With the development of information, large exponent ascend of information capacity make the traditional database retrieval query mechanism and statistics analysis methods not meet the need of reality. Under this background, data analysis methods were put forward and this made people have ability to know the genuine value of data. And, data analysis technology and data warehouse technology have been combined for exclusive decision service. So data warehouse and it's related techniques naturally become the hot point in the information field. The background, research contents and meaning of this paper is introduced. The basic concepts of data warehouse and its characteristic are studied, mainly including the system architecture and data organization. Then the key technologies of building the data warehouse are studied in theory and practice. And according to the building of the student electing-course data warehouse, the process of data warehouse design is elaborated in detail, mainly including the student electing-course model design techniques, concept model, logical model and physical model.