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WrittenbyMonika

LastUpdated:11December2011

Hover to Expand

LearntheanswersofsomecriticalquestionscommonlyaskedduringSAPBODataServicesinterview.
1.WhatistheuseofBusinessObjectsDataServices?
Answer:
BusinessObjects Data Services provides a graphical interface that allows you to easily create jobs that
extractdatafromheterogeneoussources,transformthatdatatomeetthebusinessrequirementsofyour
organization,andloadthedataintoasinglelocation.
2.DefineDataServicescomponents.
Answer:
DataServicesincludesthefollowingstandardcomponents:

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Designer
Repository
JobServer
Engines
AccessServer
Adapters
RealtimeServices
AddressServer
CleansingPackages,Dictionaries,andDirectories
ManagementConsole
3.WhatarethestepsincludedinDataintegrationprocess?
Answer:
Stagedatainanoperationaldatastore,datawarehouse,ordatamart.
Updatestageddatainbatchorrealtimemodes.
Create a single environment for developing, testing, and deploying the entire data integration
platform.
Manage a single metadata repository to capture the relationships between different extraction and
accessmethodsandprovideintegratedlineageandimpactanalysis.
4.DefinethetermsJob,Workflow,andDataflow
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Answer:
Ajobisthesmallestunitofworkthatyoucanscheduleindependentlyforexecution.
Aworkflowdefinesthedecisionmakingprocessforexecutingdataflows.
Data flows extract, transform, and load data. Everything having to do with data, including reading
sources,transformingdata,andloadingtargets,occursinsideadataflow.
5.Arrangetheseobjectsinorderbytheirhierarchy:Dataflow,Job,Project,andWorkflow.
Answer
Project,Job,Workflow,Dataflow.
6.WhatarereusableobjectsinDataServices?
Answer:
Job,Workflow,Dataflow.
7.Whatisatransform?
Answer:
Atransformenablesyoutocontrolhowdatasetschangeinadataflow.
8.WhatisaScript?
Answer:
Ascriptisasingleuseobjectthatisusedtocallfunctionsandassignvaluesinaworkflow.
9.WhatisarealtimeJob?
Answer:
Realtime jobs "extract" data from the body of the real time message received and from any secondary
sourcesusedinthejob.
10.WhatisanEmbeddedDataflow?
Answer:
AnEmbeddedDataflowisadataflowthatiscalledfrominsideanotherdataflow.
11.Whatisthedifferencebetweenadatastoreandadatabase?
Answer:
Adatastoreisaconnectiontoadatabase.
12.HowmanytypesofdatastoresarepresentinDataservices?
Answer:
Three.
DatabaseDatastores:provideasimplewaytoimportmetadatadirectlyfromanRDBMS.
Application Datastores: let users easily import metadata frommost Enterprise Resource Planning
(ERP)systems.
AdapterDatastores:canprovideaccesstoanapplicationsdataandmetadataorjustmetadata.
13.WhatistheuseofCompacerepository?
Answer:
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Removeredundantandobsoleteobjectsfromtherepositorytables.
14.WhatareMemoryDatastores?
Answer:
Data Services also allows you to create a database datastore using Memory as the Database type.
MemoryDatastoresaredesignedtoenhanceprocessingperformanceofdataflowsexecutinginrealtime
jobs.
15.Whatarefileformats?
Answer:
Afileformatisasetofpropertiesdescribingthestructureofaflatfile(ASCII).Fileformatsdescribethe
metadatastructure.Fileformatobjectscandescribefilesin:
DelimitedformatCharacterssuchascommasortabsseparateeachfield.
FixedwidthformatThecolumnwidthisspecifiedbytheuser.
SAPERPandR/3format.
16.WhichisNOTadatastoretype?
Answer:
FileFormat
17.Whatisrepository?Listthetypesofrepositories.
Answer:
The DataServices repository is a set of tables that holds usercreated and predefined system objects,
sourceandtargetmetadata,andtransformationrules.Thereare3typesofrepositories.
Alocalrepository
Acentralrepository
Aprofilerrepository
18.WhatisthedifferencebetweenaRepositoryandaDatastore?
Answer:
ARepositoryisasetoftablesthatholdsystemobjects,sourceandtargetmetadata,andtransformation
rules.ADatastoreisanactualconnectiontoadatabasethatholdsdata.
19.WhatisthedifferencebetweenaParameterandaVariable?
Answer:
A Parameter is an expression that passes a piece of information to a work flow, data flow or custom
functionwhenitiscalledinajob.AVariableisasymbolicplaceholderforvalues.
20.Whenwouldyouuseaglobalvariableinsteadofalocalvariable?
Answer:
Whenthevariablewillneedtobeusedmultipletimeswithinajob.
When you want to reduce the development time required for passing values between job
components.
When you need to create a dependency between job level global variable name and job
components.
21.WhatisSubstitutionParameter?
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Answer:
The Value that is constant in one environment, but may change when a job is migrated to another
environment.
22.Listsomereasonswhyajobmightfailtoexecute?
Answer:
Incorrectsyntax,JobServernotrunning,portnumbersforDesignerandJobServernotmatching.
23.Listfactorsyouconsiderwhendeterminingwhethertorunworkflowsordataflowsseriallyor
inparallel?
Answer:
Considerthefollowing:
Whetherornottheflowsareindependentofeachother
Whether or not the server can handle the processing requirements of flows running at the same
time(inparallel)
24.Whatdoesalookupfunctiondo?Howdothedifferentvariationsofthelookupfunctiondiffer?
Answer:
All lookup functions return one row for each row in the source. They differ in how they choose which of
severalmatchingrowstoreturn.'
25.ListthethreetypesofinputformatsacceptedbytheAddressCleansetransform.
Answer:
Discrete,multiline,andhybrid.
26. Name the transform that you would use to combine incoming data sets to produce a single
outputdatasetwiththesameschemaastheinputdatasets.
Answer:
TheMergetransform.
27.WhatareAdapters?
Answer:
Adapters are additional Javabased programs that can be installed on the job server to provide
connectivity to other systems such as Salesforce.com or the JavaMessagingQueue. There is also a
SoftwareDevelopmentKit(SDK)toallowcustomerstocreateadaptersforcustomapplications.
28.Listthedataintegratortransforms
Answer:
Data_Transfer
Date_Generation
Effective_Date
Hierarchy_Flattening
History_Preserving
Key_Generation
Map_CDC_Operation
PivotReversePivot
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Table_Comparison
XML_Pipeline
29.ListtheDataQualityTransforms
Answer:
Global_Address_Cleanse
Data_Cleanse
Match
Associate
Country_id
USA_Regulatory_Address_Cleanse
30.WhatareCleansingPackages?
Answer:
These are packages that enhance the ability of Data Cleanse to accurately process various forms of
globaldatabyincludinglanguagespecificreferencedataandparsingrules.
31.WhatisDataCleanse?
Answer:
The Data Cleanse transform identifies and isolates specific parts of mixed data, and standardizes your
data based on information stored in the parsing dictionary, business rules defined in the rule file, and
expressionsdefinedinthepatternfile.
32.WhatisthedifferencebetweenDictionaryandDirectory?
Answer:
Directoriesprovideinformationonaddressesfrompostalauthorities.Dictionaryfilesareusedtoidentify,
parse,andstandardizedatasuchasnames,titles,andfirmdata.
33.Givesomeexamplesofhowdatacanbeenhancedthroughthedatacleansetransform,and
describethebenefitofthoseenhancements.
Answer:
EnhancementBenefit
Determinegenderdistributionsandtarget
GenderCodesmarketingcampaigns
Providefieldsforimprovingmatching
MatchStandardsresults
34.Aprojectrequirestheparsingofnamesintogivenandfamily,validatingaddressinformation,
and finding duplicates across several systems. Name the transforms needed and the task they
willperform.
Answer:
DataCleanse:Parsenamesintogivenandfamily.
AddressCleanse:Validateaddressinformation.
Match:Findduplicates.
35.DescribewhentousetheUSARegulatoryandGlobalAddressCleansetransforms.
Answer:
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Use the USA Regulatory transform if USPS certification and/or additional options such as DPV and
Geocodearerequired.GlobalAddressCleanseshouldbeutilizedwhenprocessingmulticountrydata.
36.GivetwoexamplesofhowtheDataCleansetransformcanenhance(append)data.
Answer:
TheDataCleansetransformcangeneratenamematchstandardsandgreetings.Itcanalsoassigngender
codesandprenamessuchasMr.andMrs.
37.Whatarenamematchstandardsandhowaretheyused?
Answer:
Name match standards illustrate the multiple ways a name can be represented.They are used in the
matchprocesstogreatlyincreasematchresults.
38.Whatarethedifferentstrategiesyoucanusetoavoidduplicaterowsofdatawhenreloading
ajob.
Answer:
Usingtheautocorrectloadoptioninthetargettable.
IncludingtheTableComparisontransforminthedataflow.
Designingthedataflowtocompletelyreplacethetargettableduringeachexecution.
IncludingapreloadSQLstatementtoexecutebeforethetableloads.
39.WhatistheuseofAutoCorrectLoad?
Answer:
Itdoesnotallowduplicateddataenteringintothetargettable.ItworkslikeType1InsertelseUpdatethe
rowsbasedonNonmatchingandmatchingdatarespectively.
40.WhatistheuseofArrayfetchsize?
Answer:
Array fetch size indicates the number of rows retrieved in a single request to a source database. The
default value is 1000. Higher numbers reduce requests, lowering network traffic, and possibly improve
performance.Themaximumvalueis5000
41.WhatarethedifferencebetweenRowbyrowselectandCachedcomparisontableandsorted
inputinTableComparisonTranform?
Answer:
Rowbyrow select look up the target table using SQL every time it receives an input row. This
optionisbestifthetargettableislarge.
Cached comparison table To load the comparison table into memory. This option is best when
thetablefitsintomemoryandyouarecomparingtheentiretargettable
Sorted input To read the comparison table in the order of the primary key column(s) using
sequential read.This option improves performance because Data Integrator reads the comparison
tableonlyonce.AddaquerybetweenthesourceandtheTable_Comparisontransform.Then,from
thequerysinputschema,dragtheprimarykeycolumnsintotheOrderByboxofthequery.
42.WhatistheuseofusingNumberofloadersinTargetTable?
Answer:

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Number of loaders loading with one loader is known as Single loader Loading. Loading when the
numberofloadersisgreaterthanoneisknownasParallelLoading.Thedefaultnumberofloadersis1.
Themaximumnumberofloadersis5.
43.WhatistheuseofRowspercommit?
Answer:
Specifies the transaction size in number of rows. If set to 1000, Data Integrator sends a commit to the
underlyingdatabaseevery1000rows.
44.Whatisthedifferencebetweenlookup(),lookup_ext()andlookup_seq()?
Answer:
lookup():Briefly,Itreturnssinglevaluebasedonsinglecondition
lookup_ext():Itreturnsmultiplevaluesbasedonsingle/multiplecondition(s)
lookup_seq():Itreturnsmultiplevaluesbasedonsequencenumber
45.WhatistheuseofHistorypreservingtransform?
Answer:
The History_Preserving transform allows you to produce a new row in your target rather than updating
an existing row. You can indicate in which columns the transform identifies changes to be preserved. If
thevalueofcertaincolumnschange,thistransformcreatesanewrowforeachrowflaggedasUPDATE
intheinputdataset.
46.WhatistheuseofMapOperationTransfrom?
Answer:
TheMap_Operationtransformallowsyoutochangeoperationcodesondatasetstoproducethedesired
output.Operationcodes:INSERTUPDATE,DELETE,NORMAL,orDISCARD.
47.WhatisHeirarchyFlatenning?
Answer:
Constructs a complete hierarchy from parent/child relationships, and then produces a description of the
hierarchyinverticallyorhorizontallyflattenedformat.
ParentColumn,ChildColumn
ParentAttributes,ChildAttributes.
48.WhatistheuseofCaseTransform?
Answer:
Use the Case transform to simplify branch logic in data flows by consolidating case or decisionmaking
logic into one transform. The transformallows you to split a data set into smaller sets based on logical
branches.
49.Whatmustyoudefineinordertoauditadataflow?
Answer:
Youmustdefineauditpointsandauditruleswhenyouwanttoauditadataflow.
50.ListsomefactorsforPERFORMANCETUNINGindataservices?
Answer:
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ThefollowingsectionsdescribewaysyoucanadjustDataIntegratorperformance
Sourcebasedperformanceoptions
Usingarrayfetchsize
Cachingdata
Joinordering
Minimizingextracteddata
Targetbasedperformanceoptions
Loadingmethodandrowspercommit
Stagingtablestospeedupautocorrectloads
Jobdesignperformanceoptions
Improvingthroughput
Maximizingthenumberofpusheddownoperations
Minimizingdatatypeconversion
Minimizinglocaleconversion
ImprovingInformixrepositoryperformance

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