Decision Support

Decision Support News Archive

2012:

EDW's Academic Data Store (UWSDBDataStore) Reorg on Aug 25

The EDW's Academic Data Store, also known as UWSDBDataStore, will be reorganized as a result of the mainframe Student Data Base (SDB) reorg. The SDB reorg is scheduled for Saturday, August 25th, which is followed by the UWSDBDataStore reorg. The UWSDBDataStore will be available sometime before noon on Monday, August 27th.
Posted 8/20/2012

UW Wins National Campus Technology Innovators Award

The UW received the 2012 Campus Technology Administrative Systems Innovators Award, given to IT leaders for "extraordinary technology solutions to meet campus challenges." The award is for the UW's Enterprise Data Warehouse data access control solution, which provides secure access to UW administrative data to more than 5,000 UW staff. This groundbreaking work is led by Bill Yock, UW-IT's Director of Enterprise Information Services, and built and supported by the Decision Support Services team, lead by Anja Canfield-Budde.
Posted 7/18/2012

EDW's Academic Data Store (UWSDBDataStore) Reorg on May 19

The EDW's Academic Data Store, also known as UWSDBDataStore, will be reorganized as a result of the mainframe Student Data Base (SDB) reorg. The SDB reorg is scheduled for Saturday, May 19th, which is followed by the UWSDBDataStore reorg. The UWSDBDataStore will be available normal business hours on Monday, May 21.
Posted 5/14/2012

Decision Support Website Updated

The Decision Support Web site has a new look and modified navigation. All the same content is still available, now through the left side bar rather than from the old horizontal tabs. You may find the URL has changed on selected pages - some have been moved behind UWNetID protection.

We hope you enjoy this new, clean look. Please let us know if you spot any oddities or have questions. dss-support@uw.edu
Posted 3/5/2012

EDW Infrastructure Upgrades Coming

This month, the Decision Support Team, in conjunction with UW-IT's Computing Infrastructure Engineering group, is completing a two part effort to increase capacity and data availability for the Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW).

The first part, expansion of available disk storage, will support the migration of new data into the EDW.

The second part, separation of user-facing environments from the build environments and added server redundancy, will provide end users with higher availability of EDW data. This will allow for end user access to data during EDW re-processing, equipment and application backup and maintenance windows, as well as a reduced outage risk.

This effort will be completed by March 31st, 2012 and will enhance the decision support capability of the university. The upgrades should not impact EDW users.
Posted 3/5/2012

Academic Data Store Reorganization on March 6, 2012

The Enterprise Data Warehouse's Academic Data Store, also known as UWSDBDataStore, will be organized. Two columns in the database will be increased in size. The reorg is scheduled for Tuesday March 6th, and UWSDBDataStore will be available during regular business hours on Tuesday, March 6th.
Posted 3/5/2012

Online Interactive Model Diagrams and Definitions Available

The Enterprise Data Warehouse is in the midst of a multi-year program to provide improved data, information and analytics for decision-making. These new data structures conform to the university's integrated Information Architecture design, one end goal of which is to create access to information across subject areas (academics, human resources, finance, research, etc) easier and faster.

All data structures in this expansion are fully modeled and all data elements defined. From the conceptual level down to the physical layout of tables & columns, models are available on the Decision Support website. Learn more about all of the models on the Models page and view the online, interactive, physical model diagrams and definitions here.
Posted 1/17/2012

 

Memo of Understanding Updated (1/13/2012)

The Memorandum of Understanding governing report development on UW's central servers has been updated to reflect office name and resources and changes. Read the new version here.

Academic Data Store Reorganization Coming on January 28/29 (1/13/2012)

The EDW's Academic Data Store, also known as UWSDBDataStore, will be reorganized as a result of the mainframe Student Data Base (SDB) reorg. The SDB reorg is scheduled for Saturday, January 28, which is followed by the UWSDBDataStore reorg. The UWSDBDataStore will be available normal business hours on Monday, January 30th.

2011:

New Videos Help Prepare for Annual Budget Discussion with Provost (12/30/2011)

This is a year of first for the University of Washington with regard to use of central data resources for planning purposes.

• The first time that the Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW) has been used to publish the metrics used to inform our annual budget discussions;
• The first time that both academic and administrative units have used common EDW reports and metrics to assess performance;
• The first time that a broad and representative community has come together from academic and administrative offices throughout the University to define metrics in support of the budget discussions.

