Sunday, September 27, 2009

Aweekstweets Sept 20-27 2009 @jameskobielus

Aweekstweets Sept 20-27 2009 @jameskobielus

BTW, has anybody noticed the irony of the so-called "father of the Internet" being somebody named "Cerf"?4 minutes ago from TweetDeck
JK2—Surfing the Internet is still an apt metaphor. New waves of innovation just keep swelling this ocean of information and experience. It’s all we can do to stay on the board.

Scanned & posted to my Facebook key docs from 1991 attesting to Gore's pivotal role in commercializing the Internet. Setting record straightabout 8 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—Gore was one key catalyst in the development of the first truly new mass medium since television. He never claimed to be the “father of the Internet.” In fact, Vint Cerf—another key catalyst--never claimed that (admittedly sexist, paternalistic, simplistic, GreatMan-istic) role either. It’s simply a matter of Gore’s political enemies exaggerating what he claimed in order to tarnish his legacy and keep him from gaining the presidency.

"Cerf: Turning off pieces of the 'Net 'not sensible'" (http://bit.ly/15QDP3): JK--Bogus issue. No one's arguing POTUS needs to be Net-fuhrerabout 9 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—With reference to the proposed Snowe-Rockefeller legislation, Cerf sets the record straight in the linked article: “You understand the motivation behind it. It's people concerned about the dependency we have on the Net and the potential for that dependency to be very brittle. But the idea that the president would turn off pieces of the Internet is not sensible. On the other hand, focusing attention on the need to make the network more robust, more reliable, more resistant to various forms of either attack or infection is a really good thing to be attentive to. .... I don't think the president should try to turn off the Internet, and I don't think that he has any interest in trying to do that.” Heck, Bush Jr couldn’t “turn off” the civil aviation system in this country for long after 9/11? And what, exactly, would one “turn off” in response to a cyber-warfare attack? And isn’t “turning off,” or blocking, pieces of the Internet the preferred solution of the Chinese communists?

Anyone up for a Delete-a-Thon? How fast can you manually detect/purge spam from various accounts? It's everybody's everyday obstacle course.about 10 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—With a good e-mail client, a keyboard and mouse, a fast connection, and a net-side spamfiltering service, I can clear out a hundreds of spam in perhaps 30 seconds—with very high accuracy--from both my inbox, client-side bulk-mail folder, and online suspected mail folder. I have several e-mail inboxes, so we’re still talking a couple minutes of my time, at least, each and every morning.

RT @smarthart: "MRotenberg discusses modern day privacy." http://bit.ly/hW2vc: JK--It's power to make oneself less of a sitting-duck targetabout 10 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—Much of this is a “cows long since left the barn” discussion. Says Rotenberg: “Is the government going to use our data as it is supposed to or is it going to spy on us? Does the bank have good security or do we have to worry about breaches? If I give an email address to a cell phone company, am I going to get spammed? And is that quiz that just told me which European capital city I'm most like really trying to figure out who my friends are?” It’s also about the power to monetize your online self in all its informational splendor, including your blogs, tweets, and facebook status updates. Says Rotenberg: “This is modern-day privacy, about digital identity, the control of personal information, and the brewing battle between what we post and its commercial value.” Every last scrap of what we choose to share online will in fact be scooped up by the growing silent army of “listening engines” that leverage text analytics technologies: natural language processing, entity extraction, sentiment extraction, social network analysis, and the like. Some of these engines will correlate your profile, behaviors, and transactions based on your unique identity. Others will roll it all up into broad demographics and psychographics, to fine tune their strategy of reaching you and people like you. Try as you may to stop this silent army from targeting you with every last scrap of intelligence that you choose to share (or don’t realize you’re choosing to share, or others are digging up on you from disparate sources) you won’t succeed. Best to prepare your defenses. More powerful spam filtering, for example.

RT @chaskielt: R @kalido: Had in-depth conversation about Kalido KONA w/ @jameskobielus." JK--Kalido partnering with Netezza and QlikView.2:27 PM Sep 25th from TweetDeck
JK2—Forthcoming (not yet GA) solution appliance for master data management, with out-of-box information models (initially) for pharmaceutical sales and marketing analytics and insurance sales and distribution analytics. I haven’t yet come across a customer looking for a shrink-wrapped appliance for MDM. Usually, DW appliances are for query acceleration in a mart layer in front of an existing EDW hub. But give Kalido credit for pioneering a potential new market segment. KONA will become available in roughly the same timeframe as IBM’s pre-announced Smart Analytics System solution appliances (of which it has not yet announced specific vertical and horizontal applications and markets that will be addressed).

Just responded to Forrester customer email inquiry on BI-in-cloud. Reviewing research, I'd forgotten how many vendors in this immature space9:22 AM Sep 25th from TweetDeck
JK2--There is a growing range of vendors that offer DW in a public and/or private cloud environment, including Vertica, Kognitio, Aster, Greenplum, Microsoft, AppNexus, FathomDB, and 1010data. There is another group of vendors that specialize in offering the front-end reporting, query, dashboarding, OLAP, and other access, presentation, interaction, and delivery features of BI as cloud/hosted/SaaS subscription service. This list includes Bi3, Birst, BlinkLogic, FortiusOne, Good Data, InetSoft, JasperSoft, Oco, PivotLink, and QlikView, some, but not all, of which incorporate a hosted DW into their hosted BI offerings (all of which are managed from their own data centers, not public clouds). Furthermore, many leading BI vendors—including Actuate, IBM Cognos, Oracle, Panorama, SAP Business Objects, TIBCO, and QlikView—offer SaaS subscription access to their solutions (but none of them yet hosts these services in Amazon EC2 or any other public cloud).

Handled reporter inquiry on Oracle Exadata v2 last night. Key new feature: flash cache. Paves way to eventual all-SSD, all-in-memory DW/OLTP6:57 AM Sep 25th from TweetDeck
JK2-- Performance-wise, one of the most significant enhancements in the Exadata v2 machines is the cache-oriented database-acceleration technology (5 TB smart cache per machine), paving the architectural road toward an eventual phase-out of physical disk in favor of an all solid-state-drive (SSD) storage architecture for order-of-magnitude I/O bandwidth expansion. The new Sun-based machines, leveraging Exadata Smart Flash Cache (based on Sun FlashFire memory cards), offer significant improvement in Oracle Database 11g R2 query performance, and also in write-intensive online transaction processing (OLTP) applications.

Edited Wikipedia entry on Web data services (http://bit.ly/x2Iqs).7:28 AM Sep 24th from TweetDeck
JK2—A couple of days later, my revs stand unmolested. Here’s what it says up there as of this moment:
“Web data services [1]refers to service-oriented architecture (SOA) applied to data sourced from the World Wide Web and the Internet as a whole. Web data services enable maximal mashup, reuse, and sharing of structured data (such as relational tables), semi-structured information (such as Extensible Markup Language (XML) documents), and unstructured information (such as RSS feeds, content from web applications, commercial data from online business sources). In a Web data services environment, applications may subscribe to and consume information, provide and publish information for others to consume, or both. Applications that can serve as a consumer/subscriber and/or provider/publisher of Web data services include mobile computing, web portals, enterprise portals, online business software, social media, and social networks.[2]. Web data services may support business-to-consumer and business-to-business information-sharing requirements. Increasingly, enteprises are including web data services in their SOA implementations, as they integrate mashup-style user-driven information sharing into business intelligence, business process management, predictive analytics, content management, and other applications, according to industry analysts.[3] To speed development of web data services, enterprises can deploy technologies that ease discovery, extraction, movement, transformation, cleansing, normalization, joining, consolidation, access, and presentation of disparate information types from diverse internal sources (such as data warehouses and CRM systems) and external sources (such as commercial market data aggregators).[4] [5] Web data services build on industry-standard protocols, interfaces, formats, and integration patterns, such as those used for SOA, Web 2.0, Web-Oriented Architecture, and Representational State Transfer. In addition to operating over the public Internet, Web data services may run solely within corporate intranets, or across B2B supply chains, or even span hosted software as a service (SaaS) or cloud computing environments.

