Achieving Maturity in OTM Implementation Processes Part 1. Best practice definitions for Data Management and User Access Management

Achieving Maturity in

OTM Implementation

Processes – Part 1

Best practice definitions for Data Management and User Access Management

History

§   Oct  2005  (just  before  Oracle  acquired  GLog)  –  under  20  OTM  

implementors  within  Europe  

•   Success  in  Projects  achieved  through  individual  endeavours  

•   Regular  issues  with  deployment  to  producHon  –  typos  in  

agent  code,  missing  master  data  etc  

•   Regular  issues  with  user  provisioning,  eg  Hckets  raised  by  

History continued

§ 2006  thru  2009  (Steady  growth  of  OTM  install  base  within  

Europe)  

•   “Home  grown”  tools  emerge  built  by  individual  

implementors  to  solve  their  needs  at  a  parHcular  point  in   Hme  (excel  funcHons,  excel  with  vba,  access  db,  pl/sql,  vb,   java  applet)  

•   Lack  of  consistency  in  approach  between  implementaHons  

•   Clients  encounter  performance  problems  leading  to  

learnings  about  do’s  and  don’ts  -­‐>  fed  back  through  

development  to  become  the  “Performance  tuning  guide   • Projects  delivered  successfully  but:  

§   risk  of  “home  grown”  soluHons  become  unsupportable  

when  the  originaHng  implementor  leaves  the  project  

§   resources  have  to  learn  new  processes  when  moving  

History continued

§ 2010  onward  (Rapid  growth  of  OTM  install  base  within  Europe)  

•   Conscious  effort  to  define  best  pracHces  

•   Aim  to  have  consistent  approach  across  all  of  our  new  

projects  

•   New  breed  of  clients  purchasing  OTM  who  previously  

developed  so^ware  in  house.  -­‐>  Strict  code  management  and   deployment  processes  in  place  which  have  to  be  met.  

• We  start  to  migrate  “home  grown”  tools  to  common  

enterprise  grade  producHsed  plaaorm  

§ Result  is  that  we  have  now  got  defined  best  pracHces  and  are  in  

Rate Maintenance Challenges

Data Loader

How to get the rates from Excel to OTM

Data Management Best Practices

§   Remove  the  IT  middleman  from  the  day  to  day  process  and  

allow  the  business  end  user  who  is  responsible  for  the  data  to   also  load  the  data  

• To  do  this  the  process  must  not  require  the  person  transforming  the  raw   data  and  uploading  it  to  OTM  to  have  any  knowledge  of  scripHng/macro/ coding  languages  

• The  process  should  be  efficient  to  use  (minimal  number  of  mouse  clicks   etc)  

§ Use  robust  repeatable  process  

• TransformaHon  of  the  raw  data  must  produce  idenHcal  results  every  Hme  

•   Define  consistent  naming  convenHons  

•   Validate  the  data  is  correct  

•   IdenHfy  data  formaeng  issues  

•   Avoid  recurrent  errors  

Data Management Best Practices

§ The  transformaHon  must  be  able  to  evolve  over  Hme  

• Adapt  to  new  opportuniHes  (e.g.  modes,  services)    

• Simple  way  for  IT  to  handle  change  requests  to  the  

transformaHon  (e.g.  new  modes,  services)  

• Naming  convenHon  change  should  cascade  to  child  objects  

with  minimal  effort  

§     Data  should  be  Consistent  across  environments  

• e.g.  new  locaHons  loaded  to  Prod  should  also  be  loaded  

efficiently  to  test  environments  

§   The  end  user  should  be  able  to  download  the  exisHng  data,  

make  modificaHons  and  reload  the  new  data  

§   When  new  versions  of  rates  are  loaded,  the  old  version  should  

be  automaHcally  expired  (this  should  not  rely  on  the  naming   convenHon)  

User Access Mgmt Best Practices

§   Define  one  consistent  model  for  user  access  configuraHon  

§ “Level”  and  VPD  profile  are  for  the  funcHonal  role  

§ VPD  context  is  for  the  geographical  element  

§ User  role  brings  together  the  funcHonal  role  and  the  

geographical  element.  

