Introduction

The term "Data Warehouse" was first coined by Bill Inmon in 1990.
According to Inmon, a data warehouse is a subject oriented, integrated,
time-variant, and non-volatile collection of data.
This data helps analysts to take informed decisions in an organization.
A Data Warehousing (DW) is process for collecting and managing data
from varied sources to provide meaningful business insights.
Data warehouse is like a realatonal database designed for analytical needs.
A data warehouses provides us generalized and consolidated data in multidimensional
view.
Data Warehouse (DWH), is also known as an Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW)

how data warehouse works:

A data warehouse merges information coming from different sources into one
comprehensive database.
By merging all of this information in one place, an organization can analyze its
customers more holistically.
A data warehouse works similarly to a modern distribution hub.
When a distribution center receives and stores products, materials,
and supplies in a clean, safe, and organized environment.
A data warehouse does the same thing except it is storing data,
not materials. It collects data and stores it across several individual files.
A data warehouse receives data from relational databases,
transactional systems, and other sources.
Data in a data warehouse is accessed by data scientists through SQL clients,
business intelligence (BI) tools, and other applications.

why we need data warehouse?

The need to warehouse data evolved as computer systems became more complex
and needed to handle increasing amounts of Information.
An ordinary Database can store MBs to GBs of data and that too for a specific
purpose.
For storing data of TB size, the storage shifted to Data Warehouse.
and one reason is that data stored in various database cannot be visuailized.
the data first need to be intergrated and then processed before visuilization

Types of Data Warehouse

Three main types of Data Warehouses (DWH) are:
1. Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW):
An enterprise data warehouse (EDW) is a relational data warehouse containing a
company’s business data,
including information about its customers. An EDW enables data analytics, which
can inform actionable insights.
Like all data warehouses, EDWs collect and aggregate data from multiple sources,
acting as
a repository for most or all organizational data to facilitate broad access and
analysis2.
Operational Data Store:
Operational Data Store, which is also called ODS, are nothing but data store
required
when neither Data warehouse nor OLTP systems support organizations reporting needs.
In ODS, Data warehouse is refreshed in real time. Hence, it is widely preferred
for routine activities
like storing records of the Employees.
3. Data Mart:
A data mart is a subset of the data warehouse. It specially designed for a
particular line of business,
such as sales, finance, sales or finance. In an independent data mart, data can
collect directly from sources.

key componwnts;
Metadata:
Metadata is data about your data. It specifies the source, usage, values, and other
features of the data
sets in your data warehouse. There is business metadata, which adds context to your
data, and technical metadata,
which describes how to access data – including where it resides and how it is
structured.
Data warehouse access tools:
Access tools allow users to interact with the data in your data warehouse.
Examples of access tools include: query and reporting tools, application
development tools, data mining tools,
and OLAP tools.

characterstics:
Subject Oriented − A data warehouse is subject oriented because it provides 
information around a subject rather than the organization's ongoing operations. 

Integrated − A data warehouse is constructed by integrating data from heterogeneous

sources such as relational databases, flat files, etc. 

Time Variant − The data collected in a data warehouse is identified

with a particular time period. 

Non-volatile − Non-volatile means the previous data is not erased when new data is
added to it.