Finding the mobile carrier industry the chief proving ground for comprehensive in-db, in-cloud, and in-stream analytics.3:10 PM Sep 23rd from TweetDeck
JK2—The key apps for all these are customer churn analysis, customer up-sell/cross-sell prospecting, customer experience analysis, and fraud prevention/detection. Predictive models—embedded in the data warehouses, cloud computing environments, and real-time complex event processing streams upon which mobile carriers run their operations—enable carriers to maintain proactive 24x7 surveillance, look-ahead, and optimization of their environments on every level through fearsomely smart rules engines.

"Teradata: 'We were the original appliance vendor'" (http://bit.ly/1L2vTI): JK--Remember when DW vendors avoided the A-word like plague?1:22 PM Sep 23rd from TweetDeck
JK2—Nowadays, if a DW appliance vendor avoids the word “appliance,” it shows they have no clear sense for what customers are screaming for: one-stop shop for a complete, pre-integrated, pre-optimization solution portfolio on a hyper-fast hardware/software platform.

Expect DW appl vendors to push several envelopes in pitches: sub-$20K/TB affordability , super-100X query accel, & MR in-db analytics flex.11:25 AM Sep 23rd from TweetDeck
JK2—Maximum affordability, scalability, and flexibility. The MapReduce in-database analytics must be comprehensive enough to encompass pushdown of all functions—ETL, query, regression, scoring, etc.—into a massively parallel, distributed, virtual DW fabric.

Awaiting further price reductions among DW appl vendors. Expect sub-$20K/TB deal vol to grow, for core commodity DW, not incl add-ons & p.s.11:17 AM Sep 23rd from TweetDeck
JK2—DW deals for under $20,000 per terabyte (compressed, user data) for the platform (CPU, storage, I/O, query tools, loading tools) maintaining the core production tables. The sub-$20K/TB deal volume will consist primarily of deals in which that lowball pricing is accompanied by long-term customer subscriptions for maintenance/support, plus add-ons such as BI, ETL, DQ, and MDM, plus a host of professional services to put it all together, customize it, and optimize it all anew.

RT @dmscott @gmblogs #gm "Social media democratizes word of mouth." http://bit.ly/1y1WKQ : JK--Becomes word cloud of unseen flying fingers.8:39 AM Sep 23rd from TweetDeck
JK2—Most of which will feel unreal. Much of which will in fact will be auto-generated by spambots targeting suckers. Much of which will purport to come from reputable sources, or people who’ve “seen it, done it, used it” and whose testimonials must be believed. Caveat caveat caveat!

Analytics vendors need to maintain healthy "in-the-lab"/"in-customer-hands" balance on their techs. Too lab-weighted = PhDs gone wild!7:39 AM Sep 23rd from TweetDeck
JK2—I love the stuff in the lab. I could spend all my days and nights in the lab. I’m an analyst who sees countless me-too products. The stuff in the lab is usually the antidote to boredom—the seriously new stuff—for jaded old pros such as me. Then again, the people in the lab aren’t talking to customers and trying to develop and sell products. Caveat caveat caveat!

In business analytics, a "full-stack vendor" now refers to one that offers comprehensive hardware, software, and services portfolio.7:36 AM Sep 23rd from TweetDeck
JK2—“Full stack” doesn’t mean you should acquire everything or anything from that vendor. It just means their product/service catalog should guide your checklist of what, if you had all the budget in the world, you would in theory need for a feature-complete deployment of whatever.

Price wars! One DW appl vendor touting so-called "Cash4Clunkers" (3-yr sw subscr: #1 free, #2&3 cut-rate) incentive to migrate from rival.10:18 PM Sep 22nd from TweetDeck
JK2—I love when vendors disparage each other in the context of too-hip sales/marketing campaigns. Already, “Cash For Clunkers” feels a bit past its expiration date as a buzzphrase in the zeitgeist. But the DW appliance price war continues unabated.

RT @atanubasu: "Social media analysis: a new way of listening" http://bit.ly/buNdb: JK--Or new way of pigeonholing, with stats on your side.10:03 PM Sep 22nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Social media analysis drives clustering and segmentation, which in turn drive target marketing. From the recipient’s end of the target-marketing equation, it all begins to blur into spam and other invitations/solicitations that feel like they’re pitched at somebody else, not actually or specifically you. Trying to make your feel like you should be part of some “social network” that you don’t feel like you belong to, or which doesn’t add meaning to your personal experience.

RT @jackshafer: "Clay Shirky on investigative journalism” http://bit.ly/P5qhn: JK--Who'll replace reporters as watchdogs as newspapers fold?9:51 PM Sep 22nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Answer: analysts. Further context on that answer: that’s what the best reporters have always been, and most of the best are now bloggers.

"Netflix Awards Prize" (http://bit.ly/17N0um): jk--3-yr $1M contest to tweak movie-recommendation engine predictive model. Razor-thin finish9:46 PM Sep 22nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Is Netflix going to hire these people to score and evolve the model? It will decay, of course, and soon.

Most Hadoop being implemented in premises "clouds" (i.e., distributed, virtual, complex info/file stores), not public clouds.9:31 PM Sep 22nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Hadoop devotees bristle at being associated with in-database analytics alone.

RT @SethGrimes " DBMSs before electronic computers...edge-notched cards" JK--Wha? Any stackable non-volatile inscribed surfaces a database?5:44 PM Sep 22nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Let’s not imagine “databases”—a late 20th century innovation--as the pinnacle of human informational evolution. That is uncomfortably close to the “everything that’s ever going to be invented has already been invented” foolishness.

RT @nenshad: "Twitterese is "domain-specific language" in CS speak." JK--Yep. DSL for chatter-intensive attention-poor trivia-steeped domain5:41 PM Sep 22nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Let’s not imagine Twitter, in its current state, as the pinnacle of micro-expression on the Internet. Telegraphy gave way to paging, instant messaging, and SMS, then Twitter, and others will surely come. None of them created a new language—just a new constraint into which the old language mapped its complexity and stripped away distracting nuance. Essentially, each new micro-expression medium creates a new pidgin English (look up the technical linguistic definition of “pidgin”).

"The Perils of Cameras in Mobile Devices" (http://bit.ly/YtrKh): jk--Yeah. But also peril to collective memory from not having camera handy8:14 AM Sep 22nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Just keep snapping those camera photos. Future generations will thank you for “being there.”

What exactly is a "Luddite" anyway? I try not to complicate my tech life anymore than necessary. Only on my own terms. And when good & ready7:44 AM Sep 22nd from TweetDeck
JK2—For example, these aweekstweets.

Liking the new TweetDeck v0.30.5--the Facebook integration is much better, richer.3:41 PM Sep 21st from TweetDeck
JK2—But the new TweetDeck has its issues: the auto-URL-shortener is unreliable, and the Facebook link tends to de-select for no apparent reason.

RT @computerworld: "Dell agrees to buy Perot Systems for $3.9B" JK--HW a commodity, prof svcs not. Both Perot companies bought by HW vdrs.8:04 AM Sep 21st from TweetDeck
JK2—Sure am glad the little demagogue didn’t become president. Whatever became of the sucking sound he said NAFTA passage would cause as US jobs went down to Mexico? Last time I checked, Mexicans still flocking to the US, even in recessionary times. Good for them. Glad to have them here. And it’s good for them to know that US companies are not averse to investing south of the border, should they decide to go back home. My crystal ball tells me Mexico will become one of the world’s most powerful economies in this century.

