"Data Warehouse (DW)"
A Data Warehouse (DW) is a computer database that collects, integrates, and stores an organization’s data with the aim of producing accurate and timely management information and supporting data analysis. A Data Warehouse is also a collection of data designed to support management decision making. Data Warehouses contain a wide variety of data that present an overall picture of business conditions at a single point in time.
Bill Inmon’s formal systems definition of a data warehouse is a computer database and its supporting components that is:
- Subject oriented, meaning that the data in the database is organised so that all the data elements relating to the same real-world event or object are linked together;
- Time variant, meaning that the changes to the data in the database are tracked and recorded so that reports can be produced showing changes over time;
- Non-volatile, meaning that data in the database is never over-written or deleted, but retained for future reporting; and,
- Integrated, meaning that the database contains data from most or all of an organisation’s operational applications, and that this data is made consistent.
More Information
For more information, consult the WikiPedia article on Data Warehouses.