Using Open Source Platforms for Business Intelligence

Using Open Source Platforms for Business Intelligence

by Lyndsay Wise
Released November 2012
Publisher(s): Morgan Kaufmann
ISBN: 9780124158764

Read it now on the O’Reilly learning platform with a 10-day free trial.

O’Reilly members get unlimited access to books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.

Start your free trial

Book description

Open Source BI solutions have many advantages over traditional proprietary software, from offering lower initial costs to more flexible support and integration options; but, until now, there has been no comprehensive guide to the complete offerings of the OS BI market. Writing for IT managers and business analysts without bias toward any BI suite, industry insider Lyndsay Wise covers the benefits and challenges of all available open source BI systems and tools, enabling readers to identify the solutions and technologies that best meet their business needs. Wise compares and contrasts types of OS BI and proprietary tools on the market, including Pentaho, Jaspersoft, RapidMiner, SpagoBI, BIRT, and many more. Real-world case studies and project templates clarify the steps involved in implementing open source BI, saving new users the time and trouble of developing their own solutions from scratch. For business managers who are hard pressed to indentify the best BI solutions and software for their companies, this book provides a practical guide to evaluating the ROI of open source versus traditional BI deployments.

  • The only book to provide complete coverage of all open source BI systems and tools specifically for business managers, without bias toward any OS BI suite
  • A practical, step-by-step guide to implementing OS BI solutions that maximize ROI
  • Comprehensive coverage of all open source systems and tools, including architectures, data integration, support, optimization, data mining, data warehousing, and interoperability
  • Case studies and project templates enable readers to evaluate the benefits and tradeoffs of all OS BI options without having to spend time developing their own solutions from scratch

Table of contents

  1. Cover image
  2. Title page
  3. Table of Contents
  4. Copyright
  5. Dedication
  6. Acknowledgments
  7. SECTION 1: Introduction and market overview
    1. Chapter 1. Introducing BI
      1. Why is there a need for this book?
      2. What to expect in this book
      3. An introduction to BI
      4. The components of business intelligence
    2. Chapter 2. OS overview
      1. Why understanding OS matters
      2. A historical look at the broader OS market
      3. The general appeal of OS
      4. The OS market specifically
      5. Personal thoughts about OS expansion
    3. Chapter 3. The convergence of OS and BI
      1. OSBI gaining popularity
      2. The expansion of OS offerings and positioning
      3. The unique fit of OSBI and its effects on the broader market landscape
      4. Breakdown of OSBI technology
      5. General considerations for organizations
    4. Chapter 4. A look at the OSBI market
      1. Introduction
      2. The OSBI market – a general overview
      3. Traditional OS communities
      4. Adopting OSBI
      5. Why OS?
      6. OSBI transition and the expansion of OSBI into BI
      7. OSBI within the OS market
      8. Where OSBI solutions will/should be in the future
      9. Implications for businesses
  8. SECTION 2: A deeper look at OSBI
    1. Chapter 5. The increasing popularity of OS
      1. A look at BI drivers
      2. Putting it all together
    2. Chapter 6. The differences between general OS and commercial offerings
      1. Understanding different OS models
      2. Looking at community and commercial OS models
      3. OSBI models
      4. Looking at the community/commercial focus in the broader market
      5. The drivers of commercial OS for BI
      6. The bottom line
    3. Chapter 7. Business benefits and challenges of OS for BI
      1. How business and IT approach BI
      2. The relationship between business and IT
      3. Are benefits and challenges different or similar for business and IT worldviews?
      4. A look at OSBI benefits
      5. Business benefits – a wrap-up
      6. A look at OSBI challenges
      7. What all of this means for business justification
  9. SECTION 3: BI strategies for success – tying in OS adoption with BI success
    1. Chapter 8. The strategy behind BI adoption
      1. Adopting BI
      2. Why these factors matter
      3. Why choose OS
      4. Why go traditional
      5. Takeaways
    2. Chapter 9. Implications for users
      1. A practical guide to selecting OS
      2. Business factors of adoption
      3. Technical factors
      4. Considerations
      5. Checklist for software selection and implementation
  10. SECTION 4: Justifying OSBI projects
    1. Chapter 10. Selling an OSBI project to the business
      1. A closer look at ways of selling OSBI
      2. Community OSBI adoption
      3. Commercial after community
      4. Commercial for the first time
      5. New to BI
      6. BI expansion
      7. Rip and replace
      8. Embedded applications
      9. Sorting out the different models and what it means to business units
      10. Why sell to the business
      11. Selling framework
      12. The bottom line for OSBI adoption in organizations
    2. Chapter 11. Evaluating ROI and TCO
      1. Developing valid definitions of ROI and TCO
      2. Total cost of ownership
      3. ROI and TCO similarities and differences
      4. Why ROI and TCO are important to software selection
      5. Developing an evaluation framework for your OSBI project
      6. Putting everything together
      7. What is time to value?
      8. A look at long-term ROI and TCO
    3. Chapter 12. Developing a cost-benefit analysis for OSBI: A practical look at ROI and TCO calculations
      1. General TCO/ROI models – a look at what exists in the market
      2. Applying these models to ROI for OSBI
      3. Evaluating TCO for OSBI
      4. ROI and TCO calculations
      5. Looking at commercial versus community offerings
  11. SECTION 5: Understanding the technology behind business value
    1. Chapter 13. A look at technical considerations
      1. How do technical considerations help with the evaluation process?
      2. Evaluating the current IT infrastructure
      3. Looking at data integration
      4. Disparate data sources
      5. Database technologies and what the differences mean in terms of end-user delivery
      6. Takeaways
    2. Chapter 14. Understanding integration and data preparation
      1. Looking at the components of BI
      2. Why organizations should consider complementary offerings
      3. Integration
      4. Expansion
      5. Evaluating the current BI environment
      6. A brief look at Hadoop
      7. Integrating OSBI with traditional offerings
      8. The reality of the market
    3. Chapter 15. Working within an OS environment
      1. Introduction to developers
      2. A word about Java
      3. Development within a community OS environment
      4. Development within a commercial OS environment
      5. Free software access without source code
      6. Support available to developers
      7. Community involvement and vendor differences
      8. Collaboration with other developers
      9. Participating in vendor software development
      10. Upgrades, bug fixes, and the list goes on
      11. Looking ahead at developer requirements
    4. Chapter 16. Required skillsets
      1. Technical skills
      2. Java Programming
      3. IT project management
      4. Network and database optimization
      5. Metrics and analytics development
      6. Data modeling
      7. Data integration
      8. Business skills
      9. Business requirements
      10. Business unit interrelationships
      11. Business sponsor
      12. Business rules expertise
      13. Navigating the political maze
      14. Tying it all together
    5. Chapter 17. Technical benefits and challenges
      1. Expanding on the differences in technical versus business benefits and challenges
      2. A look at the technical benefits of OSBI adoption
      3. What about commercial OS and free software trials?
      4. The issue of support and proprietary limitations
      5. Weighing the benefits against the challenges
      6. Understanding technical challenges
      7. What types of challenges exist?
      8. Understanding the real benefits and challenges of software development
  12. SECTION 6: Takeaways/recommendations
    1. Chapter 18. Getting started: A checklist for OSBI readiness
      1. Business considerations
      2. Technical considerations
      3. Putting all the pieces together
      4. Important OS factors
      5. Can do with or without
      6. General conclusion
  13. Index

Product information

  • Title: Using Open Source Platforms for Business Intelligence
  • Author(s): Lyndsay Wise
  • Release date: November 2012
  • Publisher(s): Morgan Kaufmann
  • ISBN: 9780124158764