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Aweekstweets September 13-20 2009 @jameskobielus

  1. Everything's "social" these days. Social DW? Compress terabyte data mart down to flash form. Trade 'em like baseball cards. Maybe not.about 7 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Social everything. What that refers to typically is an interpersonal pub-sub service with user-generated content and a dynamically reciprocal membership roster involving various degrees of opt-in, invitation, referral, and self-assertion. Hence, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, you name it. If there were such thing as a “social data warehouse,” that would have to refer to user-generated personal-subject domain analytic content, metadata, rules, policies, calculations, and visualizations packaged up for reciprocal sharing with others. Oh, wait, that’s BI mashup maturity level 4, per my Forrester report on same. Let’s keep calling it BI mashup for now—until the mashups get packaged as “appliances” (e.g., on flash drives). Then, voila—personal mashups sharable in “DW appliance” form factors—via sneakernet. Then again....nah....dumb idea. Scratch that thought.
  2. Computerworld BI Perspectives conf: Pervasive, self-service, low-cost BI for operational intelligence--#1 customer requirement overheard.1:32 PM Sep 16th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Every organization is eager to take mundane basic analytics—i.e., traditional BI—out of IT’s lap, and shift focus to advanced analytics: predictive modeling, data mining, text mining, complex event processing, BPM-integrated analytics, etc. Clear cost reduction and strategic/competitive benefits
  3. "Google's 'Data Liberation Front'" (http://bit.ly/j2oZw: jk--Yawn! Informationista Libertarians? Nah, Google just giving you your own data.10:13 AM Sep 16th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Hmmm...maybe “personal DW appliance” a way of liberating data. But flash drives a security vulnerability. Employees walking off with great gobs of critical corporate data. Gotta watch that.
  4. Sun Oracle DB Mach w/ Exadata: I'm tad disappointed they don't offer solution packaging w/ BI, adv analytics, etc. Rivals going/gone there.8:13 AM Sep 16th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Rivals such as IBM and Sybase. Impressive as Exadata v2 is, Oracle seems to be competing mostly against Teradata and Netezza, neither of which has moved as aggressively into analytic solution appliances as they should. Teradata bundles some SAS analytic apps with its DW appliances. Netezza does the same with Kalido and some other partners. But I expect these and other DW appliance vendors to go very deep into analytic solution appliances in the coming year—leveraging add-on apps (their own plus partners’), vertical/horizontal logical domain models, and professional services ecosystems.
  5. Sun Oracle DB Machine w/ Exadata: comprehensive pushdown optimization of analytic & OLTP functions to intelligent storage layer. Excellent!8:11 AM Sep 16th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Rings all the right bells: scalability (multi-petabyte; faster CPU, memory, disk, I/O throughput; faster scans and loads; more efficient compression), affordability ($20K/TB), flexibility (comprehensive pushdown optimization of analytic & OLTP functions to intelligent storage layer; smart flash cache; storage management improvements; packaging as quarter, half, and full rack, etc.).
  6. Sun Oracle Database Machine with Exadata: $20K/TB for multi-petabyte very-high-perf DW appliance with strong compression. 2 thumbs up!8:09 AM Sep 16th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Such a strong release, I’m wondering how they can top this with splashy announcements at OpenWorld next month. We’ll see.
  7. Daily IT vendor press release glut starting to built to expected, typical post-Labor Day volumes.7:58 AM Sep 16th from TweetDeck
    JK2—If you do this job long enough, you have this rhythm in your bones.
  8. RT @genevilleneuve "wasn't sure if you wanted to be cited....thanks again for [Svc-Or Analytics] insight!" JK--My pleasure: great session!7:49 AM Sep 16th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Service-Oriented Analytics. I’ll be happy to discuss in one-on-ones with customers at Forrester Business and Technology Forum, Chicago, Thurs-Fri Oct 8-9 (http://bit.ly/e2oBE).
  9. "Autonomy Applies Adv Meaning-based Tech to Transform DBMS Market" (http://bit.ly/2y6ao): jk--Predictive probabilistic query inference.6:23 AM Sep 16th from TweetDeck
    JK2—The fastest queries are those that never need to be made. They’re the future queries you eliminate by inferring what the requester’s really looking and delivering it to them. Predictive, pre-emptive analytics applied to the heart and soul of BI.
  10. So proud of self: able to integrate Service-Oriented Analytics into Computerworld BI talk. Will definitely discuss in FORR blog soon.5:23 PM Sep 15th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Yes, I’m working on that.
  11. RT @Oracle PR: Oracle Unveils Exadata v2: First DB Machine for OLTP: JK--REPORTERS: Very significant release: call my mobile for comment.5:13 PM Sep 15th from TweetDeck
    JK2—No reporter calls. Looking at the coverage, I don’t think they grasp the significance. More important release than Exadata v1 last year. Key milestone in industry evolution of EDW into an analytic application server.
  12. I'll be speaking today from 2:55-3:40pm (central) on self-service BI mashup. Computerworld BI Perspectives. Westin Chicago River North.12:46 PM Sep 15th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Thank you everybody for attending, and for your great questions. We’ll be in touch.
  13. TweetDeck--with current content--loads faster than most other apps on my desktop. Hence, TweetDeck's becoming my first-up app.11:28 AM Sep 15th from TweetDeck
    JK2—And it delivers a surprisingly representative cross-sampling of latest industry news and scuttlebutt—I’m following the crème de la crème of them.
  14. "Actuate & Infobright Announce High-Perf Virtual Machine for BI & DW" (http://bit.ly/n2jdG): jk--Fully open source DW/BI virtual appliance.8:13 AM Sep 15th from TweetDeck
    JK2—I’m not seeing a lot of customer adoption or interest in virtual BI software appliances, of which there are only a few on the market.
  15. Opposite business analytics/optimization cultures: the SWAGs vs. the Stats. Former rely on gut intuition, the latter on hard numbers.12:49 PM Sep 14th from web
    JK2—Typically, the SWAGs write the checks for the tools used by the Stats. Therein lies a tension that keeps the Stats from gaining the upper hand. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Business is intuitive, at its heart, as is science. Both disciplines rely on numbers to steer the ship, but depend on visionaries who can see the future through the cloud of often distracting stats.
  16. "Google Plans Mirror Tech for Green Computing" (http://bit.ly/Utx7q): jk--Article disappoints. Thought was diabolic plot to blind Microsoft.7:29 AM Sep 14th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Has anybody noticed how rapidly “green” fell into the “not” side of the “hot/not” buzzword spectrum.
  17. "Web 2.0 and SaaS: A Breeding Ground for Crime?" (http://bit.ly/udsVt): jk--What th?!? Cloud, virtualization, & SOA too? Nu paradigms toxic?7:06 AM Sep 14th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Clear sign of trade press straining for sensationalism.
  18. Huh? "Coffee" now following me on Twitter. The stuff's stalking me now. Tables are turned. Let's see if it finds @jameskobielus addictive.6:51 AM Sep 14th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Those Twitterbots have become so obnoxious with the “I’m following you” e-mails. I’m only following those entities that I’ve actually heard of, and might have something useful to tweet. I’ve heard of this caffeine-bearing bean, but I doubt that its virtual presence would comfort me as much as its physical instantiation. So I decline.

