Comments on: Still Living In A Flat File Interface World

By: Michael Krupa

Michael Krupa — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 19:43:57 +0000

Oh dear, you definitely don’t want everyone like me, but thanks for the compliment.

By: Michael Krupa

Michael Krupa — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 19:43:00 +0000

Meg – I think it is a technical problem from the standpoint that the tools are still a little cumbersome to use although they are getting better quickly. I find it fascinating that many HR departments seem frustrated when the data interfaces between core HR and best of breed systems are not real-time because nightly flat files are used to shuttle data around. Yet at the same time due to the reasons given by other people in their comments to this post (cost, security, unfamiliar with the technology) real-time interfaces are not developed. Standards will definitely help. Thanks for your comments.

By: Michael Krupa

Michael Krupa — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 19:34:37 +0000

Scott – Thanks for your input. I guess I am a lone voice out there looking for more real-time interfaces. I think the lack of mature tools and data exchange standards are a factor in the slow adoption by customers. I have not heard much recently on HR XML. It’s on my list to do some research and see what is the latest on this standard.

By: Deirdre

Deirdre — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 00:23:34 +0000

You are so smart it scares me. Why isn’t everyone like you?

By: Meg Bear

Meg Bear — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 18:43:23 +0000

Mike,
Glad to see you bring up the topic. Having studied the challenges of integration from all sides (seriously, check my resume I can tell you first hand that I have built slick and fancy solutions in the past, only to have people ask for flat files. The key is to make it easy for customers to use and oftentimes that’s how flat file solutions are born.

I think it’s a big help having people like you explain the value of a message-based solution. I think that’s the part that’s been missing so far, the *why*. I don’t really think this is a technical problem, and I do have hope for standards but then again I’m a tech nerd and a dreamer.

great post!
-Meg

By: Scott Simpson

Scott Simpson — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 16:17:01 +0000

As a provider of HR SaaS solutions I have to be another voice saying the demand doesn’t seem to be there. I would love to have all our clients connect dynamically via web services or similar, but most multinational organizations in my experience aren’t ready to do that. HR are generally our clients, and due to resource issues, there’s limited availability of internal IT staff to do any data mapping activities.

There are also major security standards issues. Organizations have a clean security approved process for doing file transfers, and any new data transfer process requires a whole security approval.

One hope for the future may be with providers of SaaS Data transfer/Integration services. There are a few of them out there now. Rather than an organization integrating with all their providers, they integrate with a SaaS data integration service. Other SaaS vendors build connectors to/ from the SaaS data integration vendor, and that gives seamless data transfer with a whole variety of SaaS vendors.

That whole process becomes a lot easier when the different vendors implement a common data standard though – I’m not sure how widely the HR XML Consortium standards are implemented in vendors products. It will be interesting to see how this whole data integration SaaS segment shakes out over the next few years.

By: Michael Krupa

Michael Krupa — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 07:35:22 +0000

Beth – I know, I know. I can’t cut customers any slack in this either. FTP + Flat Files work well and as Shannon points out there are legitimate reason why you might want to use flat files. However, as we continue to roll out Manager and Employee Self Service in our core HR applications and the outlying best of breed applications, the users are not going to put up with 24 hour old information forever.

I’m glad you offer an event based XML feed via HTTP. When you customers are ready for real-time feeds you will be one step ahead.

By: Beth N. Carvin, Nobscot Corporation

Beth N. Carvin, Nobscot Corporation — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 02:06:24 +0000

Good points made by all.

When Nobscot Corp. first started offering “data feeds” we gave the choice of a once a day file transfer or an “upon the event” xml file via http request . Almost all clients chose the former even though the latter might be easier and more timely. They were familiar and comfortable with exporting a file and sending it via scheduled ftp.

I think it’s probably been about 8 years now and we still see zero demand for anything other than data file via secure ftp. I can understand where they are coming from. It’s a pretty simple process that works well for most applications. I’d like to see companies use some of the newer methods for data transfer but if they are happy and it works well for them that’s fine too.

By: Michael Krupa

Michael Krupa — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 00:49:59 +0000

Shann0n – Thanks for pointing this out. The vendors should be offering both basic and advanced integration tools. You are correct that there are times when a flat file interface makes sense. I didn’t mean to imply that flat files were undesirable, only that it’s time that vendors also start offering more advanced interfaces. Thanks for stopping by.

By: Michael Krupa

Michael Krupa — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 00:43:28 +0000

Ian – Good point. I think if more vendors offered built-in and easily configurable web services interfaces for their products then customers could connect them without having to request flat files. I agree that SMB customers may not have the ability to work with SOAP and ESB based interfaces.