Konferensartikel

Since years and decades, IT systems are used to plan, to monitor and to control train operations and railway traffic on network regions. Especially in technically advanced railway networks, the usage of computer based systems for dispatching and controlling traffic started quite early, e.g. in the 90s. This implies the necessity to update and renew outdated structures nowadays. As IT system performance, database sizes and functionalities grew within the last decades, a wide range of existing system limitations are not valid anymore and can be overcome by new systems, processes and hardware. Larger data sets and therefore the migration and aggregation of valid data sets within one new, larger data set are possible now. However, for operational systems it is highly advisable to follow an evolving strategy for the migration of distributed structures instead of a revolutionary approach to ensure the operability of working systems and ongoing operations. Such a strategy requires the migration of existing data sets and processes whereby the question arises how to migrate e.g. formerly overlapping infrastructure areas, how to aggregate semantically identical data sets with distinct technical keys etc. This paper introduces these challenges from various points of view and presents approaches chosen by the authors to establish such a migration process of existing and running operational infrastructure databases. It focuses on technical aspects to migrate and aggregate infrastructure data but also outlines challenges with respect to migration of workflows and processes towards centralized services.

Infrastructure Topology, Databases, Data Consolidation, Legacy Systems