Letter from the Editorial Director
A wave of acquisitions, a host of start-ups, and significant innovations in hardware—all combine to make business intelligence (BI) the hottest ticket in enterprise technology today. Keeping abreast of so many developments can prove a daunting challenge for even the savviest executives; and falling behind the curve is not an option.
With all that in mind, TDWI proudly presents volume 21 of What Works: Best Practices in Business Intelligence and Data Warehousing. This compendium of content focuses specifically on BI and data warehousing (DW), providing an information resource for better understanding the tools, technologies, and methods that are central to this growing industry.
The goal of What Works is to provide a snapshot of the most innovative BI and DW implementations available today. The case studies included in this volume demonstrate the power of BI for industries ranging from publishing to healthcare, manufacturing to entertainment.
In addition, What Works includes articles from leading experts in the services, software, and hardware vendor communities. These “Lessons” feature perspectives about how to build successful BI environments—including such topics as master data management, customer data integration, performance ETL, and data mart consolidation, to name a few.
Our Q&A section provides answers from these experts to the questions they hear most often, complemented by insight from an independent consultant. You’ll also find excerpts from TDWI’s most recent research reports: Data Integration: Using ETL, EAI, and EII Tools to Create an Integrated Enterprise and Taking Data Quality to the Enterprise through Data Governance.
The feature article, “Business Intelligence 2006—Only the Beginning!” comes from Wayne Eckerson, TDWI’s director of research and services. Here, Eckerson takes a look at the evolution of BI, which he describes as a rich and ever-expanding field. Breaking BI down into five dimensions, he discusses past developments, as well as technology innovations to watch going forward.
We hope you enjoy this collection of case studies, best practices, and expert insight, and we look forward to your comments. If there is anything we can do to make this publication more valuable to you, please let us know. And please join me in thanking the companies who have shared their stories and successes, their technology insights, and the lessons they have learned.
Denelle Hanlon
Editorial Director, What Works
TDWI
[email protected]
Next
Back to Table of Contents