Use Safyr to find the PeopleSoft Customer-Contact Data Model – quickly and easily
PeopleSoft Financials data model
Here is another in our occasional series of data models of those common business areas in SAP and ORACLE applications for which data models are often required for Information Management projects.
This time it is a set of tables in the form of a data model from a PeopleSoft Financials system, showing Customer-Contact tables and relationships. You can download it as an image here
How did I create it?
Initially I used Safyr® to quickly extract the metadata from our own development version of PeopleSoft. We do not use this application for our own business so there are very few customisations made to the underlying metadata, however Safyr would also extract those changes and make them available. Then as usual I created the data model by performing some simple analysis in Safyr and exported the results to Safyr’s own ERDiagrammer tool. I can easily make the same set of tables available in ERwin, ER/Studio or PowerDesigner formats – please feel free to ask if you would like to see it in one of those formats. There is no obligation and I’d be happy to provide.
Observations
In building the model, a number of observations occurred to me:
- As with previous models in this series, it’s always tricky to decide which tables to include/exclude from the model. My view of what constitutes the Customer/Contact data model is not necessarily yours. There were a number of other ‘Customer’ tables, related to the Customer Header table, which I could have included, but the model would then have been too large to be easily readable.
- What level of detail should be model be shown at? I normally choose ‘Primary and Foreign Key level’, because that shows the important aspects of the model, without drowning it in the full detail of all attributes
- Should the model show ‘Logical’ or ‘Physical’ names for tables and attributes? PeopleSoft Table and Column names are fairly readable, unlike some of the other ERPs we address, but I decided to show both on the model. I prefer to see something called ‘Standard Industry Code’, rather than ‘SIC_CODE’, but that’s just me.
Part of the answer to the point above is for you the user to make these decisions yourself – which is what Safyr is for, enabling you to scope the set of tables that are relevant to your project, including any of the customizations that have been done to your own system. As we are providing something which is usable in some contexts… here is the legal bit. In no event will Silwood Technology Ltd be liable for any indirect, special or consequential loss arising out of or in any way relating to the use or performance or the use or misuse of the information presented in this model. You can find other example models from other ERPs in earlier Blog posts. As always, I welcome any comments, criticisms or observations.
Nick Porter
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