Users can get a jump start on preparing for the conversation by watching these 4 short how-to videos. Additional background, guidance, and a place to provide feedback on the process are available at the Office of Planning and Budgeting's Annual Budget Discussion website.

EDW Featured in UW-IT's 2011 Annual Report (12/12/2011)

The Enterprise Data Warehouse is featured in the first article in UW-IT's 2011 annual report (see page 2). Bringing all the University's data together and transforming how it can be used promises to revolutionize the way we do business. Assistant Dean Lawrie Robertson shares how the EDW's financial cubes have already changed the way UW's School of Public Heath does business.

Make Suggestions for Training Topics and Vote to Prioritize Suggestions (11/23/2011)

We are in the process of developing a training curriculum to help users get the most out of UW's Enterprise Data Warehouse and the Business Intelligence tools. Do you have an idea for a training module? Do you recognize a good training module idea when you see one? Visit our training page and click on the Share Ideas and Vote button to get started. Thanks!

EDW BI SIG Holds Inaugural Meeting, Thursday, November 18 (11/16/2011)

The new EDW BI SIG is supplanting the RS and TSQL SIGs, providing a forum for discussion and learning around the broader topics of UW's EDW and Business Intelligence activity and plans. This is the place to come learn more about what's in the EDW and IEDW (Integrated Enterprise Data Warehouse) and exchange ideas with peers from across UW on how to use that data to perform analyses and build Business Intelligence tools.

Our inaugural gathering is this Thursday. Please join us for this informative session about current activity and future plans for the EDW. Many of you have asked for an update on the IEDW project. This is it - come, listen, ask questions, get answers, discuss.

Date & Location: UW Tower 22nd floor Boardroom, Thursday, November 18, 2011 - noon to 1:30pm

Academic Data Store Reorganization Coming on September 17/18 (8/29/2011)

The EDW's Academic Data Store, also known as UWSDBDataStore, will be reorganized as a result of the mainframe Student Data Base (SDB) reorg. The SDB reorg is scheduled for Saturday, September 17, which is followed by the UWSDBDataStore reorg. The UWSDBDataStore will be available normal business hours on Monday, September 19th.

RSS Feed for EDW Alerts Now Available (8/23/2011)

Users can now subscribe to RSS Feeds to stay on top of latest system alerts regarding Enterprise Data Warehouse systems and activities. You can subscribe to this feed by clicking the RSS icon next to the Alerts heading on the home page of the Decision Support website. Note: If you use Google Chrome as your browser, you may need to install the RSS Subscription Extension - you can download it here.

Financial Activity Cube for the 2011 Biennium Released July 13 (7/13/2011)

The 2011 version of the Financial Activity Cube was released on July 13, joining the 2007 and 2009 cubes already in production. The 2009 Financial Activity Cube will continue to be processed nightly until the close of the biennium's transactions, scheduled for July 29th. At that time the 2009 cube will be frozen. You can learn more about EDW's financial cubes here.

EDW expands to carry 5 biennia of financial data (7/7/2011)

With the onset of the 2011 biennium, the Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW) has expanded its holdings of financial data to include 5 biennia of transactions which span from July 2003 to the present. 2011 transactions will first appear in the EDW on 7/8/2011.

EDW financial data includes 2011 biennium transactions starting on 7/8/2011 (7/7/2011)

The mainframe Financial Accounting System (FAS), the EDW source for financial transactions, begins processing 2011 financial transactions on Thursday, July 7, 2011. The EDW will detect these 2011 transactions during its nightly processing, causing the current financial biennium to roll from 2009 to 2011. Therefore financial data in the EDW will contain transactions for the 2011 biennium starting on 7/8/2011.

Academic Data Store Reorganization Coming on June 5/6 (5/31/2011)

The EDW's Academic Data Store, also known as UWSDBDataStore, will be reorganized as a result of the mainframe Student Data Base (SDB) reorg, scheduled for Sunday, June 5. Typically reorgs happen over Saturday and Sunday, but because the work doesn't begin until Sunday June 5th, please plan on UWSDBDataStore being unavailable on Monday, June 6th. Having said that, UWSDBDataStore may be available on Monday and you can check on its availability at the Decision Support Web site. Look in the Data Availability Summary, at the Last Loaded column for Academic Data Store. Once you see an actual date and time for Monday, June 6th, (versus the word "Loading...") you'll know the reorg is complete and UWSDBDataStore is available.

