Thursday, December 23, 2010

BI Seminar - Microstrategy BI Tools

Last Friday, I invited the "Microstrategy" to present a session based on their BI tools, to students from two different master degrees classes and also some BI passionate friends.
I confess that I didn’t have a very a good opinion about Microstrategy. But since some months ago, I surrendered to their products quality not for my own experience with the tools, but mainly by the market opinion and for the amazing staff that Microstrategy Portugal currently has.

Related to market opinion, Microstrategy is for Gartner, one of the world BI leaders. Mainly after this session, I truly believe on it, but BI is more than that… there is a huge work that BI should do to became a successful system. And because we are talking about tools... an ETL tool to extract, transform and load operational data into BI system is a critical step where almost projects in average spend 70% of the time. A BI system has a huge pillar on technology, but is required to be aligned with strategy, with business processes and with the people which almost the times resist to the change.

Related to the Microstrategy Portuguese staff, they are very kindly and always available to be in touch with the master degrees that I collaborate as assistant teacher. They are amazing and I’m sure that they make the difference in an increasingly competitive BI world.

The session was very interesting and concerning to the Microstrategy tools I highlight the big flexibility to create a dashboard, and also the huge performance that seemed to have! Also the dashboard showed directly in IPAD was wonderful!

The feedback from the audience was very positive... I highlight the following:

Take a look at this video to better imagine what was included on this seminar
Thanks again to Daniel and Carla from Microstrategy Portugal!

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

BI Tools – Microsoft Project Crescent

During the PASS Summit, Microsoft announced the launch of the community technology preview (CTP) of SQL Server 11, codename “Denali”. Unfortunately, this version doesn’t have yet almost BI functionalities promised by Microsoft. Only at the end of 2011 these functionalities will be available to try!

But for now, I’m very excited to see codenamed Project “Crescent” (entirely developed on Silverlight) available to try and test! Microsoft already have cool BI front-end tools, although
it’s required a tool that gathers all the functionalities dispersed by these several tools in only one. Right now, we can explore information inside a Data Warehouse or OLAP Database, through very good tools like: Excel, Visio, Report Builder, Reporting Services, Power Pivot (Excel Add-in)… but Project Crescent is a hope that an amazing visualizing world is coming soon… I hope not be disappointed, but on 2011 we all see and prove!


If you want to download the SQL Server Denali CTP, follow this
link
Regards, Pedro

Sunday, October 31, 2010

BI Guest Corner - Oracle and SAP Events

Dear friends,
Today I have the honor to publish some feedback about SAP and ORACLE realized last month in Portugal and submitted by Maria João Gama to the blog.

SAP Conference Day
The SAP Conference Day - Business Intelligence held at the Museu do Oriente (Lisbon) on 23rd September 2010, and it was probably the biggest Business Intelligence event this year in Portugal, with the presence of about 400 guests. The whole event was very oriented to the pressing need to "mobile" BI solutions.

With a very interesting agenda, the event began with an excellent presentation of Timo Elliott (No. 8 of official Business Objects), entitled "The Clear Future Intelligence." This presentation, which I strongly recommend, is available on YouTube:


The following agenda items were completed by case studies presentations based on SAP Business Objects platform. These presentations were all realized in partnership between the customer and the provider of the BI solution (SAP partner)

Highlight the presentation of Ricardo Guerra Volkswagen AutoEuropa, for being the only one that showed benefits with financial translation, quantifiable and measurable on implementing a BI solution - Business Objects Dashboard. This project, implemented by Novabase, the main goal was to monitor the daily operations of the various IT systems. The success of this project has brought Volkswagen adopt this solution as standard within the Group

The event ended on a high note with a presentation provided by an economist and university Professor, João César das Neves

Oracle Conference
15 September 2011, at Sana Lisboa Park Hotel, Oracle held an event where they made the official release of Oracle Business Intelligence 11g.

This event was very diversified, because although it has focused on the slope of the end user, exploring the platform provided by Oracle Business Intelligence, also covered technical solutions for integrating real-time data for BI and Data Warehousing and Extreme Performance Data Warehousing

The first presentation was entitled, Integrated Solutions for Business Intelligence and Data Warehousing, where it has been a demonstration of Business Intelligence platform - Oracle Business Intelligence 11g, which is positioned as a leader in the Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligence Platforms, Gartner

It was then addressed the integration of real-time data for BI and Data Warehousing, through Oracle Golden Gate that provides a data integration in real time without affecting system performance

The event ended with a brilliant presentation of Extreme Performance Data Warehousing with Oracle Exadata Database Machine, which promises to increase the performance of Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) Databases and Data Warehousing (DW) in more than 10 times. Impressive!!!

