Data archiving is a method, which can help enterprises reduce the size of their database and keep the database growth under control. Data archiving helps removing historical data as well as redundant data, which has little or no value for the enterprise and occupies valuable space.

The archived data is kept in a structure and proprietary format outside the SAP database. The greatness of the system is that the archived data can be accessed and retrieved by the user using standard SAP transactions.

To keep the enterprise system in a healthy system status, the database size and growth has to be kept under control. Data archiving is the one-stop solution.

Data Migration helps companies simplify their system landscape by havingonly a single system for unlimited access to all kind of data. Large savings can quickly be observed due to the removal of expenditures for running the legacy system and human resource. SAP has provided time saving tools and methods to fulfill the tasks of data migration. Examples of those methods are reporting and single document display.

Imaging allows users sitting at different locations to share documents and avoid delays and errors in business processing. Likewise, documents with different formats (e-mails, faxes, and multimedia files) become easy to manage with the document management functionality. Document archiving also saves all types of documents in a safe and secure place (content server.) Additionally, the strength of that functionality fulfills the legal retention requirements of a company. And Finally, it speeds up the business processing and the return on investment on the ERP system.

What is DART?
DART is a tool developed by SAP and ASUG for fulfilling the US audit and tax requirements by following revenue procedure 98-25. DART extracts tax related information out of the SAP database into a sequential file. The extracted data could be used for generating reports using DART views for replying to IRS requests. DART saves programming effort required to respond to IDRs (Information Document Request) by the IRS. DART not only fulfills IRS requirements, but can also be used to search historical information such as master records and transactional data.

Why do companies need to implement DART?
It is very beneficial to have a tool that quickly extracts specific data and helps reply to any kinds of present and future audits. Growing SAP database will compel the companies to implement data archiving before DART. Even after the data is archived, companies still have to comply with legal retention and IRS audit demands. DART is the tool that helps companies comply.