James works at Microsoft as a big data and data warehousing solution architect where he has been for most of the last eleven years. Before that he was an independent consultant working as a Data Warehouse/Business Intelligence architect and developer. He is a prior SQL Server MVP with over 40 years of IT experience. Check out his book Deciphering Data Architectures: Choosing Between a Modern Data Warehouse, Data Fabric, Data Lakehouse, and Data Mesh.
What looks to be the biggest and best new feature in SQL Server 2014 is called the “In-memory OLTP Engine”, code-name: Hekaton. In short, Hekaton is a SQL Server In-memory OLTP Engine. Hekaton provides in-memory OLTP capabilities built into core … Continue reading →
Introduction You likely have heard about data warehousing, but are unsure exactly what it is and if your company needs one. I will attempt to help you to fully understand what a data warehouse can do and the reasons to … Continue reading →
Why do companies use placement firms to find IT contractors instead of using internal recruiters? Who better to answer that question that a recruiter who has been in the business for many years and now has his own small placement … Continue reading →
FYI: Geoflow (see Geoflow Preview for Excel 2013) is now called Power Map, and Data Explorer (see Microsoft Data Explorer) is now called Power Query. Microsoft Power Query for Excel has reached General Availability and is now available for download. More info: “Data … Continue reading →
Announced at Microsoft’s Worldwide Partner Conference 2013 is Power BI for Office 365: Power BI for Office 365 is a cloud-based business intelligence (BI) solution that enables customers to easily gain insights from their data, working within Excel to analyze and visualize … Continue reading →
SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT) has a new update: VS 2010: June 2013 version: 10.3.30618.1, December 2012 version: 10.3.21208.0, November 2012 version: 10.3.21101.1, September 2012 version: 10.3.20905.0, initial version: 10.3.20225.0 VS 2012: June 2013 version: 11.1.30618.1, December 2012 version: 11.1.21208.0, November 2012 version: 11.1.21101.1, … Continue reading →
Wow, Visual Studio 2012 is just out of diapers and here comes the next version! Microsoft officials released the preview of Visual Studio 2013 at the Microsoft Build 2013 developer conference on June 26 (along with TFS 2013). Download here. … Continue reading →
As I mentioned in my blog post describing the new features in the next version of SQL Server (see SQL Server 2014!), the CTP1 was to be released in June, and that time has come. Download it here, or it is … Continue reading →
Microsoft has posted ALL the session videos for TechEd North America 2013 and they are available for free! What a great way to learn all about SQL Server 2012 and Business Intelligence (some sessions have hands-on labs). Check them out here. … Continue reading →
There is nothing more annoying to me in my profession than getting calls and emails from recruiters who are looking for senior-level BI people at ridiculously low rates. A common example: they want someone with 10-years experience in BI to … Continue reading →
Thanks to everyone who attended my session “Building an Effective Data Warehouse Architecture” for Pragmatic Works. There were over 500 attendees! The abstract is below and the recording of the session is available here. I received a ton of questions and I have attempted … Continue reading →
The Big 5 IT consulting companies (Accenture, Deloitte Consulting, PwC (formerly PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP), KPMG, Ernst & Young) have various titles given to consultants along a career path. Wikipedia had good descriptions of the titles, and using that and a few other descriptions I … Continue reading →
I will be presenting the session “Building an Effective Data Warehouse Architecture” this Thursday, June 13th at 11:00am EST for Pragmatic Works. Below is the abstract. It will be a remote presentation that you can join online. Details are here. I hope you can make … Continue reading →
Do you ever wonder how your business intelligence (BI) and data warehousing (DW) environment compares to other companies and what steps you should be taking to progress your analytics platform? One of the first steps in any BI project is … Continue reading →
I asked a recruiter to check out my blogs about consulting, and his response is below. He had some good points on billling rates and what recruiters do behind the scenes: I really enjoyed reading over your blog you have … Continue reading →
Just when you thought you got a handle on SQL Server 2012, here comes the next version! SQL Server 2014 was announced yesterday during the TechEd North America 2013 Day 1 Keynote. It is due to be released in early 2014, shortly … Continue reading →
As a followup to my blog Power View for Multidimensional Models – Preview Available, the final version is now available via SQL Server 2012 Service Pack 1 Cumulative Update 4. So you can now create Power View reports against multidimensional models … Continue reading →
If you are involved in Business Intelligence, then the books by Ralph Kimball are required reading: The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit: Practical Techniques for Building Data Warehouse and Business Intelligence Systems, Second Edition, 2008, 636 pages (Amazon). Subject: Implementation guide. Primary … Continue reading →
There are three fundamental steps in building a data warehouse for a BI solution (see Why you need Business Intelligence): Identify the data the users interact with, or would like to interact with, via interviews. Make sure to determine the … Continue reading →
I am fortunate enough to have been selected to give a presentation at the PASS Summit 2013 in Charlotte, NC on October 14-18. It’s amazing to think that, although I have been in IT for 25 years, I first started to build … Continue reading →