§ User  provisioning  should  require  creaHon  of  a  gl_user  record  

and  assignment  of  one  or  more  user  roles  and  absolutely   nothing  else.  

§   AcHon  checks,  acHon  morgs,  menus,  status  type  filters,  default  

finder  sets  are  funcHonal  role  related  so  should  be  agached  to   the  “level”  

§ Timezones,  currency,  business  monitor  and  therefore  

preference,  along  with  saved  query  filters  are  geographical   based  and  should  be  agached  to  the  user  role.  

Rates maintenance Options

Data Loader

§     Through  the  UI?  

•   MulHple  objects/tabs  

•   Time  consuming  

   

§   IntegraHon?  

•   Disparate  source  data    

•   No  Rate  interface  

 

§   CSV  file  upload?  

•   How  do  you  generate  

the  csvs  for  many  tables   •   How  is  it  supported?  

•   How  is  it  managed?  

•   Where’s  the  audit  trail?   New Contracts Contract Expiry Rate Updates Scheduled Adjustments (e.g. Fuel) Preferred Carriers BUSINESS  NEEDS  

User Access Mgmt Options

§     Through  the  UI?  

•   MulHple  objects/tabs  

•   Time  consuming  

•   Edit  User  Access  screen  

only  available  to   “ADMIN”  Level  

§   IntegraHon?  

•   No  interface  

§   CSV  file  upload?  

•   How  do  you  generate  

the  csvs  for  many  tables   •   How  is  it  supported?  

•   How  is  it  managed?  

•   Where’s  the  audit  trail?   Role out functionality to new geographical region Add new action check to all users BUSINESS  NEEDS  

How are we internally

implementing these Best Practices?

Data Loader

Facilitate the business to load their own data efficiently and robustly

User Access Manager

Facilitate rapid and robust user provisioning Configuration Manager Robust deployment processes Data Archiver & Cleaner

Meet legal requirements for long term storage of critical data while keeping your primary database running efficiently with minimal live

data Deliver

Support tool for issue, request, feature and bug tracking

Data Loader

§

 

Supports multiple environments with different OTM

version

§

 

User Friendly error handling

§

 

Miscellaneous validation & conversion rules

§

 

Data can be pushed directly into OTM or loaded using

csvutil zip file through the OTM UI

§

 

Very quick and robust process

§

 

UI for IT personnel to easily manage and create new

templates

§

 

Extract Data from OTM back into Excel

§

 

User  Security  &  Help   Data Loader

Data Loader Templates

Template for

CE TL RATES _{CE TL RATES} OTM csv for

Template for

NE RAIL RATES OTM csv for _{NE RAIL}

RATES Template for

LOCATIONS _LOCATIONS OTM csv for

§

 

Validation Rules

§

 

Mapping Rules

§

 

Versioning Rules

User Access Manager

§

 

Supports multiple environments with different OTM

version

§

 

Locking Mechanisms to force serialisation of tasks if

they collide.

§

 

Saved queries built from templates plus parameters

§

 

Uniform naming conventions enforced across all

geographies

§

 

Time to create action checks greatly reduced

§

 

Load to OTM directly or using csvutil zip file  

Data Loader Process

Data Loader

§   Start  with  an  empty  (or  pre-­‐populated)  spreadsheet  

•   Send  to  Pricing  Team  

•   Send  to  Carrier  

§   Upload  spreadsheet  

•   Validate  

•   Error  Handling  

§   Load  into  OTM  

•   csv  zipfile  

•   or  direct  db  

1

2

Demonstration

Other Uses

Data Loader

§

 

Load test data into OTM for OTM testing before

integration feeds have been built

§

 

Load performance test data

- eg > 100000 orders with related shipments etc ready for inbound and outbound message testing

§

 

Extract business objects from production and load them

into a test environment for issue replication

§

 

Prototyping

Questions

?

Questions and Answer