It was also scheduled a presentation from Oracle Essbase, which was cancelled due to delays

Bio: Maria João Gama is a project manager at EDP and more details can be found at her LinkedIn profile.

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

PDC10 - Developers, Developers and Developers

PDC10
This event is mainly interesting for developers. Although I think that could be also interesting for those in several other areas like BI that have some free time. I suggest you to view the key note and sessions live streaming, to be inside the latest technologies. Those taking computer classes on web development will benefit from the new ideas that will be presented in this event

"Since 1991, the PDC has been the epicenter of Microsoft’s biggest platform announcements. This year will be no exception. Leading-edge developers and architects will gather in Redmond this October to hear firsthand from Microsoft’s leaders about the next generation of Microsoft developer technologies. Those taking computer classes on web development will benefit from the new ideas that will be presented in this event

The PDC isn’t just about content and sessions – it’s an opportunity for you to get hands-on access to the latest technologies, have your questions answered by the people who conceived and built the technologies and plan the features and architecture to support your business goals. If you’re a developer, architect or technology leader involved in making strategic technology decisions for your company or organization, you can’t afford to miss the PDC

This year’s groundbreaking PDC event will include live streaming of the keynotes, as well as concurrent live streaming of sessions. If you can’t join the live stream, you can still watch the video on-demand, or download all the content within 24 hours of live recording. The online event is free; no registration is required to join the live or on-demand stream"

Monday, October 4, 2010

BI Event – Microstrategy BI Symposium


Well… I come again with a post related to BI Events… Mainly because the entire world is open the eyes and the focus to BI world is growing a lot… I would not be fair if I don’t enclose Microstrategy in the more important events about BI realized in Portugal. Microstrategy is one of the top companies in BI on the entire world. After SAP and Oracle events you cannot miss Microstrategy event next 9th November 2010… Personally, I want to thank to Carla Bastos, Rodolfo Vale and Nuno Esculcas (Microstrategy Portugal) for all the support and availability to make this BI world better!

Saturday, September 11, 2010

BI Events – Oracle and SAP BI Platform’s

Business Intelligence (BI) is the present and the future. Independently on which BI tools are used, the well succeeded companies don’t live without BI. Naturally BI is not only technology, but we all agree that they are the most important driver on BI. If you are a decision maker, an employee, a student, a teacher, or a simple person that are thinking to enter on this world, could be interesting see another perspective of BI. Oracle (15 September) and SAP (23 September) will hold this month their BI events with the latest news about their BI platform.

Join these events.

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

BI Event – FREE Sharepoint 2010 Event


The SharePoint Portuguese User Group is holding what they describe as a mega-event on September 29 2010 – the SharePointPt Day! I don’t have any doubt about their success! Huge professionals like João Bilhim, Andre Lage and Rodrigo Pinto are speaking and organizing it. You’ll also have the opportunity to see SharePoint gurus Joel Oleson and Mark Miller speaking! You cannot miss it!

I think Sharepoint 2010 is very expensive for Portuguese market, although, I truly believe that has huge capabilities and functionalities to make a Business Intelligence system perfect (BI is my area of interest, but Sharepoint provides you a lot of other interesting subjects). This week I’ll buy a 64-bits laptop to put the "hands" on it!

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

BI Guest Corner - Six Sigma Business Intelligence

Dear friends,
Today I have the honor to publish an article submitted by Alexis Bonari exclusively for this our blog. The subject purposed has been taking increasingly importance in the BI world… The benefits and challenges of six sigma certification in relation to BI is discussed below. Take five minutes and read it... is it worth reading:

Many educational institutions that teach Business Intelligence are taking on a new challenge: quantifying Business Intelligence quality. The most obvious way to quantify or define the quality of Business Intelligence is to create a marriage between the concepts that define Business Intelligence, and the popular Six Sigma Black Belt program.


Six Sigma strategies are defined by their adherence to a statistics-driven model.Six Sigma BI These models are designed to eliminate resource waste and streamline operational performance within a company. A marriage of Six Sigma statistical strategies with Business Intelligence principals would provide a mathematically based model for cost-effective Business Intelligence implementation. There are two main challenges inherent to applying the Six Sigma model to Business Intelligence.

