Data Integration - Benefits, Tools, Challenges

A data integration solution takes different data types (data sets, documents, and tables) to be merged by users, organizations, and applications, for the use of personal and business processes or functions. Data integration covers several different sub-areas such as:

• Data warehousing
• Data migration
• Enterprise application/information integration
• Master data management

Data integration is important for commercial (such as when two similar companies need to merge their databases) as well as scientific (combining research results from different resources) domains.

Benefits of Data Integration

The use of data integration has the following benefits.

• It improves collaboration and unification of systems.
• It saves time and boosts efficiency.
• It delivers more valuable data and reduces errors (and rework).
• It simplifies business intelligence processes of analysis.

The ingestion process is the first step in data integration. It includes steps such as cleansing, ETL mapping, and transformation. Data integration solutions involve a few common elements such as a master server, a network of data sources, and clients accessing data from the master server.

In the process, the client sends a request to the master server for data. The master server then takes the required data from internal and external sources. The data is extracted from these sources and consolidated into one coherent data set. This is served back to the client for use.

Challenges faced during Data Integration

It is a challenging task to gather data from several sources and transform them into meaningful information. Currently, enterprises are generating different types of data (unstructured or real-time) from all kind of sources such as videos, IoT devices, sensors, and the cloud. It becomes critical for businesses to adapt to the data integration infrastructure as the data obtained from varied sources differs in terms of volume and format.

Data Integration Tools

The data integration software platform transforms data in any style and delivers it to any system. This integrated platform delivers a wide range of data quality capabilities from data profiling, standardization, matching, and enrichment to active data-quality monitoring.

Complete data integration tools are based on common design tooling, metadata, and runtime architecture. These tools address a range of different data integration styles. The best data integration tools are listed below.

Actian

Actian DataConnect can quickly design, deploy, and manage data integrations in the cloud. Features of this solution include the following.

• It can connect to on-premise and cloud sources using a number of pre-built connectors.
• It entails easy-to-use and a standardized approach for RESTful web service APIs.
• It can scale quickly and complete integrations by creating reusable templates using the IDE framework.
• It helps offer superior performance with the help of interactive feedback.
• It works directly with metadata for power users.
• It offers flexible deployment options.

Centerprise

Centerprise is a complete data integration solution that includes data integration, data transformation, data quality, and data profiling. Its features are as follows.

• It provides robust, scalable, high-performance, and affordable integration.
• It offers extensibility and openness.

QlikView

This data integration tool allows the creation of visualizations, dashboards, and apps; and also allows access to the entire story that lives within data. Features of this tool are listed below.

• It has simple drag-and-drop interfaces that help create flexible, interactive data visualizations.
• It can navigate complex information using natural search.
• It can instantly respond to interactions and changes.
• It supports multiple data sources and file types.
• It ensures security for data and content across all devices.
• It uses a centralized hub to share relevant analyses, including apps and stories.

HVR

The HVR tool allows users to replicate large volumes of data in real-time between data sources and targets. HVR also processes high volumes of data with minimal impact on database performance. Some of the features of this tool include the following.

• It helps reduce latency and ensure that data is updated in real time.
• It can accelerate data movement.
• It provides support for all the real-time cloud data integration scenarios with a single set-up.

Alooma

Alooma enables real-time data processing, analytics, and business intelligence. The tool extracts, streams, transforms, and connects all error-free data in the cloud. Its features are as follows.

• It collects data with native and custom integrations, zero latency, and enterprise scalability.
• It creates mashups to analyze transactional or user data with any other data source.
• It combines data storage silos into one location regardless of if they are in the cloud.
• It easily helps capture all interactions.

Skyvia

Skyvia is a cloud data platform for no-coding data integration, backup, management, and access. It supports various cloud applications, databases, and data warehouse services. The platform supports:

• One-time migration
• Regular loading of new and updated data
• CSV import/export
• Bi-directional synchronization
• Trigger-action like scenarios
• Advanced transformations with expressions, lookups, and constants
• Source data relations preservation in target
• Powerful automatic backup solution
• Online query tool for cloud apps and databases

Information Builders

Information builders help simplify big data management using a modern, native approach to Hadoop-based data integration. Their features are listed below.

