Informatica Cloud (IICS) Tutorial

Informatica is a well-established player in the data integration space, and its IICS platform has gained a significant user base in recent years.

Also, Informatica is a Leader in the iPaaS market, according to Gartner's Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS). This shows the demand for Informatica IICS among companies searching for cloud-based integration solutions.

Our IICS Tutorial covers various Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services aspects to help you get started. So read the tutorial till the end and master key skills to become a pro in IICS.

Table of Contents:

  • What are Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services (IICS)?
  • Why Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services?
  • Is Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services an ETL tool?
  • Features of Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services
  • How does Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services work?
  • What services are available in Informatica intelligent cloud Services?
  • What are the connections in Informatica intelligent cloud Services?
  • What are transformations in Informatica intelligent cloud Services?
  • What is the difference between Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services and Informatica PowerCenter?

What are Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services (IICS)?

Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services (IICS) is a comprehensive solution for data integration and management that can help organizations improve the efficiency, accuracy, and reliability of their data management processes.
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IICS provides various data management and integration services, including data quality, master data management, B2B data exchange, integration, application integration, and governance. Additionally, various data sources and objectives are supported, including databases, flat files, cloud applications, and SaaS solutions.

IICS is designed to be a safe, adaptable, and scalable system that can be quickly tailored to the particular needs of distinct businesses. It also provides various features and tools, like automated data integration monitoring, to help users manage and track their data integration activities.

Why Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services?

There are several reasons why a company would decide to use IICS:

  • Scalability: IICS is built to manage the demands of large-scale data integration, making it simple for businesses to scale up or down by their requirements.
  • Connectivity: IICS makes it simple to link various data sources by offering pre-built connectors to over 200 cloud and on-premises apps, databases, and technologies.
  • Flexibility: IICS can handle sophisticated data transformations and supports a range of integration patterns, including batch, real-time, and event-based.
  • Data encryption, access controls, and other security features are provided by the cloud architecture on which IICS is based.
  • Low-code development: IICS's appealing user interface and drag-and-drop design environment make it simple for developers and business users to build and deploy integrations without in-depth coding knowledge.

Want to Become Certified Informatica Cloud? Get to Know More About " IICS Training "

 

Is Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services an ETL tool?

Yes, Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services (IICS) is an Extract, Transform, and Load (ETL) tool to aid organizations in integrating data between on-premises and cloud-based applications. Moving data between different sources and goals is made simpler by the vast selection of pre-built connectors and tools IICS offers for data integration, quality, and governance.

Data replication, synchronization, masking, and validation are just a few of the functions IICS offers in addition to its ETL capabilities. It is a cloud-based solution that enables users to access it from any location with an internet connection and scale it up or down in response to shifting business requirements.

Features of Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services

Some of the critical features of IICS include:

  • Big Data Integration: Large volumes of data from sources like Hadoop and Spark may be processed and integrated by enterprises thanks to IICS' support for extensive data integration.
  • Data Governance: IICS offers capabilities for data governance, such as data lineage, data classification, and data masking, to ensure that data is safe and complies with legal standards.
  • Workflow Automation: IICS offers features for workflow automation that let companies handle complex data management and integration activities automatically.
  • Collaboration: IICS offers tools that enable teams to cooperate on data integration projects while exchanging resources and best practices.
  • Cloud Integration: With IICS, businesses can merge data from on-premises and cloud-based applications like Salesforce, Workday, and ServiceNow.
  • API management: IICS enables enterprises to manage APIs and create connections across APIs for different applications, making it easier to integrate data and services.
  • Real-time Data Integration: IICS enables businesses to collect and evaluate data instantly and respond to events as they arise.
  • Data Replication: IICS enables businesses to replicate data across numerous platforms and systems, guaranteeing that the data is up-to-date and consistent throughout all applications.

Related Article: IICS Interview Questions

How does Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services work?

Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services (IICS) is a cloud-based integration platform that enables businesses to link and integrate their data across various cloud and on-premises applications.

The platform provides companies access to a wide range of pre-built connectors and APIs to connect to various data sources and applications. Moving data between apps is made simple by these connectors, which handle SOAP and REST APIs.

Follow the below steps to get started with IICS:

  • Step 1: Sign up for IICS

Visit the Informatica website and sign up for a free trial or create an account for IICS.

  • Step 2: Navigate to the IICS Console

Log into the IICS console once you have access to it. You will find various options and services available to you.

  • Step 3: Create a Connection

You must first create a connection with your data sources. In the IICS console, click "Connections" and choose "Create Connection." After selecting the appropriate connection type (database, cloud storage, etc.), provide the required credentials and connection information.

  • Step 4: Create a Task

Next, you'll create a task to define the data integration process. Click on "Tasks" and choose "Create Task." Select the right task type depending on your needs (such as data synchronization, data replication, etc.).

  • Step 5: Configure Source and Target Connections

Specify the source and target connections you created earlier in the task configuration. 

  • Step 6: Data Flow Design

Once the connections are set up, you may define the task's data flow. This entails defining the transformations, mappings, and business rules for your data integration process. IICS's drag-and-drop interface can be used to plan the data flow visually.

