Top News – Data, Data Warehousing, Analytics & BI

November 15th, 2013
Stephen McDaniel
Chief Data Officer Advisor at Freakalytics, LLC

Finding it hard to make time to keep up with the rapidly changing world of data, data warehousing, analytics, data science, business intelligence and visual analytics?  We understand! Here’s our curated summary of relevant news that could help with your future data and analytic projects. We also add commentary on the topic, a summary of the article and the link to read the full article.

There are five articles in this update:
     Rapid-I data mining now RapidMiner, the Redhat of data mining?
     Integrating data and mobile trumps big data for many CFOs
     Bipartisan DATA Act unanimously approved by Senate Committee
     Can SAS Visual Analytics replace PowerPoint?
     Big data sources to consider for your company

Missed our last issue of Top News, November 11th? Stories included Big Data and Society, Data Mining Blues, 2014 INFORMS Conference, Facebook’s Free Big Data System for Analysts, Adaptive Data Preparation, How Trust Affects the Use of Analytics and Meeting a VAST Challenge
 
 
 
 
 
2Rapid-I data mining now RapidMiner,
the Redhat of data mining?

German predictive analytics, data mining and text mining company receives $5M in funding and announces a planned move of their headquarters to Boston from Dortmund, Germany. I would liken it to the Redhat of data mining, with a free community edition and paid corporate editions that adds support, more data sources and more capabilities. With over 3 million downloads, 20,000 deployments and 400 paid customers including eBay, Intel, PepsiCo and Kraft you may want to consider RapidMiner for your advanced analytics projects. The 2013 KDNuggets poll showed RapidMiner’s free edition ahead of every other advanced analytics choice including R.

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Top News – Data, Data Warehousing, Analytics & BI

November 11th, 2013
Stephen McDaniel
Chief Data Officer Advisor at Freakalytics, LLC

i5_2Finding it hard to make time to keep up with the rapidly changing world of data, data warehousing, analytics, data science, business intelligence and visual analytics?  We understand! Here’s our curated summary of relevant news that could help with your future data and analytic projects. We also add commentary on the topic, a summary of the article and the link to read the full article.

There are seven articles in this update:
     How Big Data Is Changing Science (and Society)
     Big data blues: The dangers of data mining
     2014 INFORMS Conference on the Business of Big Data
     Facebook System for Massive Big Data (Hadoop FS) Offered Free to World
     Paxata Launches Industry’s First Adaptive Data Preparation Platform
     C-Suite and Trust Both Affect Financial Returns on Analytics, Big Data
     Meeting a VAST challenge – Lincoln Laboratory staff create winning visualization
 
 
 
 
 
i6How Big Data Is Changing Science (and Society)

Traditional statistical approaches that long dominated scientific research are being challenged and augmented by new approaches from the fields of big data and data science.

HOW CAN YOU PREDICT something without understanding it? Simple:

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Data scientists & the data warehouse team-building success

Data-Scientist-Tech-200Whether you are a CIO, data architect, or a data management professional, it is imperative to understand the different approaches, attitudes and needs of the next generation of data warehouse consumers. Traditional data warehouse users include reporting teams, BI teams (who created reports for the rest of the company), statisticians and others. In the past few years, this has been rapidly changing with the new roles of data scientists, the rise of Data Enthusiasts and the burgeoning population of Accidental Analysts. In Part 1 of this series, we focus on successful collaboration between data scientists and data warehouse teams.

Data scientists have been with us for many years. However, the moniker “data scientist” is a recent change. The same role existed (and still exists) with titles such as statisticians, mathematicians, computer scientists or systems analysts; however, having one of these alternate titles doesn’t necessarily imply that one is a data scientist, although a wide range of techniques may be used by both groups.

Traditional training for people now in data science focused on

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My experience with data analytics-Strata Conference

Please join me at the Strata Conference/Hadoop World in New York next Tuesday, October 29th, as I talk about my years of experience with data analysis alongside the founders and executives of ClearStory Data. ClearStory Data is delivering a new solution that makes it simple for business users to find, combine and interactively analyze data … Read more

Free Webinar—Analyzing Your Data With Excel:
Simple Steps for Actionable Results

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Recorded August 22nd, 2013

Do what you can with what you have where you are.
—THEODORE ROOSEVELT
Cowboy, soldier, historian and
26th President of the U.S.