1. How should the Business Intelligence product be defined?
Although much of the literature surrounding Business Intelligence relies upon terms and definitions that seem to defy strict quantification, data still represents the foundation upon which the definitions are based. Six Sigma techniques can be applied to this foundational data, thereby defining the Business Intelligence product.

2. How should we define the success of Business Intelligence?
The needs and desires of the client define the success of Business Intelligence. Therefore, quality can only be determined if the factors that clients care about are adequately identified. These factors generally include pre-defined industry standards such as performance, accuracy, clarity, availability of data, etc. Metrics can then be used to measure these factors.

A high quality Business Intelligence model will deliver these collated metrics to team members who are in the best possible position to act on them effectively. Six Sigma techniques are well positioned to judge how effectively the information is passed along. As more managers are trained in Six Sigma Business Intelligence, businesses will be better able to efficiently transfer data to the appropriate hands. By streamlining the processes employed in Business Intelligence strategies, companies will effectively reap many benefits that can be passed along to their customer base.

Bio: Alexis Bonari is a freelance writer and blog junkie. She often can be found blogging about general education issues as well as information on college scholarships. In her spare time, she enjoys square-foot gardening, swimming, and avoiding her laptop.

Monday, August 16, 2010

BI Conference - SQL Bits VII


Today I want to inform you about an amazing conference that will take place from September 30th to Saturday October 2nd in York (UK). It will be the 7th edition and for sure is an event that you could not miss. I don’t know yet if I’ll attend, but I’ll try! I attended two times in the past… check here and here to read my experiences at SQL Bits II Birmingham and SQL Bits III London

"Just as a reminder, SQLBits 7 will take place over three days from Thursday September 30th to Saturday October 2nd in York. Day one will be a training day, featuring in-depth full day seminars by leading SQL Server professionals such as Chris Testa-O’Neill and Chris Webb; day two will be a deep-dive conference day with advanced sessions delivered by the best speakers from the SQL Server community; and day three will be the traditional SQLBits community conference day, with a wide range of sessions covered all aspects of SQL Server at all levels of ability. There will be a charge to attend days one and two, but day three, Saturday October 2nd, will as usual be completely free to attend allowing everyone to attend and experience a great day of training even if they have no training budget"

If you think to register let me know.
Pedro

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

BI Article - Writing for Portuguese Microsoft KB

Recently I was invited by Microsoft to write to Portuguese Knowledge Base on SQL Server, more specifically in the Business Intelligence (BI) area. It was an honour and extra motivation for me, despite I’m being increasingly busier and with difficulty to contribute with my BI perspective in the various communities I am currently involved. This is also a challenge to test my capability for manage my time.


My articles on Microsoft's KB will follow a structure of "from theory to practice" in the BI area and they can be less or more detailed and addressing various issues on Data Warehousing, OLAP and Data Mining using tools such as Microsoft SQL Server R2, Excel 2010 , Power Pivot and Sharepoint 2010. This first article focuses on an approach that I typically use to design the date dimension. I hope this article is useful and also contribute for more complex approaches on date dimensions that you may need to implement on your BI System.

Take a look at my first KB article (KB2293691)
here and follow this link or press on the image below to download the files refered on the article!

If you want to know my perspective about BI concept, I suggest you to read my article on BlogNotions here

Thursday, July 15, 2010

BI Education - Post-Graduation in BI

The current Business Intelligence (BI) post-graduation degree at Universidade Portucalense (UPT) is near the end, and the next edition, as is typical in a well-organized institution like UPT, is already being prepared. According to the students, the current and first edition is being a success, which gives more motivation and enthusiasm for the entire teaching staff to continue the work and achieve the high expectations of the people who normally enroll in such courses.

I was again invited to take the course of BI, which made me very honored and proud and with a sense of accomplishment. There is always something to improve and innovate, and the next edition will be no exception. In terms of innovation will be my priority update all my modules and the used tools, and especially keep students of the 1st edition "tied" to the university for sharing knowledge among all, inviting them to attend some classes, workshops and mainly to present the final project done in the current edition. The following image show the general structure of my modules aligned with all the post graduation degree:

With the aim of bringing academia to the "real world", were created partnerships with large national and international companies with recognition in the area of BI. Among them are Microsoft, Primavera and Devscope as GOLD partners, and Microstrategy, Novabase, Critical Software, Informatica, PHC and Oracle as SILVER partners. My thanks to various partners for this partnership, even in the current crisis, providing the next edition students, with high quality workshops, BI books and awards for the best students.