UW Today features the Enterprise Data Warehouse and financial cube (4/20/2011)

A UW Today article "Enterprise Data Warehouse, financial 'cube' make it easier to work with data at the UW," published March 30, highlights the value our services bring to the UW Community.

UW presentations well-received at Seattle data warehousing conference (4/20/2011)

The 8th Higher Education Data Warehousing Forum, chaired by UW-IT's Anja Canfield-Budde, drew record attendance this month, including participation from five foreign countries. Featured UW speakers included Bill Yock, Director, IM Enterprise Information Services, Michael Eisenberg, founding Dean of the iSchool, and Betsy Wilson, Dean of Libraries and DMC Chair.

Test EDW ODS server & RS environment will be down (3/30/2011)

The EDW test ODS database server is having additional disk space added to it and will be unavailable from Wednesday 3/30 thru approx mid-day on Thursday 3/31. This will affect the entire test RS environment, as well as any development RS reports that go against the test ODS & UWSDBDataStore.

EDW test servers upgrade on Tuesday (2/15) 10 a.m. (2/09/2011)

The EDW test environment servers will be upgraded to the current service pack on Tuesday (Feb 15) at 10 a.m. The upgrade will take about 1 hour. During this time the test environment will be unavailable. This will also affect the availability of the development and test EDW Reporting environments.

The production environment servers will be upgraded during the following regular Sunday morning maintenance windows.

Changes coming to UWSDBDataStore and ODS on 02/13/2011 (2/03/2011)

To improve the security of university information, on Sunday, February 13 the DBAs will turn on the "force encryption" option for the SQL Server on which both the UWSDBDataStore and the ODS databases reside. In essence, we will transition from recommending you encrypt data in transit to and from the server, to transparently enforcing it. All other EDW databases already have this setting enabled.

Users do not need to do anything. The change is expected to be transparent to users.

If you run into any problems starting on 02/13/2011, double check to ensure your settings match our instructions here.

UWSDBDataStore Reorganized on 1/30/2011 (1/28/2011)

UWSDBDataStore is scheduled to be reorganized on Sunday, January 30, 2011. A list of changes and technical definitions for new fields can be found here.

Data Custodians will apply security settings to new columns and tables on Monday, January 31, 2011, making these items available to EDW users on Tuesday, February 1st.

2010:

Online CBSR Released (12/20/2010)

The online CBSR has been released, and is available here now. Learn more...

UWSDB Migration Information (11/22/2010)

As part of the Strategic Roadmap for Information Management and Administrative Systems, UWSDB is being decommissioned, and UWSDB users are migrating to UWSDBDataStore and/or Student Web Services for their data needs. A wiki has been developed to assist users along the migration path. Readers will find information about the background behind the move, instructions for how to use the new resources, the project team leading the effort, and contact information for assistance. If you're migrating, please check it out!

DAC data sources disabled in EDW BIDEV (11/8/2010)

As scheduled, DAC Data sources in Reporting Services BIDEV environment have been disabled Nov 8, 2010. Reports converted and pointing to native databases will not be affected. Reports pointing to DAC will no longer be functional in BIDEV.

DAC data sources removal provides an opportunity for testing converted reports in BIDEV. Here's a link to a guide on how to convert reports from DAC to SEC.

Report\Analytic environment maintenance on Wednesday, November 17 (11/4/2010)

The DSS BI environments will be upgraded to SQL 2008 SP2. The schedule for the BIDev & BITest environments is for them to be upgraded around 8:45 on Wednesday, November 17. The process should take about an hour and the environments will be unavailable during this time.

The production BI environment will be upgraded on Sunday, November 21, during the server maintenance window in the morning.

EDW Data Connection is changing (10/19/2010)

Access to the UW’s Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW) data is changing. Please continue reading if any of the following conditions apply:

• You are a report developer or support reports in the EDW Reporting Services environment
• You are a software developer with applications connected to an EDW database
• You connect to an EDW database using Microsoft SQL Management Studio or Microsoft Access or other tool
• You have an automated extract from an EDW database

What is happening?
The method to access data through security views is changing.   The initial work for the transition has begun.  You can now access the security views directly from the EDW databases you are working with, rather than connecting through the interim DAC database. EDW Secured (“SEC”) views will be replacing DAC views access. To take advantage of these changes, you need to convert how you connect to your data sources in a few quick-and-easy steps.