Synopsis
Answer everyday business questions like an analyst with Microsoft Excel. This webinar is based on a selected set of techniques from The 7C’s of Data Analysis, as covered in our book, The Accidental Analyst: Show Your Data Who’s Boss. An abbreviated case study will be used to demonstrate common techniques that can start you on the course to analyzing data with Microsoft Excel 2007, 2010 or 2013.

This presentation is approximately 1 hour and 15 minutes in length.

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Thoughts on “Business Analytics Software Still Has Skeptics”

Synopsis of the article and summary chart from Pete Barlas at Investor’s Business Daily
IBD_Busines_Analytics_Skeptics
Many companies still view the promise of analytics software as a glass half-empty.

One of the strongest sectors in enterprise software, business analytics has many doubters among companies skeptical it truly is helping improve the top and bottom lines.

So found a survey released last month by accounting and professional services firm Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu.

“What we are seeing in the analytics front is a real skepticism among business leaders about whether this works and how it can make a difference,” said Tim Phillipps, global leader of Deloitte’s analytics practice.

The findings, he admits, were a surprise.

Here is Stephen’s comment on this article:

I have worked in analytics for many years at over 100 companies (employee, consultant and leading teams.)  It has always been easier to lean on costs savings as a clear measure of success with analytics and data warehouse investments. 

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Free Webinar—Quick & dirty analysis with Tableau
in 13 lucky steps!

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July 31st, 2013, Noon Pacific, 3 PM Eastern, 8 PM London
 
 
So much data, so little time!
–Stephen McDaniel
Co-founder of Freakalytics

 
 
Synopsis
Let’s face it: in the daily world of work, you often are asked to provide an answer to a new problem in less than a day. Of course, your boss tends to forget about the other three project deadlines you are currently facing, so you really have only 10 or 20 minutes to squeeze in a quick and dirty analysis.

If this sounds familiar to you, this webinar will walk you through the thirteen flexible steps that can take you from being clueless to looking smart with Tableau in just a few minutes. Hopefully you’ll be able to obtain enough information to come up with ideas for an e-mail update or talking points for the unexpected meeting that is looming large over your day, showing your boss and colleagues that you can deliver great results in time to be useful.

So, if you’re already a user of Tableau, this webinar will guide you in the critical path of many analyses in Tableau. If you are totally new to Tableau, you can see the possibilities of what you can accomplish in a short amount of time, once you get started and practice these techniques.
 
 
A preview of the first few steps

1 What question will you examine?

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Okay, in reality this step might take hours or even days! But let’s assume you have your question, and if it is complex, break it down into several, simpler questions.

2 Grab the closest, readily available dataset

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Free Webinar—Business analytics and more
with SAS Enterprise Guide

 
Recorded on July 10th, 2013
 
 
Business_analytics_SAS_Enterprise_Guide_predictive_model_600
 
 
True genius resides in the capacity for evaluation of
uncertain, hazardous, and conflicting information.

–WINSTON CHURCHILL
Prime Minister of England during WWII

 
 
Synopsis
In this webinar, Stephen will analyze multiple real-world case studies using SAS Enterprise Guide by following the 7 C’s of Data Analysis. He will collect data from a range of sources, explore the data for common problems, apply quick data fixes, demonstrate best practices of visual analytics and use powerful predictive models that go beyond the limits of standard analysis techniques.
Click here for the full post and to register below

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Freakalytics Newsletter for June 2013

Thank you for your interest in our newsletter. Please share it with your colleagues that can benefit from it.   Also, Stephen is once again full-time at Freakalytics and we are excited to be back on the road, so please let us know if we can be of service!
 
 

Freakalytics_Timeline_Since_2007_Map.pngFreakalytics Timeline

Since 2007, we have traveled 365,000 miles to help tens of thousands of people via

8 books,
24 conference talks,
47 public trainings,
26 on-site trainings,
5 conference seminars,
15 analytic advisory engagements
and 36 consulting projects.

Click here to download a summary of our accomplishments since 2007.
 
 

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Free Webinar—Visual Analytics Best Practices
Why Can’t You See My Point?!?

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You can have brilliant ideas,
but if you can’t get them across,
your ideas won’t get you anywhere.

-Lee Iacocca

 

The webinar is past but you can watch the recording and view the slides below.
This post is currently being updated with the slides and videos.

Why do visual analytics best practices matter?

Why can’t people see your point when you present data-oriented presentations?

Whether you are using big data, small data or summarized data that has been prepared for you, this webinar will explore these vital questions. If you are concerned with getting the most from your data, this complimentary webinar is a great step in learning how to clearly communicate with people as they make better informed decisions in the hectic world of modern business.

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