Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Table of Contents
1. Introduction 2. Siebel EIM 3. An Alternative Approach to EIM 4. Required Setup for Implementing Scenario 5. Implementation Steps 6. Other Alternatives 7. Conclusion 3 3 4 5 6 7 7
Introduction
One of the greatest information management challenges facing any organization is to maintain a consistent 360-degree view of the customer. Even though there are several applications for managing customer relationships or a CRM suite like Siebel eBusiness Applications, there is still a need for rich data integration with the back-ofce systems. Siebel eBusiness Application provides an inbuilt solution to enable bi-directional batch data integration using the Siebel Enterprise Integration Manager (EIM) to interface with Siebels Data Objects layer. This enables reading and writing bulk data in and out of the Siebel database via the Siebel interface tables. While EIM offers an out of the box solution to the batch data integration needs, it demands overheads in terms of administering and maintaining additional interface tables. The focus of this paper is to explore Siebel VB Scripting using COM Interface as an alternative approach for secure data loading into the Siebel Database. Siebel VB provides for in-built methods and functions to invoke Siebel objects through the COM interface and act much like the data entry via the user interface. These invocations are achieved through a program external to the Siebel application.
Siebel EIM
Siebel EIM manages the bidirectional exchange of data between the Siebel databases and other corporate databases. This exchange of information is accomplished through intermediary (interface) tables called EIM tables. The EIM tables act as a staging area between the Siebel application database and other databases. Direct modication of Siebel base tables is not supported because there is a high risk of corrupting the data integrity since the logical relationships that exist within the Siebel base tables are many and complex. Data ow in EIM is shown in the gure below.
The Siebel database contains Siebel interface tables and Siebel base tables. EIM transports the data between the interface tables and the base tables. Any SQL ancillary program utility can be used to transport the data to/from the interface tables from/to a non-Siebel database.
A sample implementation scenario is considered for explaining this alternate (usage of Siebel VB) approach. Consider a scenario where an organization has multiple sources of data (such as external purchased lists, campaign questionnaires, third party feed, web forms etc.) to be loaded in to Siebel. The format of data varies with the source. Receiving data from multiple sources through a standard automated process for data consolidation is a very common requirement for many organizations. This can be loaded onto the Siebel database after applying all the necessary validations and business rules.
All input parameters such as cfg le name, Login parameters for Siebel application, ftp site and database should be dened in an external text le (.ini le) or in the registry or in a database table. Hence the same generic program can be used for different applications or instances by changing the parameters externally.
Implementation Steps
The ow diagram given below explains the program ow using a single record example.
Program Flow for Single Record 1. The program obtains the set of parameters from the parameters le/database table. 2. Data feed les are downloaded from the pre-dened ftp location and are converted into a pre-dened standard format. 3. Data is read from the standard format le and stored in an array (for example, Data Array), using the mapping dened in the BC Table. 4.Processing starts with retrieving the list of Business Objects to be invoked from the BO Table in the order of the sequence number. 5.The list of business components for the rst BO is retrieved from the BC Table. 6.The list of mandatory elds is retrieved for each of the Business Components and the data feed records with not null values in all the mandatory columns will undergo duplication check with the Siebel DB before it is processed further. For example, updating an existing record or creating a new record for the BC. Note: Records from the data feed having null valued mandatory columns will be rejected and entered in the Error log table or the error log le. 7.Details of loading such as total count of records, count of rejected records, etc. would be entered into the Load Log Table or the Load log le. 8. Load Report would be generated from the Load Log and Error Log table or le.
Other Alternatives
Other than Siebel VB, data imports can also be handled through custom eScripts using Business Services, Workows and EAI. Data loading is direct (that is, from a at or .XML le) without going through intermediate staging tables. eScripts have their own methods to invoke Siebel objects to do data validation and manipulation. However, eScripting is not recommended when the volume, variety and velocity of data loading is high.
Conclusion
EIM offers an innovative, secure, scalable and robust method to import or export bulk data. Siebel VB reduces complexity, ensures ease of deployment, optimizes cross platform business processes by adhering to a standards-based architecture that needs to be factored in before any given choice is made. Implementation teams need to weigh the advantages and disadvantages on a case-by-case basis before arriving at the nal decision.
All content / information present here is the exclusive property of Tata Consultancy Services Limited (TCS). The content / information contained here is correct at the time of publishing. No material from here may be copied, modied, reproduced, republished, uploaded, transmitted, posted or distributed in any form without prior written permission from TCS. Unauthorized use of the content / information appearing here may violate copyright, trademark and other applicable laws, and could result in criminal or civil penalties. Copyright 2004-05 Tata Consultancy Services Limited
Siebel COM Based Interface An Innovative Alternative to EIM