 Why we are doing this?  
Database connections are now simpler and more intuitive for report developers, ad-hoc queries, and applications.  Because users can connect to the secure views directly on the database they are working with, data access times will also improve. Lastly, central administration of reporting databases is easier and security of EDW data can be applied at a finer grain.

How to convert?
If you are currently consuming EDW data, you will need to make adjustments to your data access method. Please click on the below links to these brief conversion guides:

• How to Convert Report rdl that Uses DAC views to new SEC views 
• Connect to Data

Your responsibility

• If you are a Reporting Services developer and own reports in EDW reporting environment, you will be contacted for conversion work soon. Projected RS conversion work completion deadline is at end of Nov 2010.  

*Please note: the new SEC views and their RS data sources are available now in development, test and production environments.  

• If you are currently connecting to DAC views by other means, please refer to Connect to Data for conversion assistance. Projected remaining conversion work completion deadline is at end of Jan 2011.

Timeline

• DAC data sources removed from development Reporting Services environment on November 8, 2010.
• Projected timeline for DAC to SEC conversion completion for RS reports is at the end of November, 2010.
• DAC data sources removed from test & production Reporting Services environments on December 1, 2010.
• Projected timeline for DAC views retirement is at end of January, 2011.

Future Updates and Status
For future updates, please check Decision Support News.

Data Security Settings Report Available (9/08/2010)

The DAC_Secured_Tables_Views_by_Role report allows users to quickly see how the DMC Access & Roles Security Matrix has been applied in practice. For example, are you wondering if student number is available to the Institutional Analyst role? With just a few clicks you can find out the availability of this column, as well as all columns in the EDW. In addition, one can get a quick sense of the volume of security applied to a table or even a database, as the report provides totals of restricted and available columns, by role, by database, and by table.

Have a look!

Endowment Accountability Reporting Online! (8/20/2010)

These reports display summary and budget-level activity for endowment funded operating budgets for selectable time periods. These reports supersede the reports manually distributed by the Advancement organization. In the Report Catalog, look in the Financial\Endowment folder.

EDW data access now available at the actual database (7/26/2010)

EDW secured data access was initially through views located in the DAC database. The views in the DAC database referenced the tables in the actual EDW databases. With recent enhancements to the EDW data access model, these views are now located in the actual EDW databases. This provides finer grained control over data access as well as a more intuitive user query experience.

Instead of connecting to the DAC database, users will now connect to the EDW database to find the data access views. Making use of the views in their new location will require some minor tweaks to existing queries and reports. Instructions for making those amendments are available in the topics Connect to Data and Query Data.

Eventually all users will migrate from the DAC database views to the actual database views. A timeframe for this migration is being determined. Stay tuned for more info.

Connect to Data (http://www.washington.edu/uwit/im/ds/connect-data.html)
Query Data (http://www.washington.edu/uwit/im/ds/query-data.html)

EDW Data Security Upgrades (7/26/2010)

Data Custodians can now use the SMAT to apply security definitions to data in a test environment. This allows for improved quality control over security definitions before they are introduced to the production environment. Learn more about EDW data security.

Financial Activity Cube server renamed. ACTION REQUIRED. (6/24/2010)

The server that hosts the popular Financial Activity Cubes for the 2007 and 2009 biennia is scheduled for a minor name change on 6/27/2010.

What to do:

• If you connect to the server by simply using the short server name, "edwssas1", you have NOTHING to do.
• If you use the long, or fully qualified domain name, then you need to change the name in your connection from edwssas1.u.washington.edu to edwssas1.admin.washington.edu.

See EDW Cube help, updated with the new name, to learn more.

For questions or help, email dss-support@uw.edu

Report Template Improvements (6/07/2010)

Upgrades to the report templates and report metadata database are planned for release shortly.