Sunday, September 13, 2009

Aweekstweets Sept 7-14 2009 @jameskobielus

  1. Contemplating bandwidth (the metaphorical). Ratio of timewidth to taskwidth. Wide time, narrow task = plenty of bandwidth. Opposite: now, me20 minutes ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Q3 drawing to a close. Deliverable closure activity even more dense, intense—especially when you’re also on the road.
  2. @CurtMonash @SethGrimes @jamet123 I'll be speaking at Teradata Partners. Would like to catch Pred Analytics World. I live in DC area.about 19 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—I’ll be speaking at Teradata Partners on in-database analytics: business drivers, use cases, approaches, standards, maturity, vendor support, futures. It’s the convergence point between my two core Forrester coverage areas: data warehousing and data mining/predictive analytics. Predictive Analytics World is happening the same week, in the same area (Washington DC metro area), where, coincidentally, I reside (not often that tech conferences I want/need to attend are in the DC area—strange that two should happen in the same week).
  3. Pondering the convergence of analytic and transactional database appliances. Evolved DW as the new analytic app server.about 22 hours ago from web
    JK2—This is the thesis of my in-database analytics preso at Teradata Partners, plus the Forrester teleconference I did last week, plus the upcoming Forrester report I’ve drafted. In a nutshell, analytic data repositories—with deep history, multiple subject domains, complex information sets—are getting too massive to move. It makes sense to move predictive-analytic application logic to where the data lives--the enterprise data warehouse (EDW)--than to move the data to physically distinct analytical data marts. The benefits of in-database analytics (aka “no-copy analytics”) include bandwidth saving, faster data prep and scoring, and improved model governance. As more application logic migrates to the EDW and as these apps are wrapped in SOA/REST interfaces, this platform becomes a more mission-critical analytic app server.
  4. rt @markrittman Oracle to announce another "database machine", this time based on Sun hardware and aimed at OTLP : http://bit.ly/fSFfh
    JK2—Really? That would make sense: transactional app logic will move to analytic app servers (aka EDWs) such as current Oracle Database Machine with Exadata. Other EDW vendors are moving down similar roadmaps. I’m looking forward to Oracle OpenWorld next month. Seeing as how the European regulators are holding up the Sun acquisition, there may not be any attention to the Oracle/Sun roadmap at that show. For obvious reasons.
  5. "Anti-Tweet Business Retreat" (http://bit.ly/17PxqY): jk--Saddle up the ponies, ride the range. No tweeting allowed. Birds: this means u 2!about 1 hour ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Yeah, yeah, cowpoke. The city slickers are smarter than you give ‘em credit fer. They’ll tweet from their phones, all the time pretending that they’re dialing a particularly long phone number just to call that pretty little filly back in the city and brag about how they’re roughing it.
  6. "How to Calculate Data Warehouse Reliability" (http://bit.ly/17mlFd): JK--Very cool, precise, analytical yet actionable assessment metric.about 1 hour ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—I’d like to develop a similar metric on data warehouse scalability.
  7. "Silicon Valley is shrinking" (http://bit.ly/725Ho): jk--So's my Rust Belt hometown. Welcome to the "gee remember those good ol' days" club.about 1 hour ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Let’s state this in a slightly different way. Silicon Valley has been virtualized to the world. The new “garage” is the social network of familiar strangers hatching new enterprises in the cloud. The earthbound “valley,” no matter how lovely, will be eclipsed by shifting clouds overhead, which know no borders.
  8. "Raytheon To Buy Internet Pioneer BBN" (http://bit.ly/1EdS2Q): jk--I'd forgotten BBN still existed. Pioneered use of "@" in e-mail address.about 1 hour ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Remember when that symbol, which was on most manual and typewriter keyboards, effectively stood for “each” or “individual”? As in lists that had lines such as “99@ bottles of beer on the wall.”
  9. "Twitter and the New Social Marketing Game" (http://bit.ly/1TaitE): jk--"Twitter is a social space, not a selling space"? Don't be naive!about 1 hour ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—That’s what we all said about blogs. Now my blog provider offers a tab labeled “monetize.”
  10. "10 Ways To Complement the Enterprise RDBMS Using Hadoop" (http://bit.ly/7DRIc): jk--Yes. Virtualize DW with HDFS i/f. In-cloud analytics.about 1 hour ago from TweetDeck JK2—Here’s part of the confusion. Hadoop refers to an advanced-analytic function development workflow model applicable to complex content, including but not limited to what’s in DBMSs. It also refers to a distributed file system to support that content-rich model. Over the coming 5 years, today’s relational DBMS, the Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS), and other persistence approaches will be virtualized into a more all-encompassing cloud of spindle and cache, structured and unstructured, at-rest and in-motion analytic content. “Virtualized DW” is too restrictive a term for this coming environment, but it’ll have to do for now.
  11. @jamet123 "Removing Decisioning From the SDLC" (http://bit.ly/14kwCt): jk--Service-oriented analytics. Reusable decisioning svcs. Agile dev.about 1 hour ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—I agree with Mr. Taylor. Software development life cycles usually flow in the classic waterfall. But inline decisioning services are evolved in an iterative, dynamic, collaborative, agile fashion. That’s because these services depend on predictive models maintained by analysts—i.e., subject matter experts who themselves work in such a fashion, independent of software developers. Service-oriented analytics is SOA in the predictive modeling realm: enabling maximum reuse of predictive models among teams of analysts leveraging each other’s expertise on business problems that cross multiple domains.
  12. "Oracle finally updates flagship database" (http://bit.ly/cwQD0): JK--Oracle DB 11g R2 is very substantial release: scalability, performanceabout 1 hour ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—And high availiabity too. My fave of many new features: Oracle RAC One Node. It supports server consolidation by leveraging RAC technology to enable clustering, load balancing, and failover across server blades in a single node.
  13. "IBM Chief Economist Says Recession Is Over" (http://bit.ly/G9wU5): jk--Private-sector economists feel first pulse of fresh vigor. Pay heed!about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Which brings up academic hairsplitting questions such as “what’s an economy?” and “what’s a recession?” [Note: This tech analyst has a degree in economics from the University of Michigan—Ann Arbor]. There are so many possible economic indicators you could point to (individually or in clusters, from GDP through consumer confidence, lending, hiring, profits, inventories, stock prices, etc) on so many possible levels (micro-economic or macro-economic, across so many sectors, regions, and countries), so many comparative baselines (absolute growth, percentage growth, comparisons with last quarter or year, comparison with worst-case scenario of Great Depression II), and so many authorities voicing their opinions on all this all the time through all possible channels. You accept Ben Bernanke’s word. Others heed Jim Cramer. Some listen to the president of the United States, who’s listening to his advisors. Still others think IBM’s chief economist has a thing or two to say on the matter. We’re all grasping at straws, until the next boom, however we slice, dice, and define it, is here in full force, undeniable.
  14. "SSDs Ready For The Enterprise" (http://bit.ly/mf75V): jk--Flash storage will be all the rage in DW query/mart appliances in 2010 & beyond.about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—By 2015, flash storage will be standard in the query/host tier in all DW appliances.
  15. "From Amazon To IBM, What 12 Cloud Computing Vendors Deliver" (http://bit.ly/bxbsF): jk--Great analysis. Check out cloud comparison chart.about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Some trade papers have excellent analysts on staff. They call them “reporters.” Guess which reporter-analysts all analyst-analysts read.
  16. "Using social media to turn staff into customer svc reps" (http://bit.ly/QtOdU): jk--And thru self-service letting customers rep themselves.about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Social media, coupled with business activity monitoring, will bring this vision to fruition. See Natalie Petouhoff and my preso on this topic at next month’s Forrester Business and Technology Forum in Chicago.
  17. "XML Threatens Big Data? Bull@*#!" (http://bit.ly/11cMMu): jk--Usually, XML gets staged, transformed, compressed before DW. Crunched to fit.about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Apparently, this headline was written by Penn and Teller. I did a piece for the now-defunct Business Communications Review in 2005 on this very topic, from a transactional computing standpoint. With data warehousing, XML is almost never loaded into the production tables, or into cubes. XML is usually a source format that gets transformed at the staging layer to some more storage-efficient format, with the semantics of the original XML content managed in the corresponding ETL/DW/BI metadata layer.
  18. "Madison" (http://bit.ly/Gk0kT): jk--Wisconsin capital. MSFT DW appliance: scales from Monona to Mendota to Michigan. Deep, fresh data lakesabout 2 hours ago from TweetDeck JK2—Note: This tech analyst also has a journalism degree: from the University of Wisconsin—Madison. The capital city of America’s Dairyland is on a scenic isthmus between two reasonably large inland lakes: Monona (to the south) and Mendota (the larger, to the north, upon whose southern shore sits that university, and in whose waters the plane carrying soul legend Otis Redding crashed in 1967). Madison sits in southern Wisconsin, around 90-something miles to the west of the only Great Lake that sits entirely within the USA’s borders. Seattle’s about 2,000 miles to the west. Aliso Viejo CA, where the bulk of SQL Server “Project Madison” development is taking place, is perhaps 1,500 miles south of Seattle, just north of San Diego. Draw a triangle on the map between Madison, Seattle, and Aliso Viejo, and, smack dab in the middle, you’ll find Yellowstone or Grand Teton. Both of them would make find codenames for this Microsoft project project. Especially Grand Teton: scaling petabyte mountain. I always chuckle remembering what Grand Tetons means in French.
  19. "Surfing in Hawaii" (http://bit.ly/2AScHT): jk--KONA important release for Kalido. Even more important for Netezza: DW governance appliance.about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck JK2—Netezza can’t keep margins healthy without move toward solution-based packaging of advanced analytics and data management offerings, such as MDM. Kalido can’t stay in the game without wide range of DW appliance partnerships.
