INDEX

1. PROBLEM STATEMENT .................................................................................................................................. 2

2. BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE ................................................................................................................................ 2

3. FEATURES OF BI ............................................................................................................................................. 2

4. BI WORKFLOW .............................................................................................................................................. 2

5. BI – KEY AREAS .............................................................................................................................................. 3

5.1. DATA INTEGRATION & WAREHOUSING ............................................................................................................ 4

5.2. DATA MINING ........................................................................................................................................... 4

5.3. ONLINE ANALYTICAL PROCESSING (OLAP) ....................................................................................................... 5

1. Problem Statement

Do you need your information readily available in the relevant form? Are you drowning in data and

information? All you need to make sure that you only receive information that is necessary for your

managerial decisions is a management information system, also called Business Intelligence System.

2. Business Intelligence

Business intelligence (BI) refers to techniques used in analyzing business data. BI technologies provide

historical, current, and predictive views of business operations. Business intelligence aims to support

better business decision-making.

3. Features of BI

The following lists some of the key features of any business intelligence application

Data Integration

Analysis

Reporting

Dashboard

Predictive analytics

Business performance management

Benchmarking

4. BI Workflow

Heterogeneous data sources are integrated using EAI and DIR. Integrated Data sources are

aggregated using data warehouse which will then be utilized by the OLAP processing for various

reports required. The usage of cubes can be replaced using ontology.

5. BI – key areas

There are three key areas of Business intelligence

Data Integration & Warehousing

Data Mining

OLAP

5.1. Data Integration & Warehousing

Heterogeneous data sources and various application generated data sources can be integrated using

DIR and EAI.

Data warehousing is the process which takes the transactional data and finally report those data,

generally in an aggregated way, to business users in the organization.

Transaction Data Aggregated Data

Data Warehousing consists of an ETL tool, a Database, a Reporting tool and other facilitating tools, such

as a Data Modeling tool. Below is the detailed diagram of data warehouse.

5.2. Data Mining

Data Mining Services transform data into information. Information that provides knowledge for

reducing operating costs and minimizing equipment maintenance costs. Data mining is functionality that

processes data through sophisticated algorithms to uncover meaningful patterns and correlations that

may otherwise be hidden with standard analysis and reporting. These can be used to help you

Data Warehousing

understand the business better and also exploited to improve future performance through predictive

analytics.

Open Source tool for Data mining includes Waka , JDM

5.3. Online Analytical Processing (OLAP)

Approach to answer multi-dimensional analytical queries

OLAP Cube is the data structure for fast analysis of data used in OLAP processing

Multi-dimensional database analyzes data from multiple perspectives.

Ontology can be exploited instead of OLAP Cube as they are represented in graphs and more

dynamic than the OLAP Cube

Suggested tools for OLAP includes the following:

o OLAP4j

o Mandrian (Pentaho OLAP Server)

Open Source Business Intelligence Tool

Pentaho products are all built on the foundation of the Pentaho BI Platform; A collection of community

and open source projects brought together to not only create a full Enterprise BI Suite, but also allow

companies to take advantage of their data in ways never before possible. Many enterprise solutions can

start with basic departmental reporting or begin as more advanced big data implementations that

include enterprise data services using data integration (ETL), data modeling though to reporting, analysis

and dashboards. Either way, Pentaho has solutions for your data and analytic needs.

Pentaho Features:

Data Integration

Cleanse and integrate data wherever it exists

Reporting

Access data and deliver information to the organization

Analysis

Explore and analyze data interactively with rapid response

Dashboards

Get immediate visibility into metrics and KPIs

Data Mining - Discover hidden patterns and indicators of future performance

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_intelligence

http://community.pentaho.com/