Getting Started with Master Data Services

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1 ASPE RESOURCE SERIES Getting Started with Master Data Services Prepared for ASPE by Global Knowledge's Brian D. Egler MCITP, MCT 2010 Real Skills. Real Results. Real IT. in partnership with

2 Getting Started with Master Data Services Brian D. Egler MCITP, MCT 2010, Global Knowledge Course Director Introduction One of the many interesting features of Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 is Master Data Services (MDS). This enhancement allows an organization to create a Master Data Hub that provides a single source of truth for the enterprise s numerous data entities and hierarchies. The typical medium- to large-sized company has many disparate systems, some inherited from mergers or acquisitions, each using its own data source. These data sources can be aligned using a hub-and-spoke architecture to cross-reference the data entities into a central database that can be used for auditing, change tracking and consolidation. This white paper highlights the new Master Data Services feature. Your Data, Any Place, Any Time The Microsoft Data Platform Vision is summed up by the phrase: Your Data, Any Place, Any Time. Four underlying themes categorize the Microsoft SQL Server 2008 release: Enterprise Data Platform Beyond Relational Dynamic Development Pervasive Insight The Master Data Services feature is part of the Enterprise Data Platform theme and is the subject of this white paper. Other features, while too numerous to describe here, are documented on the Microsoft web site at You can also download a trial version of the software from the same location. Master Data Services Master Data Services allows a business to create an authoritative centralized version of its data specifications available throughout the enterprise. This is particularly useful when multiple systems exist that maintain their own copy of business data that needs to be consolidated and understood, for instance, should duplication occur. Discovering the data specifications can be time-consuming but, when stored centrally and maintained with version control and change tracking, the business can benefit from this understanding of its mission-critical data. When building a Data Warehouse, much of this Data Discovery needs to be performed but instead of recording this information in an isolated spreadsheet, now the information can be recorded in a centralized database for all to access and contribute to. Through Web Applications, individual application groups can be held accountable for their data specifications through ownership, allowing all parts of the organization to contribute to the Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 2

3 centralized Master Data. Ongoing Data Warehouse and Business Intelligence efforts can then benefit with the Master Data being readily available and up-to-date. Master Data Services consists of the following components: Master Data Services Configuration Manager Used to setup the MDS Database and configure the Web application Master Data Manager ASP.NET application used to manage your master data Master Data Services Web Service Used by developers to extend and customize the functionality of Master Data Services Prerequisites Master Data Services (MDS) is available on only the 64-bit editions of SQL Server 2008 R2 Datacenter, Enterprise and Developer. It is not supported on the 32-bit platform. It requires the.net Framework 3.5 SP1 or later. For running the Web Applications, IIS is required with ASP.NET and Windows Authentication enabled. Figure 1: IIS Prerequisites Master Data Services requires IIS World Wide Web Services installed specifically with support for ASP.NET and Windows Authentication to support the MDS Web site. Master Data Services Setup The masterdataservices.msi install file is delivered on the SQL Server installation media (e.g., under the 1033_enu_lp\x64\setup folder). Double-clicking this install file will start the MDS Installation Wizard, which allows you to choose the installation path as appropriate and to proceed through the installation of Master Data Services. Figure 2: Create MDS Database Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 3

4 Once the Installation Wizard is complete, it launches the MDS Configuration Manager. This tool can also be launched from the Windows Start/All Programs menu under Microsoft SQL Server R2/Master Data Services/Configuration Manager. There are two steps to be performed by the MDS Configuration Manager: 1. Create the MDS Database with a predefined schema definitions 2. Create the MDS Web Application in ASP.NET Clicking the Create Database button will launch the Create Database Wizard for MDS. The database must be hosted on SQL Server 2008 R2 Datacenter, Enterprise or Developer editions. The user creating the database has to a member of the sysadmin server role. Figure 3: Database Server and Authentication The Database Server page of the Create MDS Database wizard allows you to specify where the MDS Database will be stored and the authentication type. The Database page allows the name of the MDS database to be entered along with any collation requirements. The MDS Service Account is recommended to be a Domain User Account that will be used by the MDS Web Services to connect to the MDS Databases. The service account will be added to the db_owner role in the MDS database. The Administrator Account again should be a Domain User Account that will be given MDS administration capabilities such as adding users and the ability to access all models defined in the MDS database. Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 4

5 When the wizard is finished, confirmation is shown that the MDS Database was created with the required specifications. Figure 4: Web Configuration page Create Application The next step is to create the MDS Web Application by clicking Web Configuration in the MDS Configuration Manager. You can create a separate site or use an existing site such as the IIS Default Web site as in the example. Click the Create Application button to launch the Create Web Application wizard. The Web Application uses IIS, ASP.NET, and Windows Authentication so your Web Server should already support these specifications before the MDS Web Application is created. Note that the MDS Web Application can run on a separate server from the MDS Database server. The Create Application wizard should be run on the Web Server. In this example the Web Server and Database Server are on the same machine. On the Create Web Application dialog box, you can specify the Virtual path of the application and the Alias which will be used in the URL when users launch the application from a browser. For instance, the URL that will be used here will be to launch the MDS Web Application. The wizard will create a dedicated application pool for the MDS Web Application within IIS to prevent other applications from affecting it or vice versa. The user name will be used as the identity of the application pool and is usually the same as the service account for MDS. To associate the MDS Web Application with the MDS Database, you can click the Select button on the Web Configuration page and point to the Database server and MDS Database name that was created earlier. Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 5