  20. "MySpace, Facebook, Other Social Ntwks Account for 20% of Online Display Ads" (http://bit.ly/Zjcf6): jk--Display ads. Play ads? Social ads?about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Ads migrate toward the virtual places where people truly live. Toward social networks, where the ads become an integral component of the relationships that sustain those environments. Not so much ads that display themselves, but ads that figure into people’s social lives. Ads that add to the community, not just suck cash and patience from it.
  21. "11 Apache Technologies That Have Changed Computing" (http://bit.ly/F76Nx): jk--Love these substance-packed eWeek slideshows. #15: Hadoop!about 2 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Apache is as formative to Web 2.0 as IETF was to Internet 1.0.
  22. The ZapForum DC event (http://bit.ly/130tZQ). I'll be there. New poem composed for occasion: "SOA DOA? No Way!" (http://bit.ly/1DXHe0)about 5 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Yeah, I stuck with my tried-n-true triple-haiku. It germinated the night before. It terminated my sleep early on the morning after. It culminated in a quick foxtrot to the laptop with bang and beep and a tweak till it came out just right. For that occasion—in 3 weeks. I never truly intended to write it on the spot as a door prize. Or, rather, I toyed with the idea and then realized I’m not Nipsey Russell.
  23. Social network analysis: look for patterns of background, behavior, preference, interaction of which people are unaware. Make them aware.about 13 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Social networks aren’t really networks. They’re simply contexts within which people may eventually find themselves and others to be more alike than different—or which they may be found by others to be an affinity cluster capable of being addressed for fun and profit.
  24. Catch and keep a customer. Covet the customer list. Uncover the customer social networks. Social network analysis: next-gen data mining.about 13 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—Relationship mining and predictive relationship analytics. Discover the full extent of the current B2C relationship and/or predict the most likely B2C relationships that may be brought into being—through well-targeted sales, marketing, customer service, and other efforts.
  25. Smiling. Have significantly expanded my knowledge of today's data mining market, and tomorrow's. I'm curiosity's cat, of Cheshire varietyabout 15 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—My Forrester Wave on Predictive Analytics and Data Mining Solutions. Essentially, mining the value prop of the current vendors/solutions and predicting how that is likely to evolve over the next few years. No, there have been no mind-blowing revelations. It’s just good to evaluate them all, their current offerings and roadmaps, side by side by side. The demos have been particularly enlightening.
  26. "Database-less DW": That actually federated data management with robust DQ and MDM. That's also a pipe dream. @markmadsen @Claudia_Imhoff \about 19 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—You need a centralized DW to be the governance focus for ensuring the quality of the “golden record.” Of course, this paradoxical phrase—“database-less data warehouse”--is not technically accurate. Even in federation environments where you have no DW (centralized or hub-and-spoke), you still generally source/OLTP databases that are storing data and responding to queries. If you take this “warehouse” notion for the metaphor that it in fact is, then the “database-less DW” is analogous to a just-in-time supply chain without transshipment depots. Customer orders get routed in real-time to the factories, which respond with production runs and shipments in real-time.
  27. The fact that DW startups are getting new leases on life through fresh funding shows a) economy improving and b) analytics remains red-hot.about 19 hours ago from TweetDeck
    JK2—And c) some DW vendors have hot enough IP and hot enough visions that investors still find impressive enough to bet on.
  28. Enjoyed James McQuivey #forrester discussion of Social TV research ongoing. I'm doing it: Twitter/Facebook over Verizon FIOS.3:28 PM Sep 10th from TweetDeck
    JK2—When I say “I’m doing it,” I mean “I’ve played with it.” I’m not doing it now. I don’t do most of my tweeting or facebooking that way. Mostly, because I don’t have a keyboard that connects with my FIOS TV service. Also, because I don’t watch much TV anymore. And because, when I do watch TV, the only interface I have any tolerance for is the remote—and the only functions that suit me are on/off, volume +/-, and channel +/-.
  29. RT @TonyBaer: RT @jameskobielus & Rob Karel "INFA deal... HP’s last brave attempt....." jk--Not so. We couch it as "case could be made."1:34 PM Sep 10th from TweetDeck
    JK2—In that blogpost, what we said specifically was: “One could even make a case for the Informatica deal representing HP’s last brave attempt to mount a credible data management software strategy.” And then we follow it with a challenge to HP: “If HP is truly serious about becoming a full-fledged data management software provider, now is the time to make strategic acquisitions in the DI, DQ, MDM, BI, PA/DM, and other key solution markets.” Doesn’t sound like we’re sounding the death knell on HP’s data management strategy, does it?
  30. Rather enjoyed the flight up to Boston this eve. Coincidentally @CurtMonash was 1 row up across aisle. Made nice non-tweet industry chitchat8:45 PM Sep 9th from TweetDeck
    JK2—And we gave each other our respective quiet zones. Curt could see me zoning—or, rather, Zuning—with my music and thoughts. I love flying.
  31. Finding folks confusing my upcoming FORR PA/DM Wave & FORR rpt on in-db analytics. These are 2 distinct projects, y'all, but complementary.5:05 PM Sep 9th from TweetDeck
    JK2—The Forrester Wave on Predictive Analytics and Data Mining Solutions will be published by year-end. The Forrester report “In-Database Analytics: Heart of the Predictive Enterprise” is substantially and will be published in the next several weeks. I plan to blog about it soon.
  32. I'm well along with the exec strategy briefings and demos on my Forrester PA/DM Wave. Soon will do ref customer interviews.5:04 PM Sep 9th from TweetDeck
    JK2—The reference customer interviews are where I test the vendors’ claims by speaking to users about their experiences. It’s not perfunctory.
  33. RT @jamet123 @soachief @rschmelzer @DavidLinthicum @jpmorgenthal @TheEbizWizard "reuse decisions made w/them" jk--Reuse best practices too!4:56 PM Sep 9th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Re what I’m calling “service-oriented analytics,” I’ll sum up for you all the things that James Taylor and I said should be reused: best practices, predictive models, predictive modelers, decisioning services, decisions. Here are my thoughts on how they can be reused: best practices (through what Forrester calls “BI Solution Centers,” on which Boris Evelson and I published a report last year); predictive models (through predictive model governance tools such as those offered by SAS, SPSS, KXEN, and others); predictive modelers (by cultivating advanced analytics experts who work across many projects, applications, and business units); decisioning services (through convergence of business rules engines, BPM, and BI; see Forrester report that Boris, John Rymer, and Colin Teubner published last year), and decisions (by making the right decisions, which then serve as proper precedent for future business problems).
  34. True story: Here at RRWashNatlAirpt, me going for meal, overhear guy say "We have best DW in world, it's called [vendor]." No, not telling.4:51 PM Sep 9th from TweetDeck
    JK2—And not agreeing. Studying this industry for a living, I can tell you they all have their strengths and weaknesses. See my Forrester Wave on Enterprise Data Warehousing Platforms, from this past February.
  35. Did great briefing today from MicroStrategy on their BI-integrated predictive analytics and data mining solution, partnership, strategy.2:52 PM Sep 9th from web
    JK2—For me, a “great briefing” is when I get a deep dive on what a vendor’s doing now, and what they plan to do over the coming year or so. Doesn’t necessarily mean I think they’re the best vendor in their niche. But MicroStrategy does indeed have one of the most interesting approaches to BI-integrated PA/DM in the industry. Check the recent Forrester report on convergence of PA/DM into the core BI stack, which I co-authored with Boris and Leslie Owens.
  36. ZapForum DC: Asked Ron to change my descriptor from "SOA chatterbox" to "Champion of Service-Oriented Analytics." Same dude different facets2:50 PM Sep 9th from web
    JK2—I have every right to self-brand.
  37. @soachief @rschmelzer @DavidLinthicum @jpmorgenthal @TheEbizWizard: jk4--Predictive/agile enterprise -> Keep on hitting moving targets.9:41 AM Sep 9th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Business is just a never-ending stream of bets. Hey Socrates, you could say the same about life itself.
  38. @soachief @rschmelzer @DavidLinthicum @jpmorgenthal @TheEbizWizard: jk2--Service-oriented analytics -> comprehensive in-cloud analytics9:33 AM Sep 9th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Check out discussion of inline analytics maturity model, culminating in “comprehensive cloud analytics,” from my recent Forrester teleconference: “In-Database Analytics: Transforming The Data Warehouse Into The New Analytic Application Server.” Same scope as forthcoming Forrester report authored by self.
  39. HP/Informatica alliance sets HP on path to deliver analytic solution appliances with Neoview inside. Needs BI to be complete, though.7:01 AM Sep 9th from TweetDeck
    JK2—See Rob Karel and my recent blogpost: “HP and Informatica’s Expanded Relationship: Portent of Bigger Deals to Come?
  40. Still encountering resistance from Hadoop community to be discussed in "in-db analytics" context, but I discuss in re "in-cloud analytics."6:54 AM Sep 9th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Hadoop won’t come to fruition until it’s integrated into data warehouses everywhere. Data warehouses, in turn, will evolve into clouds
  41. "Pluck to Launch Social Media Application Server" (http://bit.ly/tmngG): jk--New solution segment? Or renaming of collaboration solutions?7:19 AM Sep 8th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Not sure this makes sense as a separate silo product niche for premises deployment. Social media is all about converging interaction channels. It’s also about all things cloud, Web 2.0, and SaaS.
  42. "A Fact-Based Defense of Enterprise 2.0" (http://bit.ly/23QsNi): jk--Huh? Did someone create a new religion and not tell the rest of us?6:50 AM Sep 8th from TweetDeck
    JK2—Who, if anyone, wrote the enterprise 1.0 gospel? Adam Smith? Andrew Carnegie? Peter Drucker? Tom Peters?
  43. Suffered 5 bee stings in one attack mowing the lawn Saturday morning. Little buggers ambushed me toward the very end of my mow.5:59 AM Sep 7th from TweetDeck
    JK2—I’m better now. Thanks for asking.

