Help with database connections

[CalebMF]

Here is a little background on myself:

I came from a Business Objects Analyst position at a previous company with no Cognos Administration experience. When I came on at my new company, I was thrust into the position (Not complaining) of Cognos Administrator, Cognos Developer, Cognos Report Builder, Cognos Report Analyst, and I am trying to clean up a lot of mess from a previous consultant who tried to configure our systems. All Cognos lingo is pretty new to me, but I have been learning.

A question I received from my boss today: "Can you list the different ways we can connect Cognos to our sources? I believe the answer lies within the content store. What architectures can we connect to that will provide us with a similar model to what we are doing currently with [Current System]?"

Our [Current System] has a connection to Cognos through SQL Server 2008. We have about 3 other systems that we would like to connect to, to streamline our reporting. All 3 Companies who own these other 3 systems have tried to sell us their BI tools for use. But since we have invested in Cognos (Currently 10.1) as a company, we would like to utilize it to it's fullest potential. Web Services is an option that they have given us as a connection to their data. But from what I understand, Web Services is not "Live" data. Having data that is as up-to-date as possible is extremely important for our company.

If anyone could help me answer my boss's questions as well as help direct me to some of the best tools/ ways to connect to these other three systems, I would greatly appreciate it.
Thank you

Caleb

[tjohnson3050]

What is the underlying database technology of these other three systems? 

When you find that out, you can see if those databases are on the IBM Cognos 10.1 supported environments:

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg27019126