Oracle Data Integrator - a natural migration from OWB
November 23, 2016
Oracle Data Integrator - a natural migration from OWB
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with Oracle Data Integrator
We have a large data warehouse that consolidates data from three different case management systems. We use Oracle Data Integrator (ODI) as the primary ETL tool for transporting the data into the data warehouse. Prior to ODI, we used Oracle Warehouse Builder (OWB) for Oracle databases and Microsoft SSIS for SQL Server databases. ODI replaced them both. We found ODI to be a very powerful, full-feature ETL tool, and it's lightning fast, too.
- It's fast. If you have used OWB before, you will notice how much faster ODI is.
- The Knowledge Modules (KMs) are extremely useful.
- Integrates really well with the rest of the Oracle Technology Stack (GoldenGate, WebLogic, OEM, and, of course, the Oracle Enterprise Database).
- In ODI 12c, Oracle added a migration tool for OWB clients. It works, but not as well as we thought. We knew we would have to recreate the process flow - but then some of our OWB scripts didn't migrate well - and we ended up spending a lot more time than we initially thought [while] going through the entire migration.
- The installation isn't trivial. It took us a while to figure out which components need to reside where, how WebLogic fits in, and how to set it all up.
- The Oracle training for ODI is outrageously expensive - over 4K for a 5-day class.
- With ODI, we are able to run our nightly ETL process at less than half the time it took before with OWB. This enables us to have the data warehouse updated and our BusinessObjects environment up and running 2 to 3 hours earlier than what we were used to.
- For new projects, the ODI Data Transformation capabilities are saving us development time compared to what we had to do before with OWB.
We migrated to ODI from OWB - and we found ODI to be light years ahead of OWB (features, performance, and connectivity). We also looked at Informatica, but were turned down by its cost. Being a SAP Business Objects shop, we also considered the SAP Data Integrator tool (it offers data lineage capability that could be very valuable) - but since our entire data platform is running on Oracle, we preferred staying with Oracle. Once ODI 12g came out with the OWB to ODI migration tool, it was a no-brainer.