• They ensure compatibility and flexibility.
• Information Builders provide a wide array of data application and B2B integration tools.
• They support a wide variety of big data integrations.
• They can stream sources in real-time via Spark and Hadoop.
• They help improve security and encryption with effective process management.

Liaison

Liaison is a fully managed service that supports data integration and management operations. It provides all types of integration. Some of its features are given below.

• It has self-service analytics, and it enables easy integration.
• It integrates, transforms, and transmits data between any two application end points.
• It allows the use of complex pre- and post-processing rules for data cleansing and enrichment.
• It helps enterprises connect a number of cloud applications and data sources.
• It helps organizations monitor activities such as data flow, integration status, and payload profile.
• It provides a launching point to view and report on the data model.
• It integrates seamlessly with other third-party reporting tools.

Syncsort

Syncsort includes a library of used cases with common cases such as joins, hash aggregations, weblogs, and processing. Some of the features of this solution are as given below.

• Build Once, Reuse multiple times
• Allows to scale-in & scale-out
• Achieve or exceed service level agreements
• Collects, processes, and integrates data from untapped sources
• Allows development without constraints
• Free-up database capacity & accelerate user query performance
• Eliminates the requirement for constant coding and tuning
• Reduces the cost of data integration

Adeptia Connect

Adeptia Connect allows the user to perform data mapping, transformation, and integration. Its features are listed below.

• It provides a simple user interface to manage external connections and data interfaces.
• It creates connections without the need for IT professionals.
• It lowers the expenses associated with managing networks.
• It provides support for the efficient delivery of services.

Talend

Talend’s open & scalable architecture helps respond faster to business requests. This provides many unified tools to develop and deploy data integration job. Features of this tool are listed below.

• Offers big data and cloud capabilities to simplify the adoption of the latest innovations
• Repurposes big data integration to any cloud platform such as AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google
• Leverages Spark in the cloud for the processing needed by machine learning

Informatica

Informatica tool offers the capability to connect & fetch data from different sources. Some of the features of this tool are given below.

• The tool has a centralized error logging system.
• It has built-in intelligence to improve performance.
• It offers better designs with enforced best practices on code development.
• It can integrate with other external software configuration tools.
• It can synchronize with geographically distributed team members.

Panoply

Panoply is a smart data warehouse that automates three data analytics stacks – data collection & transformation (ETL), database storage management, and optimization of query performance.

Snaplogic

SnapLogic data integration tool allows enterprise IT departments and other lines of business to connect faster. It helps accelerate the adoption of cloud apps such as Workday, Salesforce, and ServiceNow. Features of this tool include the following.

• It offers data integration as well as modern application services to securely transfer data from one location to another.
• It uses visual interfaces to set up integration tools without coding.
• It offers tools that manage how data flows throughout its life cycle.
• It provides integration to big data sources such as Hadoop and other NoSQL sources.
• It supports transaction- or event-based integrations that react to changes in real time.
• It supports a wide variety of connectors across SaaS, enterprises, big data, mainframe, and files.

CloverDX

CloverDX is made for those who demand full control over what they do, need to solve complex issues in intensive environments, and prefer to buy the best tools instead of developing their own. Its features are listed below.

• Automating & orchestrating transformations and processes
• Hosting in cloud or on-premise, scaling across cores or cluster nodes
• Coding where required
• Collaborating between developers & less expensive teams
• Building extendable frameworks

Attunity

Attunity Connect is an easy-to-use data integration solution that provides fast, easy, cost-effective data access and availability. The tool allows real-time, seamless connectivity for relational and non-relational data sources. Its features are as listed below.

• Access to a wide range of enterprise data sources
• Universal and service-oriented integration
• Easy integration with web applications
• Data-driven business event detection
• Simplify and accelerate integration using a comprehensive software suite for VSAM, IMS/DB, and DB2 data

Boomi

The Boomi AtomSphere is a data Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS). It supports multiple integration processes and offers powerful integration and data management capabilities. Its features include the following.

• Visual interface to configure application integrations
• Requires lower complexity and lesser developer resources
• Application, data, and B2B integration
• Design integration processes
• Automate complex integrations
• Lightweight, dynamic run-time engine
• Automatic integration updates
• Activity monitoring and event tracking
• Real-time automatic updates