Developing a data warehouse as the first step for information systems reengineering

Abstract

All practitioners of information system know that building an industrial-strength information system is both a long-term commitment and a long-term investment for an organization. Any surviving system should encounter many times of changes either major or minor; and these changes might induce the system serious problems and a lot of maintenance cost. According to the recent development of database reengineering, data warehousing and business reengineering, many organizations have had their information system operating for years. They are facing the problems of introducing a new database system and the re-designation of the data processing procedure. For the information system to serve effectively and efficiently as time goes by, there are two ways to improve it. Firstly, re-design the whole system by using new technology and new database models; secondly, introduce a method that will make use of the existing systems to the maximum extent while the new requirements are still satisfied, i.e. Information systems reengineering. In this paper, we propose a framework for practitioners to complete the reengineering work more smoothly. The authors have applied this framework to the system reengineering work for a manufacturer. An EIS prototype is developed, according to the new requirements of high-level managers, and the system is operating currently.