SAP Data Services Reviews

1. Impact and Lineage analysis.
2. Auto Documentation.
3. Recovery of jobs.
4. Text Data Processing.

I've done a migration project (from OWB to BODS) in Singapore. The reason customer opted for BODS over OWB was automated trigger E-mail when job fails and the recovery of the jobs from the point it failed in the last execution. Also, when loading data from flat files, once the data loading from a file is complete BODS is capable enough to call any batch files to move the processed files to another location after completion.

When working with custom functions, many times it fails to execute (from 4.0 onwards) because of the data types mismatch errors. This has to be corrected.

More than 6 Years.

No issues with deployment.

No issues with stability.

No issues with scalability.

100% as no manual intervention is required once the solution is implemented.

100%.

It was quite straightforward for me as I had experience with other ETL tools and the concepts.

Through vendor team and the level of expertise was satisfactory.

OWB.

The graphical user interface and powerful SQL generation capabilities make the coding of ETL flows very easy and efficient. The ability to easily run processes in parallel or sequentially is also very valuable. Overall the ease of use is Data Services key benefit.

While Data Services performs very well when dealing with relational structures and to a lesser degree with delimited files, there is significant room from improvement with the integration with web services and related data formats (XML, JSON, etc.). We have had to code our own ETL processes in Python or Java to extract data from all but the simplest web services.

Three years.

If you have a need to access non-relational data sources, review the tool’s capabilities for your specific use cases very carefully.

Lineage analysis where used, export options, custom functions, connectivity to Business Warehouse (BW).

Fast data load to BW PSA, more integration options between different DBs.

Connections to DBs (datastores), unusual behavior of temp. and permanent tables that just get corrupted sometimes and only solution is to recreate them or re-import from data store.

1 year.

Sudden crashing of DS making unsaved changes lost, happens usually when logged in for a long amount of time.

Nope, its good in extending the features in terms of DWH scalability.

Good support is available via consultants.

Previously BW was being used, but is was a closed system , we had new source application which contained information in oracle and SQL DBs, and BW wasn't very good at loading the data in schedules.

Nope, because of its connectivity to BW it was choosen

Friendly interface and online jobs.

It gave us an easy way to collect different data sources into an analytic DB.

3 years.

It is straightforward.

I did it.

It's a good product which does not require deep knowledge of programming and integrates well with SAP othet products.

Data Quality Transforms, Data Cleanse, Platform, Match.

Doing De-Deduplication of data for Data Cleansing is much easier and has been revolutionised with Data Services. Especially used in conjunction with SAP Information Stewards.

It needs a Web-client.

2 years.

Sometimes when re-installing the product, the program corrupts and needs to be completely removed. Its wastes a lot of time.

None

Sometimes when upgrading the product, the program corrupts and needs to be completely removed. Its wastes a lot of time.

It could be better.

Could also be better. There are still a few niggles that need to be sorted out and it seems that SAP are a bit slow on the comeback.

SSIS. I switched because a) my current company specialises in Data Services and b) because DS is the best tool for working with SAP ERP and SAP Hana.

Straight forward.

In-house.

SSIS only.

Prepare well, read the installation guide and make sure you have all the boxes ticked before going ahead and installing.

We use this solution for the EPL, extraction form, and low data.

I appreciate having access to the SAP data.

It would be nice if this solution was a bit easier to move from development to production.

I have been using SAP for ten years.

The initial setup was straightforward and took about a day.

There is a one time purchase fee plus annual maintenance.

Once you have training on the solution, it is very important to explore the full potential of the product rather than jumping right into development.

This is a nine out of ten solution.

ETL is very useful. We use Data Services not only with data warehouse development but also integration with other 3rd parties and external data.

We have integration with 30 different systems now. Business users manual data-entry load has decreased, and data between different systems are consistent in almost-real time.

We can develop time-based, visualized analyses with our BI platform, and four years ago, business users had to prepare their complex records in Excel every time they needed data reports. Now they only need to refresh reports. On the other hand, business users were only able to query data four years ago, but now their visions are changing and they are now performing data mining and forecast analyses.

Data mining and more visualized reports are the next steps.

We had to deal with data quality problems.

It has inadequate data analysis and data profiling, which has increased testing and user acceptance duration.

BO Web Intelligence, v4.0 is more unstable than XI v3.x. We’ll upgrade to v4.1 in Q3.

No, we did not.

Setup was straightforward, but the customization and implementation process was complex.

We started with a vendor-partner, but now we have in-house team and still get consultancy advice from the partner.

• Cognos
• Microsoft SSIS
• SSRS

First, perform an analysis of your business users' requirements.

The data quality and your data warehouse models are the most important parts of a BI project. Design the model from both business requirements and source data. Make sure you involve business users from the beginning and explain the advantages of business intelligence to the data life-cycle well. Assign a short and attractive name to the web site and/or tool that users can remember easily and will like.

Scalability and easy to use.

There are a lot of version improvements in the years and makes it hard to sync up with older versions of the same tool.

1 Year.

It is very stable and doesn't crash easily.

Nope.

On a Scale of 1-5, I would give them 3.

On a Scale of 1-5, I would give them 3.

It was already setup on the client system. I used it just for ETL purpose.

Pretty Good

Its a very great tool to be used for ETL process. It has support for all the databases and in most cases, it generates SQL by itself which is a big help for beginners.