This upgrade provides the following enhancements:

• Built-in ability to provide additional report metadata, through a "More Info?" link
• Release of landscape and portrait RS 2008 versions of the report template files and their associated metadata sub-reports
• Retirement of the RS 2005 report template file and its associated metadata subreports
• Small structural changes to the Report Metadata database and the associated front end Report Metadata management tool, to allow more consistent capture of report metadata

The 2008 versions of the Report_Template.rdl file will supplant the 2005 versions available on the central RS development server. If you are still developing reports in RS 2005, please note the 2008 subreports have been tested and work within in a 2005 report .rdl file. Therefore upon upgrade, the 2005 sub-reports will no longer be available on the central RS development server.

The current planned publication date is Monday, June 14. Please notify dss-support@uw.edu if you have any questions.

Improved Browser Support (6/01/2010)

To better support non-Internet Explorer browsers, the DSS Reporting Services (RS) environments are undergoing some minor configuration changes. The RS Report Manager Web site report display in Firefox and Chrome browsers will be improved. These configuration changes go into effect on June 2, 2010.

Report Catalog Enhanced (5/21/2010)

Catalog can now be browsed as well as searched, and it even remembers your preference. See for yourself.

3 New Academic Reports Released! (4/30/2010)

The final three reports of a report conversion effort have been released, the latest providing information on Time Schedules, Student Transfer, and Student Transcript Summaries. The larger suite of 10 reports, formerly accessed through a Web-based system called "Departmental Information," are available now through the EDW. The move is part of an ongoing effort to improve access to information, simplify data delivery, and improve security.

Several reports, including student degree information, can be filtered by ethnicity, gender, class, residency, and other parameters, reducing the need to import data to into Excel for further analysis. This effort is a partnership with the Registrar's office and the advising community.

New Finance Report! Variable Reporting Period Budget Summary (4/27/2010)

This new report allows users to choose a variable reporting period for an individual budget summary. The user selects reporting period start and end dates and gets a report similar to the Financial Desktop Budget Summary report that reflects their selected reporting period dates.

New Functionality! Raw-Data Export for Financial Reports (4/27/2010)

Every report now allows you to export raw report data without any of the excess formatting that causes problems when you manipulate exported data in Excel. Steps to utilize this new functionality:

1. Navigate to the Financial folder, and execute any report.
2. In the Reporting toolbar, choose “XML file with report data” from the “Select a format” drop down menu.
   
3. Click Export.
   
4. When the file download box appears, click open or save. If you click open, the file will automatically open in Excel. If you click save, please note that file extension is XML. However, when you browse to the file and open it, it will open in Excel.

New in May! (4/27/2010)

• The Remaining Balance by OrgCode and Category report will be modified to allow users the choice to view Fiscal Year Budgeted Amounts.
  
• Additionally, a new report will be released called the OrgCode-Budget Hierarchy which allows users to view budgets in relationship to the OrgCode hierarchy for a selected date.

Microsoft Reporting Service and Analysis tools has been upgraded from SQL 2005 to SQL 2008 (4/19/2010)

Microsoft Reporting Service and Analysis tools has been upgraded from SQL 2005 to SQL 2008. This means that these data warehouse business intelligence tools will run on their latest technology, offering new features that make data analysis and reporting easier and faster.

New electronic Agreement implemented in EDW reporting environment (4/14/2010)

You will be asked to read and accept online the Access and Use Agreement for UW Information Systems and Institutional Information the first time you log in to Reporting Services in the Enterprise Data Warehouse on or after April 13, 2010. The Agreement is an illustration of existing University policies and is being sponsored by the Data Management Committee. It is being implemented for various applications to communicate the rules related to access to and use of University Information Systems or Institutional Information.

More information about the Data Management Committee is available at http://www.washington.edu/uwit/im/dmc/. The Agreement can be viewed or accepted at https://uwnetid.washington.edu/agree/. For questions about the Reporting Services implementation of the Agreement, please contact dss-support@uw.edu.

Now available: Cube access now possible with any EDW ASTRA role (4/12/2010)

Anyone with access to the Enterprise Data Warehouse can now automatically connect to two new financial cubes. Learn what is in the Financial Activity Cubes and how to connect here.

Security Metadata Administration Tool (SMAT) releases new functionality April 30, 2010 (4/12/2010)

The Security Metadata Administration Tool (SMAT) releases new functionality April 30, 2010. A dynamic user interface and automatic email notifications will allow users to apply and process data access information to Enterprise Data Warehouse data faster and more easily.