Online Transaction Processing System
What is an OLTP System?
Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) systems are one of the most common data processing systems in today's enterprises. Classical examples of OLTP systems are order entry, retail sales, and financial transaction systems.
OLTP systems are primarily characterized through a specific data usage that is different from data warehousing environments, yet some of the characteristics, such as having large volumes of data and lifecycle-related data usage and importance, are identical.
The main characteristics of an OLTP environment are: * Short response time
The nature of OLTP environments is predominantly any kind of interactive ad hoc usage, such as telemarketeers entering telephone survey results. OLTP systems require short response times in order for users to remain productive. * Small transactions
OLTP systems normally read and manipulate highly selective, small amounts of data; the data processing is mostly simple and complex joins are relatively rare. There is always a mix of queries and DML workload. For example, one of many call center employees retrieves customer details for every call and enters customer complaints while reviewing past communication with the customer. * Data maintenance operations
It is not uncommon to have reporting programs and data updating programs that need to run either periodically or on an ad hoc basis. These programs, which run in the background while users continue to work on other tasks, may require a large number of data-intensive computations. For example, a University may start batch jobs assigning students to classes while students can still sign up online for classes themselves. * Large user populations
OLTP systems can have immeasurably large user populations where many users are trying to access the same data at once. For example, an online auction Web site can have hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of users accessing data on its Web site at the same time. * High concurrency
Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) systems are one of the most common data processing systems in today's enterprises. Classical examples of OLTP systems are order entry, retail sales, and financial transaction systems.
OLTP systems are primarily characterized through a specific data usage that is different from data warehousing environments, yet some of the characteristics, such as having large volumes of data and lifecycle-related data usage and importance, are identical.
The main characteristics of an OLTP environment are: * Short response time
The nature of OLTP environments is predominantly any kind of interactive ad hoc usage, such as telemarketeers entering telephone survey results. OLTP systems require short response times in order for users to remain productive. * Small transactions
OLTP systems normally read and manipulate highly selective, small amounts of data; the data processing is mostly simple and complex joins are relatively rare. There is always a mix of queries and DML workload. For example, one of many call center employees retrieves customer details for every call and enters customer complaints while reviewing past communication with the customer. * Data maintenance operations
It is not uncommon to have reporting programs and data updating programs that need to run either periodically or on an ad hoc basis. These programs, which run in the background while users continue to work on other tasks, may require a large number of data-intensive computations. For example, a University may start batch jobs assigning students to classes while students can still sign up online for classes themselves. * Large user populations
OLTP systems can have immeasurably large user populations where many users are trying to access the same data at once. For example, an online auction Web site can have hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of users accessing data on its Web site at the same time. * High concurrency