BW Information Model: Overview
BW information model is based on the core building block of InfoObjects which are used to describe business processes and information requirements. They provide basis for setting up complex information models in multiple languages, currencies, units of measure, hierarchy, etc. The key elements in the SAP’s BW information model which are:

• DataSources
• InfoSources
• ODS Objects
• InfoCubes
• InfoProviders
• MultiProviders

Data Sources
DataSources are flat data structures containing data that logically belongs together. They are responsible for extracting and staging data from various source systems.

InfoSources
InfoSources are the group of InfoObjects that belong together from a business point of view. It contains the transactional data obtained from the transactions in online transactional processes (OLTP) and master data such as addresses of customers and organizations, which remain unchanged for longer time period.

ODS objects
An ODS object is a dataset which is formed as a result of merging data from one or more info sources. In it information is stored in the form of flat, transparent database tables that are used for preparing reports and quality assurance purposes.

InfoCubes
InfoCubes are multidimensional data storage containers for reporting and analysis of data. They consist of keys figures and characteristics of which latter is organized as dimensions facilitating users to analyze data from various business perspectives such as geographical area or types of sales channel.

InfoProviders
InfoProviders refer to all the data objects that are present in the SAP BW systems. These include all the data targets viz. InfoCubes, ODS objects and master data tables along with Info sets, remote Infocubes and MultiProviders.

MultiProviders
MultiProvider is a virtual information provider which is a combination of any two physical or virtual info providers. MultiProviders do not contain any data and are used to combine data from different info providers. Their main purpose is to make this data accessible for reports and analysis.

BW Database Design
The info cubes and master data tables that are used in a BW system are generally unique to that system as shown in the figure below :-

The complexity of the objects in this design leads to the challenge of maintaining up-to-date and accurate data in all the BW data tables. However, loading data into the BW is accomplished by using InfoPackages. InfoPackages are tools for organizing data requests that are extracted from the source system and are loaded into the BW system. With the progress of BW project the number of info packages increases emphasizing the importance of good performance of each info package. Although the DBMS underlying the BW system is monitored by the standard software’s for the R/3 functionality but this leaves a gap between the table spaces and table names as they appear at the DBMS level and the BW application level entities to which these objects belong. To bridge this gap, the new BW functionality for R/3 includes reports that place DBMS objects in a BW context. These reports allow the user to take an object at the DBMS level and associate it with its application-level entity.

In case of any problem in order to enable the administrator to identify the problem the InfoPackages are organized on the basis of the object to which they are transporting data- Info cube, ODS or Master Data. The overall request status for the object is displayed, and an alarm is triggered if any Info Package run from any Info Source fails. In this way, the administrator is able to locate the exact position where a failure is going to impact the users and the BW system. Also, for InfoCubes, Master Data and the ODS to give an overview of the history of requests for the system, the progress of the last N requests through each stage of extraction and load is displayed, and for any failures, the step that failed is displayed. The performance of requests can be monitored by display of performance statistics for each stage of extraction and load in the form of graphs.

Metadata modeling: Metadata modeling component is the main entry point for defining the core metadata objects used to support reporting and analysis. This includes everything from defining the extraction process and implementing transformations to defining flat or multidimensional objects for storage of information.

Modeling Features

• Metadata modeling provides a Metadata Repository where all the metadata is stored and a Metadata Manager that handles all the requests for retrieving, adding, changing, or deleting metadata.
• Reporting and scheduling mechanism: Reporting and scheduling are the processes required for the smooth functioning of SAP BW. The various batch processes in the SAP BW need to be planned to provide timely results, avoid resource conflicts by running too many jobs at a time and to take care of logical dependencies between different jobs. These processes are controlled in the scheduler component of AWB. This is achieved by either scheduling single processes independently or defining process chains for complex network of jobs required to update the information available in the SAP BW system. Reporting Agent controls execution of queries in a batch mode to print reports, identify exception conditions and notify users and pre compute results for web templates.

With the growing network of processes and systems, the need for efficient management support systems is also increasing. However for this it is not enough to place a company strategically and give guidelines for its further development. Instead it is essential to have real time analysis and graphical visualization of the key performance indicators. In BW automatic assimilation and analysis of information is possible. BW gives a holistic view of the company by considering both the financial data and non- financial assets of the company. As corporate planning is often not done in one common planning tool (e.g. turnover plan in a sales system and cost center plan in excel) studying interdependencies and coordination among them has become even more tedious. Thus the strategic management system must establish a planning process through all levels of planning in the company to make the data available for all responsible persons in one system. With SAP BW it is possible to upload data of different planning tools, manipulate planning data and write back changed data to the operational system. BW can also be used as early warning system to inform the responsible persons about critical indicators on the basis of already defined thresholds of these indicators.