What is a canonical data model?
A canonical data model (CDM) is a standardized and simplified representation of data entities and relationships within an organization or across different systems. It acts as an intermediary format that facilitates seamless and consistent data exchange between different systems and applications, enhancing interoperability, data quality, and overall efficiency in data management and integration processes.
Benefits of a canonical data model
Standardization: provides a common format and structure for data, which helps with preparing and standardizing data definitions, formats, and semantics across disparate systems.
Simplification: simplifies complex data structures by defining a unified model that can be easily interpreted and used by various systems and applications.
Interoperability: by serving as a common language, a CDM facilitates data exchange and integration between different systems, applications, and services, reducing the need for multiple point-to-point integrations
Consistency: ensures that data is consistent and accurate across different systems by providing a unified view of data entities and relationships.
Scalability: a CDM can scale to accommodate changes in business requirements, new data sources, and evolving data structures without significant rework.
Example use cases of a canonical data model
Enterprise application integration (EAI): a canonical data model can be used to integrate data from enterprise applications, such as ERP, CRM, and SCM systems, into a unified view.
Service-oriented architecture (SOA): in a service-oriented architecture, a canonical data model acts as a common data structure for services to communicate and exchange information.
Data warehousing: helps with consolidating data from multiple sources into an enterprise data warehouse or cloud data warehouse with a consistent structure and format.
