Greetings All & Happy Pre-New Year!

I try my best to only write blog posts when they are informative and add potential value, thus it has been a while since I’ve blogged. The flip-side I suppose is sometimes my blog posts resemble short articles but oh well…

With 2009 upon us I thought I would share a bit of insight I have applied for the last three years of my career that you may find quite helpful. At the beginning of every year I sit down for 2 hours and write up a document that reflects my own personal thoughts on where my career has been and where it is headed. If you look at companies, they start out using what is called a business plan and they then continue their operations year after year with plans and review of actuals vs planned (you smell a bit of BI in this content?:). So I figured why not apply the same basic principals to an individual? I mean, are you on a career path or are you just ‘riding the waves’? I ask this very question because I was one of the ‘wave riders’ and did ok to be honest but with a bit of planning and ofcourse discipline throughout the year you can truly set professional goals, obtain them, and then note the results.

It should also be a given that usually the harder you work as an individual, the more successful you will be in life. 2008 was a very challenging and intense year for me but in review it was also probably the best single year professionally I’ve been fortunate enough to experience yet. I do not intend for this to be some arrogant post about my personal career growth so let’s move on (i’m far from perfect).

There are 3 basic sections of the document I referenced that I create:

1. Where have you been (what did you accomplish) in the current year?
2. Where are you going (what do you wish to accomplish) in the new year?
3. Actions Items you believe will help you obtain the goals stated in #2

I hope this helps everyone as it has me quite a bit over the years!

Happy Holidays!

Derek Comingore

SQL Server MVP

Syndicated via RSS From: http://weblogs.sqlteam.com/derekc/Default.aspx

Just add the following without the quotes after the youtube film URL and use something like FlashGot (or grab the full URL with Firebug) to download it:

“&fmt=18″ for HQ MP4 format
or
“&fmt=6″ for HQ FLV format.

The “Flash Video Resources Downloader” Firefox addon seems to get this right and is able to download FLV, HQ FLV and HQ MP4 format movies from Youtube and can also handle similar sites. The downside is reliance on a web hosted php script (it means visiting this site every time you want to download something to grab the URL).

Syndicated via RSS From: http://unixsadm.blogspot.com/

Tip 1. Write the abap program.

loop at itab.
DELETE FROM “For Single Record
DELETE FROM TABLE ” For Multiple Records
endloop.

Syndicated via RSS From: http://www.abapcode.info/

Syndicated via RSS From: http://www.mysysad.com/

In an article entitled “The Changing Face of Business Intelligence,” last month Dave Wells eloquently described how the business intelligence industry has strayed from its original vision and how it is now changing to recover what’s been lost. A longtime veteran of data warehousing and business intelligence, Wells is one of the leaders in the industry who have shaken free of the technology-centric perspective that holds the industry back.

Wells begins by reminding us of Howard Dresner’s original vision when he coined the term “business intelligence” (BI) in the early 1990s. Dresner defined BI as “a set of concepts and methodologies to improve decision making in business through use of facts and fact-based systems.” Over the years, the industry that took hold of Dresner’s visionary term (mostly data warehousing vendors at the time) buried the goal of decision making in an emphasis on technology. As Wells says: “The troubling thing is that all of the definitions are IT-centric” and “too much of today’s business analytics has little connection with real business analysis.”

He goes on to offer a new definition of business intelligence, which recaptures the essence of the original and enhances it to further clarify the goals. I don’t want to give too much away by quoting his definition here; you should read Wells’ words directly. I do want to include one more quote, however, which is central to Well’s vision of BI’s transformation:

It is analysts – the people who perform analysis – who find meaning in the data. These are the people who explore cause-effect relationships and who guide decision-making processes. It is they who will lead the charge to reshape decision making in business.

To recover the original vision, the business intelligence industry must shift from an emphasis on technology to an emphasis on the people who use the technology. Only then will it begin to fulfill its original promise.

(Note: While I consider Wells’ argument brilliant, I believe that some of the software products that he lists as examples of “next generation of analytics” don’t belong there. In fact, I believe that some of the products on the list exemplify little understanding of and support for data analysis. This difference of opinion suggests that our common vision must become informed by clear definitions of data analysis and analytics and clear criteria for assessing products’ ability to deliver. All in good time.)

Syndicated via RSS From: http://www.perceptualedge.com/blog