A special thanks to students from the current edition for all their interest, dedication, kindness and friendship. I’m sure that for all their qualities their future is very promising. Personally, I see this graduation as only a training opportunity for sharing knowledge with students about this fantastic world of Business Intelligence and for which I am truly passionate.
Registrations are now open!

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

BI Thoughts – Writing on BlogNotions about BI

After Karen's (BlogNotions) invitation, today I’m starting a new adventure… writing about BI more often at the Business Intelligence BlogNotions website.

"BlogNotions Business Intelligence Blog delivers a diverse series of perspectives provided by BI thought leaders. Presented by NetLine, this forum delivers compelling updates on the latest technologies in the marketplace, discussions of competitive decision making, new ideas for analyzing data, and much more. Here you can find helpful information, ask questions, and collaborate freely"

This first post is dedicated to the Business Intelligence concept and for that reason, I should refer my main reference in this world: Drª Maria José Trigueiros.

I hope you read it and also enjoy it.
Check it here
Give feedback and let me improve with your experience and knowledge.
Regards,
Pedro

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

BI Article - Writing about BI in a Magazine

Today I accomplish one more important step in my professional evolution. Together with Drª Filomena Lopes (IT Director of Universidade Portucalense) I wrote an article for a Portuguese magazine about Business Intelligence. Naturally, this article is more interesting for Portuguese people than those that don’t have Portuguese as a mother or second language. But for those that don’t understand Portuguese don’t worry, because I was invited to write some stuff about BI in a english website... I’ll tell you more about it during this week.

Article published last week on "Semana Informatica" magazine.

I hope you enjoy this article.
Regards,
Pedro

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

BI Green - I Love You Earth


We are living in exceptional times. Scientists tell us that we have 10 years to change the way we live, avert the depletion of natural resources and the catastrophic evolution of the Earth's climate.

The stakes are high for us and our children. Everyone should take part in the effort, and HOME has been conceived to take a message of mobilization out to every human being.

For this purpose, HOME needs to be free. A patron, the PPR Group, made this possible. EuropaCorp, the distributor, also pledged not to make any profit because Home is a non-profit film.

HOME has been made for you: share it! And act for the planet. You can find this amazing documentary on YouTube in several languages, even up in Portuguese. Take some time on this and see how our home is right now

Start today the change of your lifestyle… follow this Mind-Map:

HOME official website
http://www.home-2009.com

Saturday, June 19, 2010

BI Interview – Donald Farmer BI Perspective

Today I want to share an amazing interview done by my friend Ella Maschiach’s with the “father” of Microsoft Business Intelligence… Mr. Donald Farmer. He’s responsible for the new amazing Microsoft products like Power Pivot and Sharepoint 2010. You can’t miss this interview. Ella… why do you not follow a career also as a journalist?
ehehhehehehehe

Part I


Part II

Check the entire post in Ella’s blog here
I hope you enjoy it.

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

BI Dissertation – MSIAD

Today I finally publish the presentation of my master BI dissertation, that I defended last year. I do it to share my perspective and experience with you, but mainly because I know that it was one thing that the teacher Maria Jose Trigueiros would want to see, if she was with us. For that reason, I’m also writing an article about this dissertation with my advisor, the teacher Drº Orlando Belo, in order to submit it internationally.


For now the presentation is in Portuguese, but I can easily translate it to English if I get some requests to do it. Unlike most of the master's students, I do not hide my dissertation and I share it with pleasure. I hope it could be helpful to you at least, to get some ideas.
Regards.

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

BI Blog - Three Years Blogging - Thank You!


Starts to be a routine add a post to commemorate the anniversary of this blog. :-) It’s a project created 3 years ago with great passion and dedication, and therefore remains alive for this long time. This is the place where I described some of my many stories, tips, news and even some personal moments/events.

For those who thought three years ago that the blog was more like a joke, today maybe are surprised. It has over 100 posts on various subjects related to Business Intelligence… But I do not cross my arms and I'm already preparing something to further improve this blog, not only in design but also related to the content. The promised remote BI sessions mentioned in a previous post, will really start soon…

Naturally these three years of life are due also to the thousands of visitors who passed through this blog, from the simple readers, to those who placed questions or requested some opinions/feedback. I know that many of those visitors have yet unanswered questions due to my immense workload during the last year… nevertheless I’ll try to answer soon.

