Balaji Yuvarajan

Informatica Certified Consultant

Advanced Teradata Certified Professional, Teradata Implementation and SQL specia
list
612-987-4065(cell)
SUMMARY
* Data Warehouse and Business Intelligence Technical Lead, ETL and Data Warehou
se Architect
* Have nearly 10 years of experience in the Information Technology(IT) industry
, with more than 5 years experience in Infosys Technologies, with specialization
in Business Intelligence, Data warehouse and ETL fields
* Have lead BI projects, as an ETL architect, developing end to end solutions f
or large Enterprise Data warehouse, Datamarts and complex ETL projects using Inf
ormatica(v 7.1, 8.1 and v 8.6) with Teradata(v7 and v12), Oracle, DB2 and SQL da
tabases, IBM WCC , MQ series and with Business Objects(XI R2) as reporting tool
and OBIEE.
* Certified Informatica Consultant, Advanced Teradata Certified Professional, C
ertified SQL specialist, Certified Implementation Specialist
* Extensive experience in Conceptual, Logical and Physical data modeling using
ERwin for large Enterprise Data warehouses and designing ETL solutions for dataw
arehouses of size over 200 Terabytes.
* Instrumental in Modeling Complex Data Warehouses of varying Complexities in v
aried business domains
* Extensive experience in Data Quality analysis, Data Profiling, Informatica B2
B, Metadata manager
* Expert level query tuning experience
* Sound knowledge of ETL SDLC and on implementing Capability Maturity Models(CM
M-Level5) and CMM(I) processes in projects
ETL Development with Informatica, Teradata and Oracle:
* Designed, Developed and Implemented various ETL applications using Informatic
a and Teradata
* Designed and Developed Informatica Realtime ETL applications for integrating
IBM Websphere applications using XML and IBM MQ series
* Developed solutions to reuse Informatica components, developed common formats
, several reusable Unix wrapper scripts, Teradata BTEQ, across various projects,
which resulted in large cost savings to the clients.
Centre of Excellence(CoE) experience:
* Have experience in working in the Center of Excellence(CoE) for Data Integrat
ion, Data Warehousing and Data management.
* Performed Technical Lead role in CoE projects with teams located Onsite and i
n offshore locations in different countries
* As a part of this team, I had been involved in defining and implementing Data
management strategy for the company, implementing best practices and optimal so
lutions to a variety of data integration, data warehouse projects.
Unix Administration and Development:
* Have more than 7 years of experience in Developing shell scripts and administ
ering several Unix servers supporting large business applications.
* Has developed several shell wrapper scripts, automation, server monitoring sc
ripts to perform end-to-end loading of data using Informatica and Teradata.
Windows and Unix Server migrations:
* Have experience in migrating several large business application Windows and U
nix servers, across business
units and across different companies.
* Automated several migration processes to reduce the migration time and to imp
rove the efficiency of the
migrations.
* Technology:
* Informatica Power center(versions: 7.1, 8.1, 8.6)
* Data Profiler, Informatica B2B, Metadata manager
* Teradata BTEQ scripting(Using Mload, Fastexport, Tpump, UDFs)
* ERWin
* Sybase, DB2, Oracle
* Developing Data models(DM) (Abstract DM, Physical DM, Logical DM) for Large E
nterprise Warehouses
* Unix shell scripting and server administration
* Experience in:
* Onsite/offshore management and coordination across various geographies. Coord
inated 50-60 member teams located in different countries.
* Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) for several Data warehousing, ETL proj
ects and end-to-end project development and delivery
* Implementing CMM(Level 5), CMM(I) and various Infosys software quality standa
rds in various projects
* Designing solutions to backload large volumes of complex data models to EDW
* Change management, Configuration management, Release management and using var
ious software development processes and tools to manage and execute large and bu
siness critical projects
* On the job Mainframe MVS administration training for 8 months at Maples ESM t
echnologies
* Business domains
* Have executed projects in the following business domains - Healthcare, Health
Insurance, Telecom, Retirement services(401(k)), Financial Planning, Financial
Advice, Compliance, Insurance and Annuities, Investments, Banking, Mutual Funds,
Credit cards and Financial Securities
* Certifications:
* Informatica certified consultant
* Informatica PowerCenter 8 - Architecture and Administration
* Informatica PowerCenter 8 - Mapping Design
* Informatica PowerCenter 8 - Advanced Mapping Design
* Informatica PowerCenter 8 - Advanced Administration
* Informatica PowerCenter 8 - Enablement Technologies
* Teradata Certified Professional V2 R5
* Teradata Certified SQL specialist V2 R5
* Teradata Certified Implementation Specialist V2R5
* Advanced Teradata Certified Professional V2 R5
* Fundamentals of Financial Securities certified by Dun & Bradstreet
* Advanced Open systems certification - C, Oracle, Unix
* Quality process
* Education: B.S. Computer Science & Engineering
KEY SKILLS & KNOWLEDGE
Languages:
Unix shell scripting, C, C++, COBOL, Java, JCL,
ASP, JSP, PL/SQL, JavaScript, Perl Scripting,
Sybase SQL programming, MQ Series, Sybase stored procedures, VB, JavaScript, XML
, HTML, FORTRAN, PL/SQL, SQL*Plus, Teradata BTEQ scripting
Tools:
Informatica Powercenter 7.1, 8.1, 8.5 Informatica
Power exchange, Mainframe, Data Profiler using Informatica, Informatica B2B, IDE
5.0, Metadata manager, EXEROS for Transformation discovery , IBM Webshpere , TO
AD, ERwin, Business Objects(XI R2) Distributed Scheduling tools, Mainframe TSO,
Quality center, Clear Quest, DOORS(For Tracking project Requirements), Actuate A
dministrator, Actuate Developer Workbench, NetValult for database backup
Databases:
SQL Server 2000, Oracle 9, DB2(On Mainframe
And Distributed environments), Teradata 12.0,
Sybase 12.5
Operating systems:
Unix(AIX, Sun Solaris, HP), MVS, OS/390, Z-OS,
Windows 95/NT/2000/XP, IBM Mainframe
Scheduling Tools:
Unix -- Maestro, Control M, WLM
Mainframe - ZEKE, JobTrac
Testing Tools
Quality Center / Test Director, IBM Rational ClearQuest
AWARD
* Received a highly recognized "Extra Miler award" from Infosys Technologies fo
r exemplary performance in the projects
* Received several other awards and accolades from the employer and several cli
ents for outstanding performance in projects
BUSINESS AND APPLICATION EXPERIENCE
Gantec Corporation Jun 2008 -Present
Client: WellPoint, Inc. / Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield Dec 2008-Present
WCC Enablement Project
Role: ETL Designer and Architect
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 8.1, 8.6, Power Exchange, MQ, IDE 5.0 IBM We
bsphere XML, DTD, XSD and Unix shell scripting
This purpose of this project is to migrate WellPoint applications that are runni
ng on Mainframe systems to IBM Websphere Web applications and build a real-time
CDC(Change data capture) system to load data from mainframe systems to the Web a
pplication, real time. This project utilizes MQ as the middleware to move data(e
mbedded in XML messages) between the Mainframe systems, ETL and the target IBM W
ebsphere application.
Roles and Responsibilities:
* Designing the approach for migration
* Developing architecture for Change Data Capture(CDC) realtime approach
* Developed a common format approach for the entire project, which was used in
the next projects
* Developing architecture for the project end-to-end
* Developing test approaches, balance and counts auditing, response monitoring
* Defining configuration and approach for Unite testing, SIT, UAT and Productio
n migration
* Developing the approach for automating the entire process using scheduler, id
entifying runtimes, dependencies that is suitable for the environments
* Developing Production migration process for Initial load and CDC
* Developing and Implementing Standards and control for ETL code migration acro
ss various environments
* Implementing reusability in the project by identifying common design patters
across various components in the project, thereby improving the cost savings for
the client
* Suggesting improvements, optimizations in the project that resulted in cost a
nd effort savings
Building Enterprise Data Layer(EDL) for WellPoint, Inc.
