WildTangent
www.WildTangent.com
WildTangent is the leading publisher of online and downloadable
games. They publish over 250 leading 1st and 3rd party game titles
through a unique distribution network comprising leading PC
Manufacturers, ISPs, and Portals. Their proprietary PC Game Console
ships with all new Dell, HP, and Toshiba PCs in North America giving
them an effective reach of over 30 million U.S. households in 2006. From
family friendly games like Polar Bowler and Scrabble to Adventure RPG
titles such as FATE, WildTangent is bridging the gap between the casual
and core gaming markets.
WildTangent uses SQL Server on several levels. First, their SQL
Server database is the backbone to the WildTangent websites providing
storage for registration and configuration for templated sites. It is
also the core of their custom ecommerce solutions which include
storefronts, shipping, and gifting. In addition, it is used as the
center of the packaging and deployment systems that aid in the
development and distribution of their games. And finally, they use the
database as a data warehouse, importing anonymous Site Traffic Data and
Game Play Statistics, Sales Transactions, along with metrics gathered
from the other OLTP Databases to provide datamarts and reports that
assist business decisions and measure performance.
"We had found it increasingly difficult to manage all
of the import and ETL processes within a realistic timeframe. We
originally performed many tasks in batches. To ensure that the steps
were executed in the right order and that the previous task had
completed, we had implemented a complex set of triggers and flags, or in
some cases, had simply padded schedules to ensure that enough time had
gone by."
Steve Ledridge Sr Data Warehouse Architect/DBA |
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The whole process was made more complex because the data was flowing
between five stages (Production, Staging, Datawarehouse, Datamarts, and
OLAP Cubes) and four separate servers. Due to the extra schedule
padding, the entire import process took so long that reports and cubes
were not available until noon each day.
After installing Event Manager, WildTangent implemented Event
Manager's advanced chaining capabilities. This allowed them the unique
ability to connect a single data flow from start to finish even across
multiple servers ensuring that each step would start as soon as its
preceding step had completed. This ensured that one data flow would not
impact or hold up another as it had previously when they were running in
batches.
"With Event Manager's incredible chaining power, my
daily administration tasks are now much quicker. My agent tasks are more
robust than ever before and notifications are so informative and simple
to use that now they get used rather than just ignored," said Steve. |
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In addition, WildTangent makes extensive use of the Event Manager
Outlook-style calendar and easy "visual scheduling" to monitor all of
their servers from a single console.
"Event Manager helps me to perform my morning sanity
checks in a fraction of the time it had taken in the past. I am also
able to make use of a notification system that blows the stock SQL
Server alerting out of the water. If you have ever had to set up SQL
Mail with Outlook profiles in a production environment, you will know
what I mean. I don't have to set up mail profiles anywhere and I can now
report on any errors or conditions across my entire network of servers
from one simple interface."
Steve Ledridge Sr Data Warehouse Architect/DBA |
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