Information management

From the Editor: Advanced analytics full of promise, but hard to do

Advanced analytics technology adoption has been slow, but sports analytics has been brought to the fore with the London 2012 Olympics. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Star schema vs snowflake schema: Which is better?

Yahoo’s data and business intelligence architect, Rohit Chatter, answers the latest debate, Star versus Snowflake schema, by breaking down the differences, one aspect at a time Continue Reading

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• Rohit Chatter, Yahoo!

Predictive sports analytics put in play for Wimbledon, Formula One

Predictive analytics in sports is proving itself in tennis and car racing. Can it make the leap to team sports, long the preserve of barroom anoraks? Continue Reading

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• Gareth Morgan, Contributor

Data virtualisation on rise as ETL alternative for data integration

The Phone House and Novartis have turned to data virtualisation from Denodo and Composite to gain a single logical view of disparate data sources. Continue Reading

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• Gareth Morgan, Contributor

BI tool transforms planning, sales and service at TVS Motors

For TVS Motor, business intelligence tool deployment has enabled better production planning and improved sales and service. Here’s how the company did it. Continue Reading

By

• Mitchelle R. Jansen, TechTarget

BI platform standardization: Step-by-step approach

BI platform standardization is the key to improved data management and clarity on the cost per report. Follow these steps to standardize your BI with ease. Continue Reading

By

• Srinivasan Rengarajan

SAS: High-performance analytics frees data scientists to model faster

High-performance analytics on "big data" could aid European companies as they struggle to make headway in the recession, say senior SAS executives. All sectors are turning to big data, they claim. Continue Reading

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• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Organisational design for analytics function needs governance

Scant are the absolute rules for the organizational design of the analytics function. It can be outsourced or in-house; sit within a business unit or run from the centre. But it needs governance. Continue Reading

By

• Lindsay Clark

Enterprise data warehouse deployment: A step by step tutorial

To be quick on the enterprise data warehouse technologies uptake, this tutorial gives you all the information you need. Continue Reading

By

• SearchBusinessIntelligence.IN

From the Editor: Big data arrives, but plagued by governance challenges and skills shortage

Big data offers big opportunities, but governance challenges and skills shortages could pose big problems. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Making money from data: Financial business intelligence at work

Finance professionals are heavy users of BI and predictive analytics software. Find out how a variety of European finance functionaries are analysing trends, cutting costs and finding new business. Continue Reading

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• Kristina West, Contributor

Inmon or Kimball: Which approach is suitable for your data warehouse?

Inmon versus Kimball is one of the biggest data modelling debates among data warehouse architects. Here is some help to select your own approach Continue Reading

By

• Sansu George

Business analytics skills shortage provokes companies to cast net wide

Organisations face lack of business analytics skills. Smart companies cast the net wide for the broadest pools of talent, help analysts learn from each other and work to ensure they realize potential. Continue Reading

By

• Lindsay Clark

IBM users reveal five data governance best practices to remember

IBM customers Nationwide Insurance and Cardinal Health reveal five rules of thumb they learned while implementing highly ambitious data governance programs. Continue Reading

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• Mark Brunelli

Zornes: Master data governance will fuse MDM to BPM

Master data governance tools are emerging to aid the orchestration of MDM and BPM, according to MDM expert Aaron Zornes. “Big data” is a distraction from the business basics of MDM, he says. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

India CIO Salary and Career Survey 2012

Get an insight into the expectations of CIO for 2012 in the India CIO Salary and Career Survey 2012. Continue Reading

By

• SearchCIO.IN Staff

BI Masterminds, 2012

SearchBusinessIntelligence.in presents the winners of India’s only independent business intelligence excellence awards, BI Masterminds, 2012. Continue Reading

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• Sharon D'Souza, Reporter

Your 10-step cloud database migration checklist

Thinking cloud database migration? Use this checklist to migrate your database to the cloud to avoid any issues such as security, latency, or integration. Continue Reading

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• Devendra Murkute, Suraj Dubey