Role: ETL Designer and Architect
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 8.1, 8.6, IDE 5.0, Teradata 6.0, Power Excha
nge, MQ, IBM Websphere XML, DTD, XSD and Unix shell scripting,
The purpose of this project is to build and Enterprise Data Layer(EDL) for WellP
oint, Inc. As part of this project data from various sources systems are loaded
to the Enterprise wide Data warehouse. This involves building Staging, Data ware
house tables, audit, error handling, error reporting and Data reporting using Bu
siness objects. The data is sourced from disparate sources in the company, loade
d to Staging tables using Informatica and then loaded to the Data warehouse(EDL)
using Teradata scripting. The BO reports are used to build reports from the Dat
awarehouse. A logical portion of the data from the source are loaded to Webspher
e applications with XML and IBM MQ series as the middleware.
Roles and Responsibilities:
* Designing the approach for data load on Enterprise Data Warehouse(EDW)
* Developing architecture for the daily load of the Staging and Data warehouse
tables
* Developing the approach for error handling, resubmissions of the daily load o
f the EDW data
* Developing test approaches, balance and counts auditing, response monitoring
* Developing Production migration process for Initial load and CDC
* Working with the OBIEE teams to develop the required reports for business fro
m the datawarehouse
* Defining configuration and approach for Unit testing, SIT, UAT and Production
migration
* Developing the approach for automating the entire process using scheduler, id
entifying runtimes, dependencies that is suitable for the environments
* Developing and Implementing Standards and control for ETL code migration acro
ss various environments
* Implementing reusability in the project by identifying common design patters
across various components in the project, thereby improving the cost savings for
the client
* Suggesting improvements, optimizations in the project that resulted in cost a
nd effort savings
Client: AT & T Jul 2008-Nov 2008
Consolidation of Business Intelligence Datawarehouse
Role: : ETL Designer and Architect
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 7.1, Teradata, BTEQ scripting, Unix shell sc
ripting, Oracle, OBIEE
Business Objects XI R2
This project integrates multiple datawarehouse systems into a consolidated data
warehouse which will be used by the users to report on business metrics to enabl
e optimal sales performance and provide timely sales performance information to
various business stakeholders.
Roles and Responsibilities:
* Designing the approach for data load on Enterprise Data Warehouse(EDW)
* Designing the optimal solutions for data load using Teradata, Oracle and Info
rmatica
* Working with the OBIEE teams to develop the required reports for business fro
m the datawarehouse
* Developing architecture for the daily load of the Staging and Data warehouse
tables
* Developing the approach for error handling, resubmissions of the daily load o
f the EDW data
* Developing test approaches, balance and counts auditing, response monitoring
* Developing Production migration process for Initial load and CDC
 * Defining configuration and approach for Unit testing, SIT, UAT and Production
migration
* Developing the approach for automating the entire process using scheduler, id
entifying runtimes, dependencies that is suitable for the environments
* Developing and Implementing Standards and control for ETL code migration acro
ss various environments
* Implementing reusability in the project by identifying common design patters
across various components in the project, thereby improving the cost savings for
the client
Billing release project in Business Intelligence Database (BID)
Role: ETL Designer and Architect
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 7.1, Teradata, BTEQ scripting, Unix shell sc
ripting, Oracle, OBIEE
Business Objects XI R2
The objective of this project is to develop and implement projects/releases rela
ted to the Billing release for AT& T in the
Data Warehouse(Business Intelligence Datawarehouse). This project includes vario
us modules like Data integration,
Extracting the data from the warehouse, reports generation using BO and includes
Informatica programming, Teradata
Development, Unix shell scripting, Oracle application development.
