Simply put, “Data Virtualization describes the process of abstracting disparate data sources (databases, applications, file repositories, websites, data services vendors, etc.) through a single data access layer (which may be any of several data access mechanisms). This abstraction enables data access clients to target a single data access layer, serialization, format, structure, etc., rather than making each client tool handle multiples of any or all of these.”1
Whether your applications are on-premise, in the cloud, or both, DSS can ease and automate access to your data via a meta-data construct thus enabling or facilitating the use of an organizations data in ways that are not otherwise possible for the purposes on data mining, reporting, validation, and much, much, more.