A special thank to a person that is the huge driver of BI in Portugal and is undoubtedly my main reference… the teacher Maria José Trigueiros. She’s not physically with us anymore, but for sure, she’s seeing what we are doing here.

Some numbers...

Want to receive an alert via e-mail about new posts?
Add your email address in the box at the right side menu

Want to have alerts about new messages and/or posts?
Follow the links from RSS feeds in the right side menu

Want to share an experience? A tip? Some news?
I could give you permission to create your own blog in BIResort community or you could write a post here as a guest in section BI Guest Corner

This place will continue to be a meeting point for all those persons that have the same passion as me for Business Intelligence. Some more technical post’s continue to be published on BIResort community that I’m co-founder.

THANK YOU ALL
Pedro

Thursday, May 13, 2010

BI Conference - European TDWI Conference


Today I want to advise you for a big and very interesting conference that will take place at Germany between 14th and 16th June... The 10th European TDWI conference! This conference will provide both business and technology professionals significant opportunities to learn and understand best practices across a wide variety of BI topics.

I can assure you that the conference will be very interesting as well as the country itself that is fantastic! I was there last November 2009 to take the CBIP exams and it
was amazing. If you are near Germany or even in Europe don’t waste this opportunity. I hope someday organize CBIP/TDWI exams here in Portugal for all the BI Portuguese professionals interested on this certification. Regards, Pedro.

Thursday, May 6, 2010

BI Tools - SQL 2008 R2 Digital Tour


My teacher Maria Jose Trigueiros is not physical present any more, but she’s always present in my mind. I’m sure that she’s watching what the persons that has the luck to has her as teacher and as a friend will be doing. She shared amazing words, enthusiasm and experiences with me that changed my life. Because I know that she wishes that I continue blogging... I’ll do it, and even with more power!

SQL Server 2008 R2 RTM is now available for download!
I already installed in a new virtual machine in order to preparing some posts about it. In Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2, several components have new or improved features. I highlight the following new improvements:

PowerPivot for SharePoint
PowerPivot for SharePoint adds shared services and infrastructure for loading, querying, and managing PowerPivot workbooks that you publish to a SharePoint 2010 server or farm. To create PowerPivot workbooks, you use PowerPivot for Excel.

PowerPivot for Excel
PowerPivot for Excel is an add-in to Excel 2010 that can be downloaded from the web and installed on client workstations. You use PowerPivot for Excel to assemble and create relationships in large amounts of data from different sources, and then use that data as the basis for PivotTables and other data visualization objects that support data analysis in Excel

Reporting Services improvements
Reports can now include maps, sparklines, data bars, and indicators to depict data. Report parts enable collaboration through shared datasets, report items, and data regions that are centrally stored and managed. Dataset query results can be cached on first use or by schedule. SharePoint integration supports multiple SharePoint Zones, SharePoint Universal Logging, and local mode report viewing with Access Services and SharePoint lists. SharePoint lists, SQL Server 2008 R2 Parallel Data Warehouse, and SQL Azure Database can be used as data sources for reports

Take a look at additional news here
Take a tour on this new version of SQL through SQL 2008 R2 Digital Tour:
Regards,
Pedro

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Até breve professora!

I write this post in memory of the most important person for me in the Academic world. Unfortunately she left us yesterday, but I’ll never forget her. She’s an amazing person and all I have achieved in last 3 years is dedicated to her… The life is not fare! I never forget you teacher! Never! See you soon, I know that you’ll watching what we’ll doing here!

Maria José Forjaz Pacheco Trigueiros nasceu em 1956 em Cascais. Fez os seus estudos em Roma e em Caracas onde se licenciou em Matemática (1983, Universidade Central de Venezuela). Foi assistente estagiária na Universidade Simon Bulivar entre 1984 e 1986, onde obteve o título de Mestre em Ciências da Computação. Em Setembro de 1986 ingressou no ISCTE como assistente estagiária. Doutorou-se um 1994 em Investigação Operacional pelo Instituto Politécnico de Grenoble. Exerceu uma grande variedade de cargos académicos e actividade docente. À data do falecimento era professora auxiliar de nomeação definitiva no Departamento de Ciências e Tecnologias da Informação do ISCTE.

