Special Report: Getting down to business intelligence

By SearchOracle.com Staff 14 Feb 2006 | SearchOracle.com

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Learning guide

This new compilation of news analysis and technical advice has everything you need to know about BI and data warehousing using Oracle.

Getting the most out of business intelligence (BI) implementations means getting various forms of data to work together effectively. But this goal is much easier set than reached. All this month, SearchOracle.com examined how BI is enhancing the bottom lines of companies -- and the careers of DBAs and other IT pros who take the time to learn it. Our coverage includes the latest news and BI tech tips live from February's TDWI data warehousing and BI conference in Las Vegas, as well as analysis from our archives.

TDWI coverage

• Getting started on master data management
  Expert Cliff Longman explains what IT professionals need to know before embarking on a master data management (MDM) initiative.
  
• Do the big BI vendors really understand your company?
  The leading business intelligence software vendors don't do enough to cater to individual industries, but some smaller up-and-comers are stepping in to pick up the slack, an outspoken business applications expert said.
  
• With MDM, it's all about the journey
  Your organization may never achieve true master data management (MDM), but speakers and attendees at the TDWI conference say there are plenty of reasons to try anyway.
  
• Expensive data warehouses not always necessary for BI
  Attendees at the TDWI conference and other data experts explain why some companies may want to rethink their approach to data warehousing and business intelligence.
  
• TDWI keynote speaker reveals secrets of DBA career success
  Anthony Politano started out as a DBA but made his way up the business ladder. Here, the keynote speaker at the TDWI conference explains how he did it.
  
• Expanding business intelligence with enterprise information integration
  The chief architect for ING Worldwide, a featured keynote speaker at the TDWI data conference, explains how enterprise information integration technology can help companies get more value out of BI implementations.
  

More BI news and analysis

• Analyst sizes up Oracle's post-Siebel BI strategy
  Business applications expert Joshua Greenbaum sizes up Oracle's post-Siebel business intelligence (BI) strategy and explains why he thinks general-purpose BI offerings belong on the endangered species list.
  
• Getting BI with a little help from your friends: The IT manager for a prominent legal auditing firm explains what he learned during a yearlong Oracle BI implementation process.
  
• Legal auditing firm retains customers with Oracle BI: The threat of losing major clients over lack of analysis and reporting capabilities prompted one legal auditing firm to get moving on a long-delayed Oracle Business Intelligence initiative.
  
• Getting BI from the contact center: Forward-thinking contact centers are using quality monitoring applications for business analysis.
  
• Update: Business Objects sweeps up Firstlogic: Business Objects SA has announced a new addition to its rapidly expanding business intelligence (BI) suite.
  
• Getting BI from RFID no easy feat: Widespread RFID implementations are only a matter of time, but there is still a dearth of BI tools on the market for analysis. Will companies have to build BI for RFID themselves?
  
• The best practices in customer intelligence: Customer intelligence management can help improve acquisition, retention and profitability. A study describes the best practices of early adopters and offers recommendations.
  
• One year later, Oracle touts progress of Fusion: This article details the progress of Oracle's year-old Fusion initiative as of early 2006.
  

Technical tips

• Analyst views: Business intelligence: This article provides analysts' views of what BI really is, some of the reasons behind the increased interest in BI and the pitfalls to which users should be alerted, as well as recommendations for how best to proceed with BI.
  
• Implementing business intelligence with Oracle's E-Business Suite, part 1: This tip covers the merits of using Oracle's Embedded Data Warehouse, Business Intelligence System and Daily Business Intelligence features.
  
• Implementing business intelligence with Oracle's E-Business Suite, part 2: This tip covers the merits of using Oracle's Sales Analyzer, Financial Analyzer and Enterprise Planning and Budgeting features for data analysis.
  
• Implementing business intelligence with Oracle's E-Business Suite, part 3: This tip covers the merits of using Oracle's Discoverer and Reports features.
  
• The BI application consolidation challenge: This tip addresses the necessity and difficulty of consolidating business intelligence applications gained through acquisitions.
  
• Saving lives with Oracle BI: In the area of medical informatics, powerful tools such as Oracle Discoverer and Oracle Data Mining are improving the quality of health care and helping scientists to save lives.
  
• OLAP defined: What is OLAP, and what are its uses in the present day business environment?
  
• Oracle9i OLAP uncovered: This article outlines some of the key features of the Oracle9i OLAP option and explains how multidimensional OLAP data can now be incorporated into Oracle databases and made available to standard SQL-based Oracle tools and applications.
  

Expert advice

• Areas of impact while migrating database from 8i to 9i/10g: Read our expert's response to this reader question: "We are supporting a BI/data warehouse application. Now the backend database is migrating from Oracle 8i to Oracle 9i/10g. We are using Oracle Express Analyzer 6.3.2 as the OLAP tool for report generation. We would like to know the impact and areas of concern."
  
• Reducing time to process a query: Read expert Mike Lampa's response to the question, "We are using Oracle Business Intelligence 10g. We have a problem: when we click on a worksheet it takes too much time to process the query. Is there any possibility that we can reduce this elapsed time of querying?"
  
• Testing BI applications: This expert response addresses the types of tests that are typically used in testing BI and ETL applications.
  
• More business intelligence advice: Browse the archives of Mike Lampa's expert advice on data warehousing, metadata and BI.

Have a BI question? Ask one of our experts.

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