Methods for acquiring and transforming data for business analysis, and computer
readable media having program instructions for enabling the same are provided.
One exemplary method identifies a set of data sources to be accessed for a user,
loads the raw data from each of the accessed set of data sources to raw data type
specific locations then verifies the integrity of the acquired raw data. Next the
acquired raw data of each of the raw data type specific locations is transformed
to a uniform data type and then stored as processed data into processed data type
specific locations. Some notable advantages of the discussed methods of acquiring
and presenting data for business analysis purposes is the ability to efficiently
extract, organize and present the data as requested by a customer over a world
wide computer network. Examples of such efficiency include the ability to convert
data acquired from disparate sources to a uniform format, thus allowing centralization
of the data and eliminating the need to continually access various data sources
to provide requested reports. The customer can thus be provided with dynamic reports
in real-time, thereby allowing for time sensitive and mission critical business
decisions to be made with current data.