Missa de 7º dia por alma da professora Maria José Trigueiros no próximo dia 08 de Maio (sabado) pelas 19h00. Alguém não consegue ter saudades de um anjo como este?
Eternamente presente na minha memória e no meu coração.

Saturday, May 1, 2010

BI Books - Free SQL 2008 R2 eBook

Dear friends,
A very interesting free eBook was publish and shared by Microsoft Press. If you are a Database Administrator or a BI Developer, don’t forget to take a look to this book. You have no excuses… the book is FREE. Naturally the part of the book more interesting for me is undoubtedly the Business Intelligence chapters. Check the book structure:

PART I Database Administration
CHAPTER 1 SQL 2008 R2 Editions and Enhancements
CHAPTER 2 Multi-Server Administration
CHAPTER 3 Data-Tier Applications
CHAPTER 4 High Availability and Virtualization Enhancements
CHAPTER 5 Consolidation and Monitoring

PART II Business Intelligence Development
CHAPTER 6 Scalable Data Warehousing
CHAPTER 7 Master Data Services
CHAPTER 8 Complex Event Processing with Stream Insight
CHAPTER 9 Reporting Services Enhancements
CHAPTER 10 Self-Service Analyses with Power Pivot

More details about this book
Download the free SQL 2008 R2 eBook

Regards,
Pedro

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

BI Conference - TechDays 2010 - After my session

Finally I have some time to describe what I experienced last week during the TechDays Portugal conferences. Today I’m writing my post nrº100 and could not do it better describing this fantastic experience

The facilities
The day before my session I went to see the event facilities and aclimatize myself to the room where I would present my session. There were many people working for this event, and it is important that everyone had the notion that organizing such an event is not easy. It requires lot of human labour and a lot of dedication, mainly from persons like Luis Martins, João Bilhim and Leonor (Microsoft) and several other amazing dedicated persons


The people
I met many people and also spoke with people who normally only contact via the Web. Is indeed a very interesting event, where people share knowledge and opinions that for sure is more important than if the lunch is good or bad! Jorge Paulino, Ricardo Peres, André Lage, Rodrigo Pinto, MVP guys, Jorge Moura, Nuno Batalha, Tiago Rente, and a lot of enthusiastic professionals

The Session
Most people, certainly should not have a notion that it was my first public session with so many people... and also, that a year ago never came into my head be presenting a session at TechDays. It was a very difficult challenge trying to pass a message on Data Mining for almost 300 people, mainly because the profiles of the audience was very diverse ... feedback received varied between easy and very difficult session contents. Thanks to all the persons that attended to my session. Well… if you're curious take a look into presentation below:

I hope you enjoy it... I can translate to english if needed.

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

BI Conference - TechDays 2010 - Before my session

Dear friends,
There are only a few hours before presenting my session at TechDays. It will be a great challenge for me where I hope I can transmit the message I purposed to.

I don’t know yet, how many people will be watching my session, could be from 40 to 500 attendees… and for that reason I cannot measure right now the pression level that I’ll have today… :-)


There’ll be a lot of interesting sessions almost made by portuguese professionals…It’ll be a prove, that here in Portugal we have lot of expertise professionals.

I am sure that next year there will be lot of new speakers that are just watching this year. Mainly the master and pós-graduation BI Students… are your there!?!! :-)

Well… I'll leave now and I’ll wish a good luck to myself and a very good TechDays to all you. :-)
I’ll be back after the event...
Pedro

Thursday, April 1, 2010

BI MVP - My time has come!

My time has come!
Today I received the email from Microsoft with MVP award!
This award it’s the recognition of all my effort, passion and dedication to this amazing world of Business Intelligence. I know that I have lot a work to do and even more responsibility to follow Microsoft and community expectations.

Now, I cannot forget to thank all the persons that once again, helped me to achieve this award. I want to thank primarily to my princess Joana that is always by my side and to my family. Some special thanks to all direct and indirect support:

- To the all visitors of this blog (sorry for the late answers!)
- To the pos-graduation students on BI from Universidade Portucalense (Porto)
- To the master graduation students on BI from ISCTE (Lisboa)
- To Dra. Filomena Lopes for all the trust placed on me during last year
- To Dr. Orlando Belo for all support in my dissertation in the last years
- To Dra. Maria José Trigueiros for all the magic words (I'm wait a quickly recover!)
- To all those persons that believed in me, even more than myself!