  • Step 7: Configure Transformations

You can add various transformations within the data flow to manipulate and cleanse the data. 

  • Step 8: Monitor Tasks

Once the data flow is designed, you can run the task to execute the data integration process. The task can be manually started or scheduled to run at regular intervals. You can keep tabs on the execution's progress, look for mistakes, and see the outcomes of the data transformation.

  • Step 9: Validate and Troubleshoot

After the task execution, it is essential to validate the data to ensure it has been integrated correctly. 

  • Step 10: Administer

Once operational, your data integration tasks can be managed and maintained via the IICS console. This entails keeping track of task performance, planning routine data updates, and making any necessary modifications as your data sources or requirements change.

What Services Are Available in Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services?

Some of the key services available in Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services are:

1) API Manager: The maximum number of API calls per minute (Rate Limit) and the IP addresses from which the API can be accessed are two examples of the policies that can be placed on the API. You can specify the authentication method for each API using the API registry. With the help of the API group, it is possible to compile all logically connected APIs into a single group to which the policies may be applied.

2) Application Integration: This aims to create ICRT (Informatica Cloud Real-Time) APIs. 

3) Application Integration Console: You may obtain logs and keep track of the health of your server while scheduling and monitoring real-time tasks.

4) Data Integration: Used to create batch jobs.

The following is a list of the various tasks involved in creating batch jobs:

  • Use a range of tasks, including mapping, synchronization, replication, and task flows, to create batch jobs.
  • Execute on-demand, on-time, and in-the-moment events.
  • IICS tasks for import and export.

5) Administrator: You may find connectors for applications like files, databases, and more, as well as the Secure Agent download and installation instructions for your server.

  • Assign roles to newly created users and user groups.
  • Define runtime settings.
  • Establish links between Source and Targets.
  • For connecting to the cloud, use Add-on connectors.
  • Set up schedules to execute integration task execution.

6) Discovery IQ: This offers analytics on your company's number of jobs and procedures.  A few KPIs are available, including the volume of data and the number of successful and unsuccessful jobs. Logs can be downloaded, examined, and used to produce various metrics.

7) Monitor: Like in PowerCenter, you can monitor the batch jobs created throughout the data integration. You can look at active, unsuccessful, and successful jobs. Additionally, it offers the ability to download logs, halt a job, and restart it.

8) Operational Insights: This information includes the status of the Secure Agent services and whether they are operational.

What are the connections in Informatica intelligent cloud Services?

Connections are used in Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services (IICS) to specify access to different data sources or target systems employed in the ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) operations.

IICS offers various connectors to connect to different systems and integrate data between them. Some examples of connectors available in IICS:

  • Database Connectors: IICS can connect to various databases, including Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL, PostgreSQL, and others. These connections let you link and combine data from many databases.
  • Messaging Connectors: Amazon SNS, Amazon SQS, and JMS are just a few of the messaging interfaces IICS offers. With the aid of these connectors, you can include information from messaging platforms.
  • Application Connectors: IICS offers connectors to link with various on-premises and cloud-based applications, including SAP, Workday, Netsuite, and Salesforce. Data from these apps can be integrated with other systems using these connections.
  • File system Connectors: IICS supports several file system connectors, including file reader/writer, SFTP, and FTP. These connections let you combine data from many file systems.

What are transformations in Informatica intelligent cloud Services? 

Transformations are operations or actions carried out on data when it passes through a mapping in Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services. Among other things, transformations can manipulate, combine, filter, or enrich data.

Some of the transformations that are frequently used in Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services are listed below:

  • Source Qualifier: With this transformation, you can provide the database source, table, and columns utilized as the mapping's input data.
  • Expression: With this transformation, you can apply operations to the input data, including arithmetic, text manipulation, and logic checks.
  • Aggregator: With this transformation, you may use the input data to do aggregate operations like sum, average, min, max, and count.
  • Filter: With this transformation, you can exclude specific rows from the input data by a requirement.
  • Joiner: Data from two or more sources can be joined using the joiner transformation if they share a standard key.

What is the difference between Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services and Informatica PowerCenter?

Although Informatica offers both Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services (IICS) and Informatica PowerCenter as data integration platforms, they serve different functions and goals.

Informatica PowerCenter is an on-premises data integration platform that offers enterprise-class data management and integration capabilities. It enables the development, management, and execution of data integration workflows that transfer data from many sources, such as data marts and warehouses, to destination systems. It is designed for large enterprises with complex requirements for data integration. 

On the other hand, businesses can use Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services (IICS), a cloud-based data integration platform, to link cloud-based applications and services with on-premises data sources. IICS offers various data integration services, including cloud data integration, application integration, API administration, and data quality monitoring. A vast array of pre-built connectors are also provided to allow connectivity to numerous cloud-based applications and services and on-premises data sources.

Conclusion

To sum up, IICS is a reliable and comprehensive platform for data integration that provides various features and functionalities. It is ideal for enterprises that must merge data from on-premises and cloud systems and ensure that their data is dependable, consistent, and compliant.

By Tech Solidity

Last updated on January 24, 2024