Enterprise software procurement done right can save companies millions

Software procurement is frequently poorly conducted, argues consultant Andy Hayler. Intelligent software evaluation processes and savvy contract management can pay huge dividends, he says. Continue Reading

By

• Andy Hayler, Information Difference

Predictive analytics used to cut costs in oil sector

Predictive analytics is being used in the oil and gas industry to better manage asset maintenance on capital equipment. And a more enterprisewide adoption of the technology is predicted. Continue Reading

By

• Lindsay Clark

In-memory database technology gains ground, but challenges remain

In-memory database technology improves specific application performance notably. But challenges need to be met before in-memory database becomes the norm. Continue Reading

By

• Sharon D'Souza, Reporter

Deloitte spots analytics trends, ethics and open data

Deloitte identifies four analytics trends: an increased focus on ethics, the rise of open data, new business models and a refusal to do analytics for its own sake. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

European river managers delve into new knowledge management system

The UK’s Environment Agency has procured a semantic wiki based knowledge management (KM) system to aid river restoration across Europe. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

BI reporting tools set to aid decision making at Elder Pharmaceuticals

BI reporting tools are known to buttress quick decision making. In this regard, Elder Pharmaceuticals plans to deploy BI tools for data mobility. Continue Reading

By

• Sharon D’Souza, Reporter

Advanced analytics key component for ‘decision management systems’

James Taylor, CEO of an independent consulting firm, discusses the need for advanced analytics to build “decision management systems,” which he believes are critical to staying competitive. Continue Reading

By

• Nicole Laskowski, Senior News Director

'Big data' technologies emerge to battle large, complex data sets

‘Big data’ technologies that allow the storage, management and analysis of big data are on stream: NoSQL, Hadoop, MapReduce. Mark Whitehorn explains the reasons for their emergence and how they work. Continue Reading

By

• Mark Whitehorn, University of Dundee

Shell enterprise MDM foundation proof of concept disturbs rulebook

Shell has laid a foundation for enterprise master data management, choosing SAP MDM over Microsoft. The major lesson was that IT can build an enterprise MDM system to which the business will come. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Record management standards improved

New standards by ISO assist with records management and can help you frame a storage strategy Continue Reading

By

• Anthony Caruana

Sybase: Data warehousing too slow for ‘big data’ analytics

Sybase EMEA business development director speaks about ‘big data’ analytics’ need for speed and pronounces traditional data warehousing “antiquated.” Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Royal Mail delivers enterprise master data management

The Royal Mail has delivered a master data management programme stemming from a new electronic data warehouse and BI initiative. Project team leaders claim a people-plus-technology synthesis. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Shell HR gains from structured information quality programme

Oil giant Shell’s human resources function has been on an information quality journey since 2002, integrating historically decentralized businesses into one assured talent pool. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Improved debt collection with BI: An ICICI Bank story

Debt collection can gain immensely by BI. By powering this, ICICI Bank has effectively turned debt collection into a customer-relations management program. Continue Reading

By

• Sharon D'Souza, Reporter

Larry English calls for an information quality revolution

Larry English, in an interview, calls for an information quality revolution that will put the customer first. New rules are necessary for the “information age 3.0”. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

BBC evolves digital asset management with Life

The BBC’s Life series marked an ongoing shift from film to digital media that is making the need for rigorous metadata and digital asset management in broadcast media more pressing. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Integrate your CRM application with BI for maximum benefit

Your CRM application need not stop after its growth after rollout. Integration with BI can helps organizations get the most from any CRM application. Continue Reading

By

• Rajendra C Mruthyunjayappa

BI software migration to give IndusInd Bank a leg up

IndusInd is undertaking BI software migration to consolidate data and make most of customer information. Read more about the software migration project. Continue Reading

By

• Sharon D'Souza, Reporter

Build an MDM hub with this step by step guide

Building a master data management (MDM) hub can be baffling. Use this step by step manual to build your own efficient MDM hub. Continue Reading

