Preservation of Data Warehouses: Extending the SIARD System with DWXML Language and Tools

Abstract

Data warehouses are used in many application domains, and there is no established method for their preservation. A data warehouse can be implemented in multidimensional structures or in relational databases that represent the dimensional model concepts in the relational model. The focus of this work is on describing the dimensional model of a data warehouse and migrating it to an XML model, in order to achieve a long-term preservation format. This chapter presents the definition of the XML structure that extends the SIARD format used for the description and archive of relational databases, enriching it with a layer of metadata for the data warehouse components. Data Warehouse Extensible Markup Language (DWXML) is the XML language proposed to describe the data warehouse. An application that combines the SIARD format and the DWXML metadata layer supports the XML language and helps to acquire the relevant metadata for the warehouse and to build the archival format. Copyright (C) 2013, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.