Saturday, September 12, 2009

poem SOA DOA? No Way!

SOA DOA? NO WAY!

Yep! SOA’s to
thank for many memorable
lunches and junkets.

Yep! We’re cashing in
on its cachet, careers on
its lingering vogue.

OK rogues! Enough
bashing! More service-mashing
and silo-smashing!

Monday, September 07, 2009

Aweekstweets August 31-September 7 2009 @jameskobielus

AWEEKSTWEETS AUG 31-SEPT 7 2009

1. Sorta curious why people seem to imagine it's OK to request free reports and free slices of my time. I'm an analyst. We're in business.14 minutes ago from TweetDeck
JK2—It’s not as if we—analysts generally, me specifically--don’t already provide ample free slices of our brainpower through tweets, blogs, podcasts, public speeches, comments to press, e-mail back-and-forth, random/not-so encounters at conferences, and the like. If you’re a vendor or user, I’ll refer your requests to a Forrester account manager. If you’re a personal friend who wants to chat about non-work-related stuff, this doesn’t apply. But I will get back to you after-hours. Gotta eat.

2. Jotting down string of DW-pricing tweets now to set frame for "AWEEKSTWEETS" blog exegesis I'll be laying down come Monday...when not lazingabout 8 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—What follows.

3. RT @merv RT "DW appl ...Price full core ....in $/TB for .... (and discounts!)" JK--Discount-from-list factor. I'm seeing 50%+ discounts nowabout 8 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—Everybody’s moving inexorably into the sub-$25K/TB range. Price pressures are acute on all DW appliance vendors, owing to a) encroaching commoditization of core DW stack, b) ever cheaper commodity CPUs and storage within DW appliances, c) intensifying glut of new vendors/products, d) soft economy and tight IT budgets, e) growing open-source and SaaS presence in DW market, and f) increasing vendor positioning of DW appliances as low-margin hook to sell premium add-on applications and professional services (i.e., the old Gillette “razor and blades” business model).

4. Add-on apps? You know, like IBM's doing with its Smart Analytic System solution appliances. Or Aster with its MapReduce appliance.about 8 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—I fully expect all leading DW appliance vendors to go this route over the coming 1-2 years—either through their own app/solution stack (those who have them), through strategic partnerships, and/or through buying or being bought out by those who do.

5. In other words, that's referring to commodity pricing of core DW appliance stack. You can/should also factor premium pricing of add-on apps.about 8 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—Add-on apps also include/leverage the logical domain models, derived from vendors’ professional services engagements addressing various horizontal/process and vertical/industry requirements. Riding a full DW stack, the logical domain models, with associated modeling tools and APIs, enable the vendor to position its DW appliance as an extensible solution platform, for partner- and customer-enablement.

6. Keep in mind that's simply referring to pricing of the DW-appliance "core stack": DBMS, query tools, loading tools, workload mgt, db admin.about 8 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—Yes, the core stack. Same functional scope as what I evaluated in the Forrester EDW Platforms Wave earlier this year. Check it out (note: you must be Forrester customer).

7. Hey DW appl vendors, if you denominate your pricing per the previous tweet, we have comparability. If you don't, your competitors will.about 8 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—In other words, your competitors will twist your publicly announced pricing, in all its ambiguity, to their advantage and your disadvantage. I see it all the time. Forrester customers turn to me to help clear up the confusion.

8. Hey all DW appl vdrs: Price full core stack: hw&sw. State acq cost in $/TB for compr-user-data cap . State raw-to-usable-stor & compr ratiosabout 8 hours ago from TweetDeck
JK2—I’ll decompress that tweet here. If I ruled the world, DW vendors would frame their price structure as follows: Price out a full core DW appliance stack (for the production DW tables only, encompassing the components handling query/mart, hub, and staging nodes, but not including any test/dev platform, and not including any associated BI or ETL/data integration components/nodes): hardware (servers, direct-attached storage, interconnect), software (licenses for DBMS, query planning and optimization tools, loading tools, workload management and resource governance tools, and other database administration software tools). Denominate your pricing in terms of upfront acquisition cost in US dollars per terabyte (TB), but exclude any deployment- or optimization-related upfront professional services, and also exclude any first-year or out-year maintenance fees. State your pricing in terms of capacity of TBs of compressed usable data that can be stored on your DW appliance. Provide customers/prospects with the key information need to translate raw storage capacity to usable-data capacity: a) your ratio of raw-to-usable data (deducting indexes, tablespaces, and other DW/DBMS overhead from raw to derive usable) and b) your compression ratio/efficiency (or at least the range of compression efficiencies that customers are likely to see on the types of data they are likely to storage/manage in your DW appliance). Don’t agonize over the “price per TB of storage doesn’t even begin to spell out the tremendous performance advantages of our DW appliance with our special architecture” concern. That’s an important nuance—price/performance—you should address as a qualification ONLY AFTER YOU’VE ESTABLISHED YOUR COMMODITY PER-STORAGE DW-APPLIANCE PRICING BONAFIDES!