6 Figure 5: Enable MDS Web Services If you need to create custom Web applications for MDS, you should also enable the MDS Web Services option. This allows your custom application to access MDS programmatically. The URL for the web services is the MDS Web Application URL plus /service/service.svc (in this example: ). When you receive the Configuration Complete confirmation, you can launch the MDS Web Application named Master Data Manager in the browser using the URL such as in this example. This is the application that will be used to define master data. Alternatively, you can launch the Master Data Manager Getting Started page by checking the Launch Web application in browser checkbox. The Getting Started page shows you common first steps when using MDS such as known issues and access to sample data for learning how MDS works. There are also links for documentation and feedback. The Master Data Manager can also be launched from here. Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 6

7 Figure 6: MDS Model Explorer The Master Data Manager application is used by the data owners and administrators within an organization to define the central Master Data using Master Data Models. Each model can be created and deployed to MDS using this tool. A model consists of entities, hierarchies, attributes, members, and collections that define the master data objects in the business and where they are derived from. Version control and change tracking are built into the application for verification and auditing. Master Data specifications can be imported or exported using Integration Management. In this case, we are going to explore an existing model called Customer. Figure 7: Explore Attributes and Hierarchies Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 7

8 Entities define objects we need to store business data about. An example is the Customer entity. Attributes provide individual information about an entity and provide a container for attribute values or members. An example of an attribute would be Country with members of United States, France, and Germany. Hierarchies provide structure where multiple attributes are related to each other; for instance, a Geography hierarchy might be based on Area, Region, SubRegion, and SalesLocation. Another example may be Product Category, Product Sub Category, and Product. Derived Hierarchies are so-called because they are derived from attributes and the relationships between them. Derived Hierarchies have a consistent number of levels. Explicit Hierarchies can be defined in special circumstances where the hierarchy is ragged (i.e., when there are an inconsistent number of levels such as an employee organization chart). For example, the Engineering department may have 6 levels, but the Marketing department may have only three. A Collection is a group of members that is organized hierarchically but is used when you do not need to use all the members of an explicit hierarchy. The collection can be used for reporting and analysis. An example might be defining a collection of Managers within an employee organization chart. This would enable analysis of managerial trends, for instance. Figure 8: Explore Derived Hierarchy Hierarchies can be maintained using the Hierarchy page. Here we can add/change/delete levels of the hierarchy structure or add/change/delete individual members within a hierarchy level itself. In this case, the structure of the hierarchy is listed on the left of the pane and the members for the current level (Area) are listed on the right including Asia Pacific, Central and Eastern Europe, Greater China, etc. Clicking on any particular level on the left will show the appropriate members on the right. Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 8

9 To view a particular entity, you can select it from the Entities menu, which shows all the entities in the current model. In this case, we wish to explore the Region entity. Figure 9: Explore Entity The members of the entity are displayed on the Entities page. If there are too many members to display, you can apply filtering using the Filter Criteria section. We can also add new members using the + icon as shown. Figure 10: Insert New Member Figure 11: Add Leaf Member In this case, we have chosen to add a member to the Region entity named United Kingdom with the code UK. Once saved, the new member can be further edited with annotations, if necessary. Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 9

10 Figure 12: Associate Region Member to Area member In this case, the Region member UK is being associated with the Area member WEU for Western Europe. Figure 13: View member transactions Note that all changes are tracked via transactions so they can be viewed at a later time for audit purposes. Each transaction shown can be undone if necessary using the undo button. However, even undo operations are captured as transactions for complete auditing purposes. Figure 14: Transaction tracking Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 10

11 Figure 15: Version Management Within the Version Management page, you can lock, validate, or copy a version of a model. Figure 16: Validate Version In this case, we are validating a model version against defined business rules. A model version has to be locked before it can be validated. Figure 17: Integration Management Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 11

12 Once your model structure has been defined, Integration Management allows Master Data Manager to import source data to your model. You can import data from source systems into the model using predefined staging tables within the MDS Database. You can also export data from MDS using subscription views to subscribing systems, if required. Figure 18: Import Figure 19: System Administration With System Administration you can create models and the objects within the models including entities, attributes, and hierarchies. Here, we are using the Model Explorer to view the attributes of the Customer entity in the Customer model. When you click the System Deployment menu, you will launch the Model Deployment Wizard. Figure 20: Model Explorer Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 12

13 The Model Deployment Wizard allows you to Create and/or Deploy a model as a package (.pkg file). This allows a model to be deployed or transported to another MDS system. For instance, when transferring from a staging server to a production server. Figure 21: Create a deployment package Conclusion Master Data Services in SQL Server 2008 R2 allows an organization to define a single source of truth about its enterprise data using a purpose-built centralized database and a predefined Web application Master Data Manager. Multiple application databases can be referenced through models forming a hub-and-spoke type architecture enabling the centralized database to act as the Master Data Hub. Data discovery efforts, such as when building a Data Warehouse or Data Mart, are streamlined with the Master Data Hub acting as the central knowledge-base for your enterprise data. Learn More Learn more about how you can improve productivity, enhance efficiency, and sharpen your competitive edge. Check out the following Global Knowledge courses: SQL Server 2008 for Administration (M6231, M6232) Maintaining, Troubleshooting, and Developing Solutions with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Reporting Services (M6236) For more information or to register, visit or call COURSES to speak with a sales representative. Our courses and enhanced, hands-on labs and exercises offer practical skills and tips that you can immediately put to use. Our expert instructors draw upon their experiences to help you understand key concepts and how to apply them to your specific work situation. Choose from our more than 1,200 courses, delivered through Classrooms, e-learning, and On-site sessions, to meet your IT and business training needs. Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 13

14 About the Author Brian Egler is a Global Knowledge instructor and Course Director specializing in Microsoft SQL Server technologies. He currently resides in Holly Springs, North Carolina. Copyright 2011 Global Knowledge Training LLC. All rights reserved. 14