Roles and Responsibilities:
* Designing the approach for data load on Enterprise Data Warehouse(EDW)
* Interacting with Business to determine the requirements and develop optimal E
TL architecture for those requirements
* Have worked on analyzing the components for potential performance improvement
s and improved thee runtimes of the data loads which resulted cost and effort sa
vings
* Working with the OBIEE teams to develop the required reports for business fro
m the datawarehouse
* Developing architecture for the daily load of the Staging and Data warehouse
tables
* Developing the approach for error handling, resubmissions of the daily load o
f the BID data
* Optimized the usage of Unix in the entire process, where various activities i
n the projects are placed in appropriate environments to result in an optimal pe
rformance
* Developing test approaches, balance and counts auditing, response monitoring
* Developing Production migration process for Initial load and CDC
* Defining configuration and approach for Unit testing, SIT, UAT and Production
migration
* Developing the approach for automating the entire process using scheduler, id
entifying runtimes, dependencies that is suitable for the environments
* Developing and Implementing Standards and control for ETL code migration acro
ss various environments
* Implementing reusability in the project by identifying common design patters
across various components in the project, thereby improving the cost savings for
the client
Infosys Technologies Ltd. Apr 2003-Jun 2008
Client: Ameriprise Financial Inc. Aug 2005-Jun 2008
Enterprise Intelligence and EDW for Financial Planning
Role: Technical Architect and Tech. Lead
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 8.1/8.5.1, Informatica Powerexchange for Mai
nframe, Teradata, BTEQ
scripts, Unix shell scripting, Mainframes, JCL, AIX Unix, MVS
The objective of this project is to load the Company's financial planning domain
data to the Enterprise
Datawarehouse (EDW) and to generate reports from the EDW. In this project, the f
lat files that contains the required data
from the source system are generated from the database using Informatica transfo
rmations. The data in the files are loaded
to the EDW Staging tables after the performing the business transformations and
the data from Staging are loaded to
EDW Warehouse. Based on the Warehouse data, the views(Data marts) are created wh
ich involve very complex business
logic to create tables that will be used by the Reporting to generate the report
s. These reports are used by the Financial
Advisors. The field level error handling strategy, data validation, error data r
e-processing are some of the other aspects
implemented in this project.
Roles and Responsibilities:
* Designing the approach for data load on Enterprise Data Warehouse(EDW)
* Interacting with Business to determine the requirements and develop optimal E
TL architecture for those requirements
* Developed field level error handling strategy in Teradata and a mechanism to
report errors to business
* Have worked with the Business Object teams to develop required reports for bu
siness
* Developing the LDM, PDM, ADM for the Datawarehouse and the Datamarts
EDW for multiple business domains
Role: Technical Architect and Tech. Lead
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 8.1/8.5.1, Informatica Powerexchange for Mai
nframe, Teradata, BTEQ scripts,
Unix shell scripting, Developing XSDs, XML, Mainframes, JCL.
The objective of this project is to load the Company's several business domains
to the Enterprise Datawarehouse(EDW) and to generate reports from the EDW. The b
usiness domains include Customer, Account, Transaction, and Mutual Fund. The fol
lowing are the various modules and the details of the project. This project invo
lves, sourcing the data from various sources like flat files, XMLs, Database and
loading the data to the EDW. Several transformations, filtering, cleansing befo
re it is loaded to the staging tables and to the warehouse tables. The data repr
ocessing, Audit mechanisms are build as a part of this EDW load process. I was i
ncharge of the deliverables of the project, was involved in Designing, Developin
g and Implementing this large data warehouse solution
Roles and Responsibilities:
* Designing the approach for data load on Enterprise Data Warehouse(EDW)
* Interacting with Business to determine the requirements and develop optimal E
TL architecture for those requirements
* Developed field level error handling strategy in Teradata and a mechanism to
report errors to business
* Have worked with the Business Object teams to develop required reports for bu
siness
* Developing the LDM, PDM, ADM for the Datawarehouse and the Datamarts
* Working with the Enterprise Architecture team to develop architecture for the
data loads
EDW Teradata optimization project
Role: Technical Architect and Tech. Lead
Technology: Teradata, BTEQ scripting, Informatica Powercenter 8.1/8.5.1, Informa
tica Powerexchange for
Mainframe, Unix shell scripting, Mainframes, JCL
The Enterprise Data warehouse(EDW) of the company is built using Teradata databa
se. Since the volume data loaded in the EDW is huge, there was a need for severa
l optimizations in the Teradata database, to make the Informatica programs load
perform better. This project is focused on optimization several system parameter
s for Teradata to improve the run time the batch. I was involved in designing an
d implementing solutions, which had a significant improvement in the run time ba
tch and the performance of the EDW data load.