By

• Rajesh Parameswaran

From the Editors: Bleeding edge in natural language processing, mobile BI and Big Data

Natural language processing, mobile BI and Big Data are on the leading edge of technology innovation--but should you believe the hype? Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Big data analytics made easy with SQL and MapReduce

With growth in unstructured big data, RDBMS is inadequate for big data analytics. Know how to use SQL and MapReduce for big data analytics, instead. Continue Reading

By

• Siddharth Mehta, Contributor

Data quality improvement impeded by lack of automation

Data quality improvement has boosted revenue at 12% of a sample of UK companies. Progress impeded by poor automation, says research from QAS: 42% use Excel spreadsheets to detect data quality issues. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

MDM tools vendor selection criteria

MDM tools are fast turning into necessities. Start your MDM tools vendor selection process with these helpful tips. Continue Reading

By

• Rajesh Parameswaran

Round table: the value of big data

Learn what our round table of experts thinks of the value and significance of “big data.” Continue Reading

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• SearchDataManagement.co.UK Round table

How to improve storage resources utilisation

Storage hardware vendors’ upgrade offers are leading many mainframe users to buy storage they don’t need, which sends operational expenses through the roof because storage resources’ utilisation rates are low, says an expert. Continue Reading

By

• Simon Sharwood

How to manage semi-structured data

Semi-structured data is here to stay, and it offers the potential for business advantage to companies that handle and analyse it well. Mark Whitehorn has advice on how to do that. Continue Reading

By

• Mark Whitehorn, University of Dundee

IT in Europe e-zine: Data Management & BI Edition

The benefits of effective data management and business intelligence are many; so are the challenges. Get practical information and advice on data management & BI strategies in the IT in Europe ezine. Continue Reading

By

• SearchDataManagement.co.UK staff

Predictive analytics, data visualisation, player tracking at play at Wimbledon

IBM provided predictive analytics, player tracking and data visualisation at Wimbledon. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Hadoop's run into enterprise cloud

Free enterprise cloud software from Hadoop is causing a lot of buzz in the market, and the economics of the public cloud are leading customers to more mid-sized cloud providers. Continue Reading

SAS CEO offers analytics over BI, reveals use cases for text analytics

In an interview, SAS CEO Jim Goodnight advocates analytics over BI query and reporting, explains text analytics use cases and touches on predictive asset management. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Business intelligence center of excellence (BI CoE): A handy reference

To extract maximum benefit from a BI solution, setting up a BI center of excellence (BI CoE) is essential. Here’s how you should go about it. Continue Reading

By

• Naren N.S.

Data governance framework seen as bedrock of airline MDM strategy

Data governance emerges as a prerequisite for a sustainable, long-term master data management strategy. Continue Reading

By

• Jessica Twentyman

DHL uses product-level track and trace system for high-value air cargo

Logistics company DHL is one business that uses product level track and trace for high value cargo. OnAsset Intelligence provides sensors and data. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

From the Editors: Master Data Management journeys never-ending, but still worth it

Master data management is like the quest for the Holy Grail -- elusive, yet well worth the journey. See how MDM has demonstrated value within the private and public sectors. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Database normalization in MySQL: Four quick and easy steps

Normalization helps in achieving resource optimization with improvements in MySQL database design. Learn about database normalization in MySQL Continue Reading

By

• Ronen Baram

What to look out for when migrating to cloud databases

Companies going for a mix-and-match approach to migrating databases to the cloud are meeting interoperability problems. Early evaluation is necessary for integration. Continue Reading

By

• Cath Everett

Lloyds bank on master data management for business integration in M&A

Mergers and acquisitions have complicated Lloyds Banking Group's efforts to gain a single customer view through master data management. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

6 data warehouse design mistakes to avoid

Although difficult, flawless data warehouse design is a must for a successful BI system. Avoid these six mistakes to make your data warehouse perfect. Continue Reading

By

• Amit Agarwal

Volkswagen creates common data services in pursuit of car industry pole position

Volkswagen’s common data services approach is crucial to the IT-enabled transformation of its five businesses. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Teradata data warehouse joins SSD technology to HDDs, virtual storage