9. RT @SethGrimes "Anything to say on Informatica's acquisition of Agent Logic announced Wed?" jk---Left voice-msg commentary with Jeff Kelly.10:41 AM Sep 4th from TweetDeck
JK2—Jeff, at searchdatamanagement.com, has a longer lag time than other pubs/reporters who cover this space. He hasn’t yet acknowledged receiving my message. Here’s my comment in a nutshell: Informatica needed a CEP acquisition to add a true-real-time component to its otherwise near-complete data integration suite. Agent Logic is not a CEP vendors that Forrester customers ask about much, or one that its competitors mention much, so I doubt this acquisition will provide Informatica with much of a revenue contribution. But, given the strong true-real-time features of competitors such as IBM and Ab Initio, this is a smart move on Informatica’s part. I expect to see them integrate Agent Logic’s technology tightly into their PowerCenter product family in the coming year, not wasting any time.

10. Paper is definitely my favorite medium for analysis. Somehow, having physical impressions of all data to thumb thru, annotate, focuses me.9:43 AM Sep 4th from TweetDeck
JK2—If it’s purely on-screen, I get tired and sleepy very fast. Having physical tokens of information to run my fingers over somehow keeps me awake. Even better than coffee (though, like the latter, too much too long tends to give the jitters).

11. RT @WinstonChen "MDM-DW who's the boss?: jk--Neither. Trustworthy business analytics--i.e, the "golden record" imperative--is the boss!9:38 AM Sep 4th from TweetDeck
JK2—Technologies don’t rule. Besides, this is like arguing whether yin or yang’s the boss. Single version of the truth demands the DW as the key master data management repository. In other words, a DW without life-cycle data governance is just another database.

12. Anti-social media would be good now & then. Put up the do-not-disturb sign across all social ntwk services. Pushback spam into spammer faces8:50 AM Sep 4th from TweetDeck
JK2—My do-not-disturb sign is implicit. I turn technologies off. I close my eyes. I go for a walk.

13. Remembering back when we worried about info overload. Now we treat info like electrical "load," and our brains like circuitry bearing loads9:45 PM Sep 3rd from TweetDeck
JK2—It’s sort of like the difference between before you could verbalize on a keyboard, and now, when you scarcely realize you’re verbalizing most of your life on a keyboard. We rewire with some discomfort, but we rewire, inexorably.

14. Finished first full draft of FORR report "In-Database Analytics: Heart of the Predictive Enterprise." Now in peer review.9:39 PM Sep 3rd from TweetDeck
JK2—And I expect Rob and Boris to get back to me with full, deep comments on the coming week. We’re all so friggin’ busy, and Q3 is drawing to a close, that none of us can afford to delay this too long. I, for example, am also working on a TEI study, a Wave, and an FLB doc—as well as a BTF preso and one or two other Forrester deliverables that will come back to my mind in just a sec....as soon as the coffee kicks on.

15. RT @merv RT @timoelliott @weckerson "every analysis should lead to action" JK--Should lead to decision, such as choice not to act.8:23 AM Sep 3rd from TweetDeck
JK2—I just had to insert my two cents on this perennial BI-analyst philosophical/ontological topic. It’s sort of like the perennial freewill vs. determinism concept in philosophy at large. The issue will never be settled. But philosophers use it to break the ice, and break the spirits of lowly undergraduates.

16. RT @weckerson: #enzee "biggest endorsement of Netezza TwinFin is SAS decision to embed functions" jk--Netezza has strong in-db partnerships.8:07 AM Sep 3rd from TweetDeck
JK2—On which I’ll provide a bit more info in my coming/above-mentioned Forrester report: “"In-Database Analytics: Heart of the Predictive Enterprise." To be published in a month or so. No firm ETA yet. Forrester publication dates are outside my direct control

17. Always puzzled when vendors surprised they've caught Forrester's ear. Not hard to do. I'll talk to everybody in my space, time permitting.6:59 AM Sep 3rd from TweetDeck
JK2—“Time permitting” is the key qualifier. Time is always tight. I have to prioritize. Usually, I prefer that you simply e-mail me your pitch/materials to jkobielus@forrester.com. If you want me to consider giving you a half-hour of my time, please submit your request through www.forrester.com/briefings and specify me by name; recognize, though, that I may decline, based on a) having a full calendar and/or b) not finding your pitch interesting enough to warrant any time at all, though I still want to see it in writing. Don’t feel hurt if I decline. We get way more such requests than is humanly possible to accept. Also don’t feel slighted if I opt to do this over the phone, not in person; over the phone is far more efficient for me on a day-in/day-out basis. Furthermore, don’t imagine that I’m going to travel to your office, even if you’re physically close to me in northern Virginia; you come to me, not vice versa. Finally, I’m not in the Forrester HQ in Cambridge MA; please do a little bit of research (e.g, check my e-mail signature, which contains my physical office location) before blithely assuming that I, or any other Forrester analyst, works out of HQ. I see a steady stream of “hey Jim, I’ll be in Boston on such-and-such date and I’d love to meet you” vendor-briefing requests. Don’t you folks realize that most analysts in most firms are mostly home-based most of the time? Yes, I occasionally work from Forrester’s McLean VA office, but that’s the exception, not the rule.

18. Expecting my memory enhancement this morning. Till then, I'll simply have to swap everything I do immediately to disk--or scribble on paper6:30 AM Sep 3rd from TweetDeck
JK2—Got it. Tried to de-install the existing memory module on my own. Wouldn’t budget. Not going to force it out and risk damaging my laptop. Bringing it to the tech folks at the Cambridge MA HQ this week so they can do it for me. I’ll be at HQ for another reason, so just makes sense to do two-birds-one-stone. Yes, indeed, I occasionally go to HQ, but don’t assume that I have a regular schedule of such visits. On an as-needed basis.

19. RT @WinstonChen "Kalido KONA announced today. An important step in the evolution of data warehousing." jk--A DW governance appliance.
JK2—A DW appliance with best-of-breed, low-cost, commodity (mostly, not entirely) platform (Netezza) and add-on apps/tools from Kalido and QlikTech. Remember what I said above about DW vendors’ push in this direction. We’ll definitely see more. I’m surprised Lorita or Chas didn’t reach out to pre-brief us. Very important announcement.

20. RT @WinstonChen "MDM belongs in every DW." jk--In other words, every DW should house master records. DW belongs in MDM, not vice versa.9:42 PM Sep 2nd from TweetDeck
JK2—MDM, as an add-on app, belongs, as an optional (not mandatory) component in every DW appliance solution family. I’ll grant you that.

21. INFA buying AgentLogic doesn't confirm convergence of CEP into BI, cuz INFA's not BI. Rather, INFA's DI, and lacked true real-time (ie,CEP).7:23 PM Sep 2nd from TweetDeck
JK2—See aweekstweet exegesis above. CEP is indeed converging into BI, but there are more important industry announcements in the works. We’re moving into the fall announcement season.

22. RT @TonyBaer: @bmichelson @johnrrymer "Much of purpose of CEP is to decipher what's happening NOW " jk--Puts NOW in context of HISTORY.7:10 PM Sep 2nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Once again, just had to get my two cents in on this tweet discussion thread. This is perennial water-cooler ice-breaker chit-chat small-talk fodder among BI analysts. BTW, I’ve found Facebook a very good platform for connecting personal histories out there, in the Web 2.0 space. I’ve also found Twitter, auto-posting tweets as Facebook status updates, as a very good platform for the NOW of me to feed the HISTORY of me. For those who care for any of this ME ME ME narcissism.