Despite the award, I guarantee that I'll keep the same personality and I’ll remain my independence and always be watching to what all BI vendors and BI consultants are doing. I’m with Microsoft because I’ll believe in their strategy and If you want to join me in this adventure, I think you’ll not be disappointed. Unlike many other BI vendors, Microsoft remains near the community and always present. In my case, I want to thank to João Bilhim that is an amazing person that always encouraged me, to be inside this amazing world of Business Intelligence. Microsoft has few years in the BI market and for that reason is not yet the number one, but the first position is too close. If you want to join this adventure don’t lose the event with Donald Farmer next 16 April here in Portugal (just send me an email)
Regards,
Pedro

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Yes we can!...see Donald Farmer in Portugal!

For many years I have been following Donald Farmer work in Business Intelligence, mainly in Data Mining. Now and thanks to Microsoft Portugal we can see and make some questions to him in the first person.

"What do medieval archaeology, fish farming, Southwestern University of Chongqing and Microsoft Business Intelligence have in common? If you know, you should tell Donald Farmer, because he has been deeply involved in all of them at various times. Donald has worked in the Microsoft Business Intelligence team for 8 years covering many subject areas: data integration, information quality, metadata Donald Farmerintelligence, master data management, OLAP, predictive analytics and self-service BI. He is a well-known speaker at Microsoft and other industry ev
ents, and the author of several books and articles" [Source: SQLBits]

In the scope of the Business Intelligence community (www.BIResort.net) Donald Farmer will come to Portugal for a meeting/session at Microsoft Auditorium on April 16, 2010 from 18h to 20h.

The session topic will be focused on Self-Service BI (Power Pivot) followed by some questions and answers. It’ll be a mix between public/private and all the attendees should have an invitation.

If you want to be on this FREE event, just send an email to BIResort@gmail.com
(Limited seats)

Monday, March 22, 2010

BI Conference - TechDays 2010 Portugal


Sorry for not writing for so many weeks, but last month was very hard to me… not only the weekly work as BI Consultant but also the work as invited teacher at Universidade Portucalense on a Business Intelligence pos-graduation. Additionally I was working on the event preparation which brings me to blog today: the TechDays 2010

Microsoft Portugal will organize the TechDays 2010 event next April (20/21/22) at Lisbon (Oeiras). For the first time, in spite of attending the event, I’ll be presenting a session on Data Mining with SQL 2008 R2… that I’m sure that will be a huge challenge for me.

My session description:
“The volume of business data grows exponentially and the technology made the world evolve rapidly. Bad decisions may be the result of the world be evolving more rapidly than the decision maker’s capability to analyze these data.

This session is intended to establish a first contact with multidimensional data structures (OLAP) and to recognize and to derive the exponential importance of knowledge discovery in databases through the data mining models in SQL Server 2008 R2”


Check my session link here

There is still a month for the event and there are more than 1200 participants confirmed. If you are near Portugal you cannot miss this!
Regards, Pedro.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

BI Conference - Predictive Analytics World

Business Analytics is a subset of a Business Intelligence framework, even if some players like SAS, started changing their strategy killing Business Intelligence term and starting a new one: Business Analytics… Why companies like SAS with a flag of Innovations are always creating new concepts and creating more confusion on adding new buzzwords!? Are they creating new way to resolve problems? Are they creating new products!? Of course not… I’ll publish soon an article about this subject and about all the controversy this position has created on the web.

The main purpose of this post it’s to write about the Predictive analytic world conference. This conference will take place on February 16-17 at San Francisco and unfortunately, and again, I’ll not be present on the event because once again it’ll be held in USA and I’m little far in Portugal… maybe during this year I’ll go to other event for my PhD research.

“Predictive Analytics World is the business-focused event for predictive analytics professionals, managers and commercial practitioners. This conference delivers case studies, expertise and resources to achieve.

Predictive Analytics World focuses on concrete examples of deployed predictive analytics. Hear from the horse's mouth precisely how Fortune 500 analytics competitors and other top practitioners deploy predictive modelling, and what kind of business impact it delivers”


But never forget one thing… the future will never be like the past. Although of course it’s worth trying, and planning should be done based on facts and less on intuition. Read the Black Swan book, a good overview of how successful predictive models can be.

Use the following discount code to get 15% off a two day Conference pass:
Code: PEDRO010
(workshops are not included)

Saturday, January 16, 2010

BI Books - My Suggestions...

Following the request of many families :-), today I’m writing about my favorite books. In particular those I have read, those I'm reading right now, and those I’ll read soon relating to Business Intelligence world.

