation,
bringing them to the end user for preplanned reporting and for active data
anlysis. The most relevant area of security for an informational application
is identification and authentication. The informational application must be
able to identify an end user and pass that information on to the database
management systems that own the data to be accessed. The Visualizer
products perform identification and authentication, and authorization
functions through the native operating system and the database
management systems.
Tools
This box shows generalized data replication tools used for
moving/transforming data among the variety of organization asset data
defined in the IW architecture (for instance, real-time data, and reconciled,
change or dericed data). These tools include extractors, loaders, file
transferers, data convertors, and so on. The IBM DataHub product and the
IBM Data Replication family of products work together in support of data
replication management in an IW implementation. The DataHub product is a
database administration tool that provides an interface with single point of
control for administering relational databases un an enterprise. The native
operating systems and the management systems on which DataHub is
running are used to perform the identification and authentication, and
authorization functions for DataHub administration requests.
Access Enablers
This box provides access to the organization asset data by informational
applications and tools via the SQL application programming interface. The
DB2 family is an example of products that support the SQL application
program interface. They support a common set of SQL calls and extensions
to support specific characteristics of that DB2 product on the specific
operating system the DB2 product runs on. DataJoiner in an example of a
product for accessing both relational and non-relational databases.
Organization Access Data
This box is composed of two elements: “data” and “meta-data.” “Data” is
the storage for the actual real world data, and “meta-data” is the storage for
the models of the data (Information models). The information models contain
the information catalog and system information, which are key components
of the IW architecture. The physical data is stored on a variety databases,
relational and non-relational. The DB2 family of products are examples of
relational databases that provide storage for and organizations asset data.
84 Security P-Guide
The IBM DataGuide is an example of product that provides the “meta-data.”
It helps informational workers find the right data using a graphical user
interface. Identification and authentication, and authorization still rely upon
the native operating system and the database management systems.
Infrastructure
This box contains the components used at or by the other components
previously described. The functions available are:
Work-Flow Management
System Management
Database Management
Security Management
Chapter 2. IBM Security Strategy and Architecture 85

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