Dump your legacy CRM system for Salesforce.com using open source tools

Do you have a business application you'd drop like a hot rock if you could just get your data out? Fire up this open source drag-and-drop tool and get happy.

By Alex Khizhnyak, LinuxWorld.com, 11/05/07

 Start a discussion    Print article

 Comments (1)    Print article

The truth is that most data-integration projects in today's enterprises never get built. The return on investment (ROI) on these small projects is too low to justify bringing in expensive middleware. So, if you want to perform the migration at zero license costs, you will probably need an open source data integration or Extract, Transform and Load (ETL) solution, coupled with an open source database. This article will explore a common task: how to get your customer data into Salesforce.com. We'll use Apatar Open Source ETL for visual data integration mapping and metadata management, and a MySQL database for staging the data for cleansing or enrichment.

Six Easy Steps to S-a-a-S CRM Migration

You've decided to move your CRM data from, say, GoldMine to the Salesforce.com on-demand CRM system. What steps should be taken to have your customer and enterprise data migrated to your new software-as-a-service package?

1. Ask Yourself Preintegration Questions

Before any data migration, ask yourself some questions to clarify the goals of the oncoming integration process. For data-integration specialists, it is critical to know:

1. What data tables, fields, and rows should be extracted and taken as a source?
2. Where do I want to put the extracted data entries?
3. Do I need to provide data migration from one single database or multiple data sources, perhaps using a staging database?
4. Do I need a one-time migration to SalesForce.com or recurring synchronization?
5. Do I have all of the required skills to do manual coding, or it is better to use visual data-integration tools?

If you still consider manual coding, take into an account the time and effort to study APIs, write connectivity to both the source and the target, write transformation logic and, most important, the tasks related to debugging, reporting, and future maintenance of the integration and the related metadata,

The more clear you make your goals, the more accurate your data integration will be, so set your goals properly.

2. Connect to Data Sources

To read the source data, you need to establish connections to source databases. You need to gain access to data tables, data structures and data entries. This is where data integration actually starts. With visual tools like Apatar, you can do it without having to write a single line of code. Just open the "drag-and-drop" job designer, choose the necessary data connectors, enter SalesForce.com and GoldMine (or other legacy CRM/ERP) authorization details, and provide the paths to the servers or storage files. The application is ready to operate with data.

Click to see: Apatar, v0.180

Figure 1: Open the job designer to see the available data sources.

3. Set up a Staging MySQL Database

You may also want to mash-up data from multiple sources. Say, take news from an RSS feed, extract a client's information from GoldMine CRM, add your custom notes, and then mix it all up and throw it across to your SalesForce.com account. Consider this step if you have multiple data targets from which to aggregate information, or if you have to apply complex data-cleansing or -enrichment rules to the data on its way between the source and the target. This step is optional, but sometimes it's worth considering.

To connect to a MySQL database, use MySQL connector. The process of establishing the connection is very close to the instructions of the previous step. Just drag-and-drop the connector to Apatar's work panel, enter database authorization details and provide the paths to MySQL server.

Click to see: Apatar, v0.1.7.2

Figure 2: You can mash up data from multiple sources using joins and filters.

Click to see: MSSQL Property

Figure 3: The MySQL connector prompts you for database information.

4. Match Data Sources

According to the Gartner Group, corporate developers spend about 65% of their effort building bridges between applications. Luckily, today data-integration systems allow data to be linked even by nontechnical users. Imagine if you could visually design (drag and drop) a workflow to exchange data between files (Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, CSV/TXT files), databases (such as MySQL, Microsoft SQL, Oracle), applications (Salesforce.com, SugarCRM), and the top Web 2.0 destinations (Flickr, RSS feeds, Amazon S3), all without coding.

Featured Whitepapers

About Us | Contact Us | Advertising Info | Terms of Service/Privacy

Copyright, 2006-2007 Network World, Inc. All rights reserved.