At Teradata Universe in Barcelona, the company announced the Active EDW 6680, a data warehouse system that mixes SSD technology, hard disks and storage virtualization software. Continue Reading

By

• Mark Whitehorn, University of Dundee

PizzaExpress parent turns to customer data analytics to target diners

The Gondola Group of restaurants, which includes PizzaExpress, Ask, Zizzi, Byron and Kettner's, has gone digital with targeted promotions to casual diners over the past 18 months. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

Dundee BI masters programme takes BI practitioners to next level

Dundee University’s business intelligence masters programme is training practitioners to take a step back, focus on user requirements and think about wider applications to science. Continue Reading

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• Brian McKenna, Senior Analyst, Business Applications

When data goes bad: how data quality analysis can fix problems

How can data quality be improved for business benefit? Data quality is complex, and thrown into relief by the pressing requirement for analysis. Learn how to clean it up through data quality analysis. Continue Reading

By

• Mark Whitehorn, University of Dundee

Business intelligence implementation best practices

Business intelligence implementations are riddled with challenges. Use these best practices to make your business intelligence implementations successful. Continue Reading

By

• SearchBusinessIntelligence.IN Staff

ETL tool buying guide

While procuring an extract, transform, and load (ETL) tool, your considerations should range from data formats, profiling, data quality to meta data support and more. Continue Reading

By

• Dr. Pramod Singh

Ensure data quality management during integration

Data quality management is the first and crucial step to data integration. Here are some tips to help maintain the data quality in your organization. Continue Reading

By

• Bijoy Abraham, Contributor

Data management a focus for UK CIOs and the retail sector in 2011

This could be an important year for data management, and business intelligence in particular in the UK, according to a recent survey. CIOs and retail in particular are optimistic about their IT projects. Continue Reading

By

• Brian McKenna, Site and News Editor

Tier Wars: Hardware, storage management software and document management software stake a claim for

Storage tiering is a hot meme, and rightly so because it can lower costs and is an important way to use the speed of solid state disks to your advantage. But with three tiering choices in the market – hardware, storage software and document management software - all offering tiering features, how can users decide which tool is the best tiering option? Continue Reading

By

• Simon Sharwood

TPC-E: New IT benchmarks for OLTP database servers

The Transaction Processing Performance Council (TPC) has released new benchmarks for online transaction processing (OLTP) database servers and hopes CIOs will use the new measures to inform their purchasing decisions. Continue Reading

By

• Matthew Emmerton, Contributor

Gartner's Top 10 disruptive technologies for 2008 to 2012

What are the new technologies that will change the way IT departments operate? Adam Turner reveals Gartner's top ten future disruptors. Continue Reading

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• Adam Turner, Contributor

Should I use data deduplication to manage unstructured data?

Absolutely; there are two areas where data deduplication, or single-instance storage, can help... Continue Reading

Storage Outlook '07: In search of better data management

Brian Peterson, storage architect for a Midwest-based Fortune 100 company, says better data management and business processes will be the main goal in 2007. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

Zoning 101: Why zone?

Zoning can offer a number of benefits for your SAN. This tip details the advantages of zoning and offers an explanation of the different methods. Continue Reading

By

• Rick Cook

Zoning, part 2: Hard zoning vs. soft zoning

Zoning is a fundamental management technique that basically controls who can see what in a storage area network (SAN). The following is part 2 of a three-part series on zoning. Continue Reading

By

• Simon Gordon

Zoning, part 1: An overview of zoning

Zoning is a fundamental management technique that basically controls who can see what in a storage area network (SAN). The following is part 1 of a three-part series on zoning. Continue Reading

By

• Simon Gordon

Zoning, part 3: Zoning schemas

Zoning is a fundamental management technique that basically controls who can see what in a storage area network (SAN). The following is part 3 of a three-part series on zoning. Continue Reading

By

• Simon Gordon