Integrating Cloud and On-Premises Systems with No Programming Required

DataSpider Servista Made it Possible to Accelerate Strategic Information Utilization

Kyoto University of Foreign Studies set out to create an infrastructure to smoothly connect its individual systems, which had been partially optimized. They also introduced a new workflow system to coincide with the change of their financial system to an open system, and constructed a platform for extracting data necessary for institutional research (IR). This platform contributes to decision making by collecting, accumulating, and analyzing information related to the university’s various activities. DataSpider Servista, a data integration platform that does not require programming, was used as a system integration platform to flexibly connect each of these systems.

USER PROFILE

Kyoto University of Foreign Studies, which celebrated its 70th anniversary in 2017, is an academic institution that was originally founded as Kyoto Foreign Language School by Ichiro and Shizuko Morita. In accordance with its motto, “PAX MUNDI PER LINGUAS” (World Peace through Languages), the university is built on a foundation of practical education in methods of building global relations. Through changes such as the establishment of the Faculty of Global Engagement in 2018, the university is making proactive adjustments to its educational foundation in order to foster the strengths that are necessary for its students to thrive in a global society.

Mr. Manabu Nakahara
Assistant Sub-Section Manager for Information Systems Promotion
Facilities Management & Maintenance Section
Division of Corporate Affairs
Kyoto University of Foreign Studies

Mr. Takashi Nishide
Assistant Professor, IR Promotion Unit
Division of Coordination of Planning and Implementation
Kyoto University of Foreign Studies

Mr. Kenichiro Kitayama
Staff for Information Systems Promotion
Facilities Management & Maintenance Section
Division of Corporate Affairs
Kyoto University of Foreign Studies

Background: Aiming to Optimize Siloed Systems and Efficiently Collect Information

The University’s Information Systems Promotion Division, which was established in 2015, is involved in a variety of measures such as establishing a master plan for institutional IT promotion, advancing the reform of the university’s systems and the use of cloud services, and introducing a workflow system. One of these measures is the optimization of the university’s information systems.

Mr. Manabu Nakahara, Assistant Sub-Section Manager for the Facilities Management & Maintenance Section of the university’s Division of Corporate Affairs, recalls issues associated with the partially optimized systems. “Each of the systems," he says, "was constructed individually for a specific department. This led to data silos within our own university.” To optimally manage the university’s systems, however, it would be necessary for all systems to be managed in an inter-departmental fashion. For this purpose, the university decided to create a mechanism that they hoped would lead to the overall optimization of their systems.

Mr. Takashi Nishide, an assistant professor in the IR Promotion Unit of the Division for Coordination of Planning and Implementation who serves as an internal data scientist at the university, recalls the problems the university faced, from the perspective of using IR for data analysis.

“Previously,” he says, "Each time we needed data for analysis, we had to ask the relevant departments to extract and provide the data. As a result, it took a lot of time before we could actually perform the analysis. Furthermore, because data processing was also required, we needed a platform that would allow us to efficiently collect data.”

To resolve this issue, the university decided to construct an enterprise application integration (EAI) infrastructure to serve as a data integration platform. This platform was to enable easy integration with the university’s internal systems, to coincide with the change of the financial system to an open system and with the introduction of the workflow system as per the master plan for institutional IT. According to Mr. Nakahara, “Although the Facilities Management & Maintenance Section manages systems used by thousands of people, it is a small organization with only a few IT staff members. Because this project involved launching a new system from scratch, it was essential that the system construction be completed quickly and in a short period of time. We thought that EAI would be useful to us in this situation.”

Introduction:Using DataSpider Servista to Achieve Flexible System Integration

The requirements for this project included the ability to flexibly integrate data regardless of the type of databases being used, and a trigger function that would allow new information to be applied to the system when the data was updated.

Mr. Nakahara says, “We needed a tool that would allow us to add adapters as needed. For example, we needed an adapter for linking with Active Directory in order to simplify complicated account management.”

It was because of these needs that DataSpider Servista, provided by Saison Technology, caught his attention. Mr. Kenichiro Kitayama, of the Facilities Management & Maintenance Section, attended a seminar about DataSpider Servista, where he was impressed by the ease of use that it offered.

Of DataSpider Servista, Kitayama says, “The operations were easy to understand and could be performed by using the GUI. It was easy to see how DataSpider Servista could be used for system integration, and that was an important factor in our decision. We also considered other companies’ products, but the thorough support offered by Saison Technology, including implementation support, proved to be one of the big deciding factors.”

As a result, DataSpider Servista was selected to be used as the core of the platform for enabling data integration at the university.

Result: System Integration Made Possible by DataSpider Servista

Currently, the cloud-based financial and workflow systems are integrated via DataSpider Servista, which is installed on premises. Furthermore, over 15 systems such as the enrollment and grade management systems have also been integrated in order to collect the data needed for IR.

The data is first stored in a PostgreSQL database, and then analyzed by using the open-source BI tool Pentaho. Reports can therefore be generated on demand according to the university’s needs. Reports that can be generated include changes in the number of students who drop out according to the year they entered the university, the distribution of TOEIC scores, and information about the high schools from which students graduated or students' employment after university graduation. With these reports, the university staff can now utilize information about past results to help them in their discussions when they visit high schools or corporations.

On top of this, the integration of the financial and workflow systems was successfully completed within only one month.

Mr. Nakahara was astonished by this speed. Regarding platform construction, he says, “Everything from database extraction and mapping to formatting could be performed via menus, and we were able to build our platform simply by connecting and combining those components. We didn’t have to do any programming or write SQL. Without DataSpider Servista, we would not have been able to construct our current platform.”

The data used for IR was acquired in a variety of ways. For example, some data was acquired directly from each system’s databases, which include Oracle, PostgreSQL, DB2, SQL Server, and other database types. Other data was periodically extracted to CSV files and acquired from file servers. However, by using DataSpider Servista to process the data, it became possible to establish procedures for intermediate tasks and to efficiently collect data.

By using DataSpider Servista to integrate the financial and workflow systems, the time required for operational tasks has been decreased by about 70%. However, the university is planning to continue introducing a variety of systems, including those specified in the master plan for institutional IT promotion. When a new system is introduced, system integration based on DataSpider Servista will also be necessary. The university expects that system integration will continue to help them decrease the time required for operational tasks and the labor hours required for development.

According to Mr. Nishide, “We can’t escape the fact that, as a result of using IR to improve the visualization of data that we couldn’t previously utilize, our awareness and understanding of data have changed. The need for data utilization in each department is also increasing, and we are contributing to overall efficiency, for example, by decreasing the workload associated with creating meeting materials.”

Kyoto University of Foreign Studies is also planning to organize its database of teaching staff and replace its business systems, such as the human resources system, in the future. As part of this plan, they will also integrate G Suite, which they are currently using, by using DataSpider Servista to introduce an adapter for integrating with Active Directory, thereby simplifying account management.

Mr. Nakahara speaks of his future outlook by saying, “We also plan to use DataSpider Servista to help us utilize system integration to make our business operations more efficient. For example, we want to make it possible to issue accounts by applying via the workflow system. We also want to support our entire institution, including our affiliated high schools and technical colleges, to enable them to make strategic use of information.”

“Without DataSpider Servista, we would not have been able to construct our current platform.”

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Notes:

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