Compliance Case Management
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst/Architect
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 8.1/8.5.1, Informatica Powerexchange for Mai
nframe, Teradata, BTEQ scripts,
Unix Shell scripting, Developing XSDs, XML, IBM Webshpere Java transformations a
nd Midstream XML generator,
API Target, Mainframes, JCL. Case Management Project is to increase the business
process efficiency and effectiveness of the Case management in Ameriprise by us
ing a Vendor product. This project uses Java transformations and Midstream XML g
enerator Transformations are used and messages are posted to API.
The are two Key objectives of the system- One is to load various domains and rel
ationship between domains using
Informatica Midstream XML generator, Java Transformations and posting messages t
o API and the second is migrate the
existing Sybase database for the Compliance application to an IBM Websphere appl
ication which uses MS SQL database.
My role is to develop and design the ETL components using Informatica and inchar
ge of the technology deliverables of
the project.
EDW Recommending Advisor project
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 8.1/8.5.1, Informatica Powerexchange for Mai
nframe, Teradata, BTEQ
scripts, Unix shell scripting, Mainframes, JCL, AIX Unix, MVS
The EDW Recommending Advisor project is an enhancement made to the Company's EDW
to add details related to the
Recommending advisors(RA) for the Financial advisors and to load new Brokerage b
usiness related domains to the EDW.
There were several data model changes for the EDW due to this project and the ET
L Informatica code was developed to
Load the data to the EDW. Designed backloading for the new domains to load the h
istorical data to the warehouse.
Advisor Practice
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst/Architect
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 8.5.1, Informatica Powerexchange for Mainfra
me, Unix Shell scripting,
Developing XSDs, XML, Java transformations and Midstream XML generator, API Targ
et, Mainframes, JCL.
The purpose of this project is to load the latest development in the Distributor
system of the client to a database used by a
different business area. In this project, the XML sources are read and they are
loaded to a relational database. Error
handling and the audit processing are some of the functionalities implemented fo
r this project.
Integrating data sources in the Enterprise
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 8.1, Informatica Powerexchange for Mainframe
, Unix shell scripting, Mainframes,
JCL,AIX,Unix,MVS
The scope of the project involves creation of a data integration layer which int
erfaces between the Source Systems and the
target application. The sources from various domains in Ameriprise and Transform
ed and Integrated using Informatica to
create the output dataset for consumption by the end users. The project involves
, Initial load and the delta load, where the
data is loaded based on the delta logic and is consumed by the end users daily
Business As Usual(BAU) for EDW, ETL and EI applications
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 8.1/8.5.1, Informatica Powerexchange for Mai
nframe, Teradata, BTEQ scripts,
Unix shell scripting, Developing XSDs, XML, Mainframes, JCL.
This project is involved in the supporting and maintaining the EDW and EI applic
ations. As a part of this project, there are
several Work requests implemented. The work requests include enhancement to the
EI/EDW or fixing any productions
issues. This project involves Interaction with various upstream and downstream c
onsumers on a day-to-day basis to
understand the issues and provide solutions for the issues to ensure the EDW, EI
and ETL systems are business as usual.
This is a high critical project, as the issues need to be fixed within a very le
ss turnaround time, due to very stringent
production Service level agreements(SLAs)
Advisor Relationship tracking Metrics project
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 7.1, 8.1 Informatica Powerexchange for Mainf
rame, Unix shell scripting,
Mainframes, JCL.
The purpose of this project is to load the Enterprise Customer data to the Advis
or Relationship tracking servers. The data
is loaded from the customer database to the Tracking database using Informatica,
after undergoing several business logic
transformations. My role in this project is to design, incharge for the delivera
bles.
Analysis Engine Upgrade
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst
Technology: Informatica Powercenter 7.1, 8.1 Informatica Powerexchange for Mainf
rame, Teradata, BTEQ scripts,Unix
Shell scripting, Developing XSDs, XML, Mainframes, JCL.
The purpose of this project is to load the Customer, Transaction and other busin
ess areas in the company to an application
server. The sources are flat files, mainframe datasets and XMLs. In the project,
the data from various source systems are
transformed using the business transformation logic and are loaded to the target
systems. The error reprocessing, field
level error comparisons, validations are some of the aspects handled in this pro
ject. My role is to develop and design the
ETL components using Informatica and incharge of the technology deliverables of
the project.