23. RT @TonyBaer @johnrrymer @bmichelson "#CEP makes #BI literally actionable." jk--No. Orgs/folks actually taking action makes BI actionable.
JK2—Ah, yes. You see, I can’t help myself. More BI analyst small talk online. Please indulge us. If these were face-to-face encounters, this would all be accomplished through grunts, raised eyebrows, and knowing nods in each other’s general direction.

24. "Massive But Agile: Best Practices for Scaling the Next-Generation Enterprise Data Warehouse" (http://bit.ly/Z8ng6): jk--Comprehensive.3:13 PM Sep 2nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Thanks to Aster Data for linking to my doc. And excuse me for tooting my own horn. But is “comprehensive” self-congratulatory or simply descriptive of the fact that I sweated over that doc. But I am proud of the result, and Forrester customers have responded favorably.

25. Kalido's KONA Information Appliance puts it in the analytic-solution-stack appliance market. Important Netezza and QlikTech partnerships.2:08 PM Sep 2nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Clearly, the term “appliance” may soon become very yesteryear in this context. KONA and similar prepackaged, pre-optimized analytic solution platforms from other vendors will become a market segment all their own, distinct from the commodity DW appliances on which they run and which they extend.

26. BI value-prop: actionable intelligence. BI core: intelligence. BI key-diff: actionability: collab&wkflow integ. Vendors must enable latter.11:35 AM Sep 2nd from TweetDeck
JK2—The “action loop” in BI. In other words, BI embedded in business processes. I’m in Forrester’s Business Process and Applications (BP&A) orbit. One of our key emphases is embedded process analytics. BP&A description from our website: “This professional must improve or transform processes in an organization as well as the business applications and technologies that support them. He or she may also be responsible for integrating information and collaboration into the business process.”

27. Taking briefing from BI company Bi3 Solutions. Consulting firm mostly, but transitioning to solutions vendor. SaaS BI offering in beta.11:06 AM Sep 2nd from TweetDeck
JK2—Vendors take note: If I take a briefing from you, and it’s not under NDA (or, at least the fact that I’m speaking with you right now is not under NDA), I’m very likely to tweet the fact that I’m speaking with you (and share a smidgen of non-NDA info) right then and there.

28. RT @CurtMonash "Netezza claims 50X Exadata ...10X Teradata. #enzee" jk--Verify such marketing assertions with benchmarks, bake-offs.9:50 AM Sep 2nd from TweetDeck
JK2—I grow weary of these 10X, 20X, infinityX boilerplate “we scale like there’s no tomorrow” DW vendor assertions. I try not to republish any of them. I try to recast the discussion in terms of the vendor’s overall architecture, and its fitness/optimizability for a customer’s particular DW, BI, or analytics apps, loads, and queries.

29. Already thinking ahead to the FORR report on DW virtualization in cloud that I'll be doing in Q4. That, + my Wave, will culminate busy year.10:13 PM Sep 1st from TweetDeck
JK2—I’m staring at my rest-of-year schedule right now. Taped to my office wall. So I can’t forget. I won’t forget. I follow-through on my commitments. I’m just always trying to keep commitments in line with what’s humanly feasible. By the way, I work hard—and think modularly. The only way.

30. In-database analytics: subject of my FORR teleconf next week; podcast & blogpost later in Sept; & report in Oct. And preso at Teradata conf.10:12 PM Sep 1st from TweetDeck
JK2—A prime current example of how I work/think modularly. Reuse, adapt, and extend from a core research base. I plan my research agenda with all this in mind—months before I have to deliver any of it—if I can help it (sometimes I have to respond to stuff that just drops in unannounced in my agenda—I can do that too, but not without momentary.....ummmm.....headaches?).

31. Deep into vendor briefings and demos for FORR Wave on Predictive Analytics & Data Mining. Strong group of vendors. Many differentiators.10:06 PM Sep 1st from TweetDeck
JK2—Here’s a type of briefings/demos that I definitely DO NOT tweet, blog, podcast, or otherwise mention at the time I do them. Any research connected with an in-progress research project. You’ll see what I’m thinking/doing in good time—when the corresponding Forrester report is published (i.e., if you’re a Forrester customer). And not a moment before. Did I mention the whole gotta-eat imperative?

32. "Actuate Collab with Red Hat to Enhance JBoss Enterprise Middleware Apps " (http://bit.ly/3Wlxrg): jk--Hark! Methinks doth hear merger bells7:33 AM Sep 1st from TweetDeck
JK2—Seth Grimes (@SethGrimes) doesn’t hear those bells on this one. But I strongly suspect that a full open-source SOA/BI/DW/ETL/EII stack will soon emerge on the marketplace, and I strongly suspect it’ll be through Red Hat acquiring some of the usual suspects. We’ll see.

33. "Microsoft Lobbyists Reportedly Plot Strategy In 'Screw Google' Meetings In DC" (http://bit.ly/wZ5Dq): jk--Funniest headline of the morning.7:22 AM Sep 1st from TweetDeck
JK2—Just as funny a week later. Not sure if it’s true. Even if it were true, it’s one of those “software industry insider” and “political/regulatory/legal” topics that strikes me as just mundane “slow news day” trade-press blather.

34. Twitter's "won't you follow-me give-me-a-second-of-your-time solicitation via email" model isn't scalable. I seriously resent it now.2:56 PM Aug 31st from TweetDeck
JK2—I wish Twitter would e-mail me, once a week or as often as I tell it, a link to a webpage that allows me to quickly clickthrough acceptances/rejections of all these requests. Just as Postini or other hosted anti-spam services does with all the malware that targets my e-mail inbox. Because, in fact, these Twitter follow-me requests are just another form of spam.

35. RT @lmacvittie @davegraham @johnsonLAB "Disney to Acquire Marvel" jk--Old-school fabulist acquires newer-school. Absolutely MARVELous!10:33 AM Aug 31st from TweetDeck
JK2—Pun aside, I couldn’t care less. I’ve never been a huge Disney fan (still partial to old Warner Brothers on the animation side of the house). And I’ve never been a big Marvel fan (still partial to DC Comics on the superhero side of the house; Spidey, Hulk, Fantastic Four—I read them occasionally as a kid but always felt they were sort of pale ripoff of the real deal—OK....I know I’m absolutely going to flamed for saying this—here comes—YIKES!!!!!!).

36. RT @bmichelson: "why do PR people ask about writing "stories"?" jk--They conflate/confuse analysts with journalists, not fabulists.10:29 AM Aug 31st from TweetDeck
JK2—It’s funny. Throughout the 21-plus years I freelanced a column to Network World, PR flacks tended to assume I was a journalist on their payroll—a quick glance at their masthead would have set them straight. I was always, from the start, a freelance analyst who contributed analysis in the form of columns, features, and buyer’s guides. It’s a fine distinction that I suppose is lost on people who don’t share my vocation.

37. Noticing that "social networking/media" have replaced "cloud," "virtualization," and "SOA" in every vendor's me-too buzzword-bingo list.10:27 AM Aug 31st from TweetDeck
JK2—Yes, I’ve got scads of thoughts on “social everything.” I’ll blog/tweet all that in good time—as I develop something differentiated to put out there.

38. RT @DavidBThomas: "What's your dirty little social media secret?" http://bit.ly/nttaD: jk--It's everybody's secret: busybody browsing.9:30 AM Aug 31st from TweetDeck
JK2—I learn a surprising lot of stuff from simply toggling over to and glancing at my TweetDeck on a semi-obsessive basis. I guess it’s not really “browsing,” and not really “busybody,” since others haven’t chosen to block me. I learn less from from my Facebook. Blogs? Them too, but somehow the tweets feel fresher, more candid, more of-the-moment.

39. FORR podcast on BAM/in-process analytics future recorded. Me + @passion4process, re #BPM #CEP #BRE #BI. Will be posted for playback midweek8:33 AM Aug 31st from TweetDeck
JK2—I still don’t see it up there.