I have dozens or even hundreds of scanned or digital books, but there is nothing better and more motivating, than reading a book in the traditional format. All the books I have scanned into my computer, I never read them even after the print... the motivation is not the same and for that reason I always preferred to buy. The prices in Amazon website are cheap and even more, if you choose Amazon partner's stores. (In the images below you have each respective price attached)

The following books relate to the concept of Business Intelligence in general and how it fits with all its subsystems. The strategy, the processes, the people/knowledge and also something about the technological component. For those who follow the world certification in BI (CBIP), these books are essential for the examination in "Business Analytics":

              

The following books show the way to implement a successful Data Warehousing project. They were written by one of the greatest evangelists of Data Warehousing... (Ralph Kimball). These books focus on the dimensional modeling applied to multiple business scenarios and a complete life cycle that DW projects should follow. For those who follow the global certification in BI (CBIP), these books are essential for the examination of "Data Warehouse":

              

I also suggest more technical books which are more focused on Microsoft BI tools. These WROX books are very well structured, very easy to read and very helpful to understand better and fast. I’ll highlight the following books:

              

The following books are books very too simple and clearly explaining more deeply on what is behind this fantastic world of Data Mining:

              

Future purchases...
              

Currently Reading...
I am currently reading a book that promises to be very interesting. Not only by the positive feedback it has received, but also the important contribution of the author in TDWI/CBIP resources, that I’m always followed with great interest.

Keep tuned to this post because I'll be updating it with all the books I'm reading and some that have not put here yet! I hope I’ve helped you selecting your next book.
Regards, Pedro

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

BI Guest Corner – Technology vs Information

Technology and Information
Last week I was browsing for some contents on the web and I found a very interesting blog and post from Sofia Neto. I asked her permission to publish a very interesting and short post about technology and information… take a look:

“The technological revolution occurring in organizations since the mass use of Information Technology does not always achieved the expected results.

Several projects find themselves reduced to failure, since many managers and employees consider the systems complicated to implement and understand.

According to Davenport, the "fascination with technology has made us forget the main purpose of information: information." In fact, you don’t need sophisticated technological equipment, complete and powerful programs, if the user is not interested in information that these computers process and make it easier to access.

This brings us immediately to the urgency of the study of the users information behavior and understanding of their information needs. But also, for the struggle between "Technology and Information” for the podium of the importance.

In this battle, Davenport shows that only when the information (creation of users) they will leave information systems truly efficient. "Information and knowledge are essentially human creations, and will never be able to manage them if we do not take into account that people play in this scenario, a key role."

This post was kindly contributed by Sofia Neto, who is a Portuguese Information Manager and writes about Information Management and Information Management Systems at
her blog

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

BI Recognition - Sharepoint MVP award

Dear friends,
Today I’ll dedicate this post to a friend that recently achieved a MVP Sharepoint Award. MVP is an award that Microsoft gives to all those special persons that help people that are constantly helping people on specific subjects. Maybe someday it’ll be my turn… but for now, I just want to congratulate André for his accomplishment. I deal very well with the success of all my friends, mainly those like André and Jorge Paulino, that are always sharing knowledge with communities. I truly believe that Portuguese guys have a lot of knowledge to share with the world, despite most portuguese people think the opposite (portuguese people in most cases think that what is being done in Portugal is always bad… but persons like me, André Lage (MVP), Jorge Paulino (MVP) and several hundreds of portuguese people are fighting against them)

Andre has a similar life history to mine… he took his IT degree on “Universidade Portucalense” some years ago (like me) and moved away from his city (from Oporto to Lisbon like me) looking for better challenges.

Andre in the first person after receiving this award:

First: Recognition
Second: never give up.
Third: To assist, in every sense of the word
Four: do not make the title as a goal, but a mission
Fifth: As Microsoft says "Your Potential. Our Passion"

Andre has 30 years old, born in Porto (Portugal) and took his Information Management degree on “Universidade Portucalense” between 1999 and 2004. He’s a System Architect, Technical Leader and Consultant on SharePoint Corporate Portals in Sybase, SBS Portugal, with international focus. Andre has an extensive curriculum where his major steps are the support to several Sharepoint communities, the Codeplex Community contributions, speaker on Sharepoint 2010 webcasts and the contribution to BI Resort community and this MVP award. Check is blog here.
I hope to refer several other friends in future posts!
Regards, Pedro.

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