Archive for October, 2008

While in England earlier this week, there were two things that I got really excited about.  The first was this really cool toilet seat with a self-closing lid that my sister had installed at her house where I was staying.  It was so neat, you just touch the lid gently and it slowly and smoothly closed on its own.  My sister and brother-in-law thought I had digestive problems, because I kept disappearing to the toilet.  I just couldn’t get enough of this toilet seat!

The second thing that got me buzzing was this demonstration I saw of the Web Intelligence Integration Suite from Antivia.  Now I’ve seen some pretty neat dashboards and features with Xcelsius (and I get very excited about them, too) but just picture this: Take a Web Intelligence document with drill down built-in integrated as a component in an Xcelsius dashboard, so that you can interact with the document within the dashboard itself.  Now think about linking that document to other Xcelsius components so that, as you navigate through data in the report, these other components are changing dynamically and vice versa.  It could be linked to maps, gauges, pictures, internet content and tons of other stuff.  And that’s not all – the best is yet to come…  The suite also includes a Web Intelligence “Slice and Dice” panel component. You can actually drag and drop objects and create multiple iterations of reports within this component within Xcelsius. This just blew me away because it adds incredible new power and capabilities to Xcelsius that just takes dashboards to a whole new level.  With this suite, you can merge the power of Web Intelligence with Xcelsius in a single powerful user interface.

And the more I saw, the better it got.  You can publish the dashboards in to PowerPoint, PDF or Word with the embedded Web Intelligence components in there, so now you could be dragging and dropping objects in a Web Intelligence document, embedded in Xcelsius embedded in PowerPoint – this is mind blowing!

Another real gem about this suite is that the data for the Web Intelligence components do not feed through the Xcelsius model unless they are connected to other Xcelsius components in the dashboard. This means you could handle some sizable Web Intelligence reports embedded in the dashboard.

The framework that the suite uses also provides a collaboration component that allows you to instant message between other selected users looking at the dashboard.
When Donald McCormick, Business Objects CTO, showed the suite at the Business Objects User Conference in Dallas this week, people were literally wide-eyed at what they were seeing and broke out into spontaneous applause – something I have never witnessed before.

I have a feeling a lot more people will share my excitement over the Web Intelligence Integration Suite for Xcelsius than over the toilet seat with the self-closing lid. I think both products are destined for  great success!

So in the middle of the worst financial meltdown in my lifetime, I find myself on a plane to London, UK to visit some partners and customers.  I am on a British Airways flight and they hand out a British newspaper and I start reading about how they are dealing with the situation.

You must remember that it is the British that brought us “Monty Python” and the “Pink Panther” and they tend to look at the world and life a little differently.

I was therefore not surprised to find this big article about how the financial crisis and economic recession will actually be good for the British people because they will eat less, drink less, smoke less, drive less, conserve energy and help the environment. All this, according to the newspaper, will result in healthier Brits and a cleaner planet! So the conclusion of the piece was “Bring it on – we will not be depressed and keep our heads low through all this, we will embrace it and turn it into something positive”.

As I was pondering this intriguing British trait of both being eccentric and humorously optimistic, I looked up to see a passenger on the plane step out of his seat into the aisle and proceed to remove his pants. He very neatly folded them and took a pair of striped pajama bottoms from his bag which he put on. He did the same with his top and then sat back in his seat and closed his eyes to sleep. I was quite shocked at first but then it dawned on me, he must be British!

As  I visited companies in the UK, it was business as usual and both the need, plus impetus to implement Business Intelligence solutions, are as strong as ever. While budgets may be reduced, companies may cut back on hardware, software and contract staff but they will still look to move ahead with projects that can both strategically improve revenues and reduce costs. Business Intelligence becomes more important than ever in a depressed economy for analyzing what works and what does not. If something works, then we will be more inclined to continue to do it, just like I am sure that the man who put his pajamas on did so because he sleeps better when he is wearing them. Maybe it is not conventional to change in an aisle on a plane, but I am sure he was not thinking about that and was simply focused on his desired objective of sleeping.

Likewise, if your desired objective is to get accurate and strategic business intelligence out of your data, then use the tried and tested methods of designing and building a multi-dimensional data mart and using proper ETL tools and processes . I was pleased to see the customers I visited in the U.K. doing this and being successful at it.

The news last week of the British Government taking major financial stakes in the top UK banks had the U.S. and several  other Western Governments following their lead. Maybe we can also follow their lead in implementing  effective business intelligence solutions to help spur a financial recovery, but I think we should stop short on copying their methods of sleeping on planes!