Data Warehousing Interview Questions and Answer Part – 2
11) What is the difference between view and materialized view?
A view takes the output of a query and makes it appear like a virtual table and it can be used in place of tables.
A materialized view provides indirect access to table data by storing the results of a query in a separate schema object.
12) What is ER Diagram?
Entity Relationship Diagrams are a major data modelling tool and will help organize the data in your project into entities and define the relationships between the entities. This process has proved to enable the analyst to produce a good database structure so that the data can be stored and retrieved in a most efficient manner.
An entity-relationship (ER) diagram is a specialized graphic that illustrates the interrelationships between entities in a database. A type of diagram used in data modeling for relational data bases. These diagrams show the structure of each table and the links between tables.
13) What is ODS?
ODS is abbreviation of Operational Data Store. A database structure that is a repository for near real-time operational data rather than long term trend data. The ODS may further become the enterprise shared operational database, allowing operational systems that are being re-engineered to use the ODS as there operation databases.
14) What is ETL?
ETL is abbreviation of extract, transform, and load. ETL is software that enables businesses to consolidate their disparate data while moving it from place to place, and it doesn’t really matter that that data is in different forms or formats. The data can come from any source.ETL is powerful enough to handle such data disparities. First, the extract function reads data from a specified source database and extracts a desired subset of data. Next, the transform function works with the acquired data – using rules orlookup tables, or creating combinations with other data – to convert it to the desired state. Finally, the load function is used to write the resulting data to a target database.
15) What is ETL process in data warehousing?
“Extract, Transform and Load (ETL) is a process in database usage and especially in data warehousing that involves:
Extracting data from outside sources
Transforming it to fit operational needs (which can include quality levels)
Loading it into the end target (database or data warehouse)
Extract – The first part of an ETL process involves extracting the data from the source systems. In many cases this is the most challenging aspect of ETL, as extracting data correctly will set the stage for how subsequent processes will go.
Transform – The transform stage applies a series of rules or functions to the extracted data from the source to derive the data for loading into the end target.
Load – The load phase loads the data into the end target, usually the data warehouse (DW). Depending on the requirements of the organization, this process varies widely ”
16) What is VLDB?
VLDB is abbreviation of Very Large DataBase. A one terabyte database would normally be considered to be a VLDB. Typically, these are decision support systems or transaction processing applications serving large numbers of users.
17) Is OLTP database is design optimal for Data Warehouse?
No. OLTP database tables are normalized and it will add additional time to queries to return results. Additionally OLTP database is smaller and it does not contain longer period (many years) data, which needs to be analyzed. A OLTP system is basically ER model and not Dimensional Model. If a complex query is executed on a OLTP system, it may cause a heavy overhead on the OLTP server that will affect the normal business processes.
18) If de-normalized is improves data warehouse processes, why fact table is in normal form?
Foreign keys of facts tables are primary keys of Dimension tables. It is clear that fact table contains columns which are primary key to other table that itself make normal form table.
19) What are lookup tables?
A lookup table is the table placed on the target table based upon the primary key of the target, it just updates the table by allowing only modified (new or updated) records based on thelookup condition.
20) What are Aggregate tables?
Aggregate table contains the summary of existing warehouse data which is grouped to certain levels of dimensions. It is always easy to retrieve data from aggregated tables than visiting original table which has million records. Aggregate tables reduces the load in the database server and increases the performance of the query and can retrieve the result quickly.