Building Data Architecture

The term, Solution Data Architecture Diagrams, serves as a generic placeholder for two Data Architecture-related diagrams. The following table shows the diagrams relevant for this training and outlines how they differ.

Solution Data Flow Diagrams shows typical data flows for key master, transactional and configuration data. It helps with understanding required data and its distribution across the used Solution Building Blocks (Solution Components). A Solution Data Flow Diagram, or Data Flow Diagram for short, represents the typical flow of data between Solution Components in the context of a specific solution.

A Solution Data Flow Diagram, or Data Flow Diagram for short, represents the typical flow of data between solution components in the context of a specific solution process. A Data Flow Diagram depicts solution components and their implemented, integration-relevant solution data objects. The data flows show the flow of data between the system of records and subsequent solution components.

Identify Solution Data Objects: Specify all (especially integration) relevant Solution Data Objects within the relevant Solution Components. An Solution Data Object is a Solution Component-specific realization of a Business (Data) Object, parts of a Business (Data) Object or multiple Business (Data) Objects.

Specify Data Structure: Define the structure of identified Solution Data Objects. In context of SAP, the structure shall be provided by One Domain Model (ODM).

Specify Data Flows: Define dependencies between identified Solution Data Objects by specifying the flow of data between relevant Solution Components. A Data Flow describes the flow of data between two Solution Data Objects located in different Solution Components. Each endpoint of a data flow is a Solution Data Object, indicating that data is sent from the sending object to the receiving object.

The given example outlines the Data Flow Diagram for HR Data in the Hire-to-Retire process.

The Conceptual Data Diagram describes the information objects / data entities processed by the Solution Components and depicts their relationships.

The purpose of the conceptual data diagram is to outline the relationship between data and business entities of the aspired solution. The Conceptual Data Diagram can be treated like an Entity-Relationship Diagram, outlining, and describing the information being processed by the aspired solution.

Define Entities

Identify information objects (entities) being processed by the Solution Building Blocks and understand the information flow between the Solution Components.

Define Attributes

Name the entities you have identified with an unambiguous name and add attributes or properties with respective data types to further describe the entities. For choosing data types, keep it simple and chose types like "number", "string", "date", for example.

Define Relationships

Think about the relationship between the different entities. Mostly, you will design an association between two entities and define a multiplicity. The association is represented by a solid line between two entities and is described with a verb.

The following graphical representation outlines and example for a Conceptional Data Diagram.