Ameriprise Retirement Services Wachovia migration project
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst
Technology: IBM Mainframe, Sun Solaris / HP / Compaq UNIX servers, UNIX, Shell S
cripts, Java, Sybase SQL
programming, MQ Series
The project is being completed due to the sale of Ameriprise recordkeeping busin
ess to Wachovia. This project involves performing the activities necessary to ex
ecute the technology migration of the Ameriprise 401(k) recordkeeping book of bu
siness(Retirement Services) and intellectual property to Wachovia.
Ameriprise Retirement Services separation project
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst
Technology: IBM Mainframe, Sun Solaris / HP / Compaq UNIX servers,Unix, Shell Sc
ripts, Java, Sybase SQL
programming, MQ Series
American Express Financial Corporation spun off to form Ameriprise Financial. Th
e company began operations as independent company on Oct 1 2005. The project inv
olves doing Day 700 work for Retirement Services, as part of physical separation
from American Express. The project team would analyze the impact due the change
s happening as part of Day 700 activities and make appropriate changes to the sy
stems and applications.
Retirement Services Fund Merger and CUSIP changes
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst, Business systems analyst
Technology: IBM Mainframe, Sun Solaris / HP / Compaq UNIX servers,Unix, Shell Sc
ripts, Java, Sybase SQL
programming, MQ Series, JCL
The objective of the fund merger project in retirement services is to merge seve
ral retail funds. This involves planning and executing huge volume of fund swaps
that will be resulted during the fund merger activity and making appropriate ch
anges to various systems to reflect the merged funds. As a part of this project,
new CUSIP numbers for all retail mutual funds were modified.
Retirement Services NT server migration
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst, Business systems analyst
Technology: IBM Mainframe, Sun Solaris / HP / Compaq UNIX servers, Windows NT, W
indows 2003 servers
Skill Sets/Competencies Unix, Shell Scripts, COBOL, DB2, C, Sybase SQL programmi
ng, Perl, MS SQL 2000 server
This is a part of the enterprise wide program to migrate all the Windows NT serv
ers to Windows 2003 servers. In this
project, the Retirement services Windows NT servers had been migrated to Windows
2003 servers. This project involves,
Co-ordinating with several infrastructure teams and other tech. teams to analyze
the requirements and setup the new
Windows infrastructure. Migrate the applications from the old server, to the new
Windows servers followed by
decommissioning the old servers from the environment.
Client: American Express Company Apr 2003- Aug 2005
Unix Environment Support for AMEX Retirement services
Role: Technical Lead/Analyst, Business systems analyst
Technology: IBM Mainframe, Sun Solaris / HP / Compaq UNIX servers, Windows NT, W
indows 2003 servers
Skill Sets/Competencies Unix, Shell Scripts, COBOL, DB2, C, Sybase SQL programmi
ng, Perl, MS SQL 2000 server
The applications for Retirement services business, runs on Unix operating system
with Sybase backend. Environment Support Team supports the Unix environments an
d Backend Sybase Database servers for this product Wystar and maintaining variou
s Wystar applications including the interactive applications Web, IVR. In this p
roject, 10 different Unix servers of different flavors of Unix are supported.
Maples ESM Technologies Dec 2002 - Mar 2003
Mainframe MVS Administration
Role: Mainframe Systems administrator, Mainframe programmer
Technology: COBOL, JCL, VSAM, DB2, RACF, Z-OS
As a part of this project, I was responsible for administering the mainframe sys
tem for the company. This involves maintaining the MVS Z-OS mainframe system, DB
2 administration and RACF security administration. My role also involved develop
ing JCL and COBOL programs as part of application development and server adminis
tration and maintenance
Altech Star Solutions Jun 2000 - Nov 2002
Interactive Web based database tool
Role: Developer, Designer
Technology: ASP, JSP, SQL Sever 2000, Oracle, PL/SQL, Javascript, Windows script
ing
The objective of this project is to develop an interactive Web based tool to acc
ess the database and provide a graphical user interface (GUI), interactive query
options to the user. This tool allows the user to build the database queries gr
aphically and the results are displayed in a graphical format. The tool was impl
emented for the SQL and Oracle databases and has the flexibility to extend the f
unctionality to other databases.