Implementation of this extremely demanding project has been conducted in several phases, which began as a pilot-project in December of 2007. The primary goal was to gain insight into the software and hardware infrastructure in order to perform an appropriate assessment of required infrastructure and get familiar with IBM Cognos BI OLAP reports system.
Upon successful realization of the pilot-project, DWH BI group of experts began working on the pre-implementation analysis of user requirements. Interviews were held and workgroups assembled in order to perform the source analysis and gather data latter described in the functional specification. Data warehousing implementation began based on this functional specification, starting with a well-defined data warehousing logical model and logical design of ETL procedures, then followed by the start-up, clean-up and load of previously prepared data. Shortly after the first dimension and fact tables were created, data quality testing of the implemented data warehouse began, based on the CNB specification. During the last phase of the project, report records were created on the IBM Cognos BI platform as well as the imperious control reports. For the necessary data controls, complex analytical reports of Volksbank d.d. Accounting Department have been implemented on the IBM Cognos BI solution, demanding high reliability, availability and quality of data. Due to the high reporting standards set by the CNB, in not one moment could consistency and quality of data be questioned, proposing a great challenge to all the participants involved in the project, but ultimately giving them great pleasure to see the first reports be sent at the beginning of the summer pushing the project to its completion with a successful outcome.
