.Net Technology

Microsoft Sql server

2008-05-22T08:50:00.000-07:00

Ms Sql server

Huh!! Sql Server is the No 1 Database.Microsoft Sql Server is still continuing to hold it position.According to 2007 database and data access integration and reporting study that 74.7 percent of enterprises are using Sql Server.

For more comments on Ms SQl Server Pleas locate @

http://www.sdtimes.com/content/article.aspx?ArticleID=30932

Internet Information Services

2008-02-12T09:16:00.000-08:00

Internet Information Services(IIS) 7.0

Huh! Microsoft has released the latest version of Internet Information Services (IIS) 7.0.This version of IIS has enormous features as compared with the older version of IIS.For more details of latest feature of IIS 7.0, please locate the below url.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/issues/07/03/IIS7/#S1

Welcome to the World of MS SQL Server

2007-12-05T03:43:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the world of MS SQL Server

As mentioned in my previous article regarding the MS SQL Server 2008

Data Warehousing: Microsoft Sql Server 2008

the latest MS Sql Server 2008 Community Technology Preview (CTP), the trial version (10 days) can be downloaded from the following link

http://www.microsoft.com/sql/2008/prodinfo/download.mspx

What is SSIS ?

2007-11-28T05:06:00.000-08:00

SQL Server Integration Services

Microsoft Sql Server 2005 Integration Services (SSIS), an extensive data integration platform which is used to transfer, transform and merge the information fom various sources and load to multiple systems.SSIS is not an Extraction, Transformation and Loading (ETL) tool but an data integration platform providing a wide range of capabilities.

In the earlier version of MS SQL Server 2005, we had the option of Data Transformation Services(DTS) which is the most important tool for the transformation process.This contains te workflow engine which support all complex logic and that can be used for a variey of database maintainance and also for data transfer operations.

IBM to Acquire Cognos to Accelerate Information on Demand Business Initiative

2007-11-20T03:58:00.000-08:00

IBM to Acquire Cognos to Accelerate Information on Demand Business Initiative

The combination of IBM and Cognos will make IBM the premier world class leaders in the Business Intelligence industry.
For information refer @

http://www.cognos.com/news/releases/2007/1112.html?mc=-web_hp

Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Sevices

2007-10-25T02:58:00.000-07:00

Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Sevices

Sql Server Reporting Service, a server-based solution enabling the creation, management and delivery for both traditional reports and found to be very interactive.The Microsoft's Business Intelligence framework, Reporting Services, thereby combining the data management capabilities of SQL Server and Microsoft Windows Server. SQL Server Reporting Services supports a wide range of data sources such as OLE DB, Open Data Base Connectivity (ODBC) and various other multiple formats including the web browsers and Microsoft Office System Applications.

Microsoft SQL Server 2005

2007-10-19T02:35:00.000-07:00

Introduction to Microsoft SQL Server 2005

Microsoft SQL Server 2005, the powerful tool that enables to implement data management and Business Intelligence Projects.This includes numerous data management and various analysis technologies.The important aspect to be focused are as follows

Database Engine -- This is the core service for processing, storing and securing data providing controlled access and rapid transaction processing meeting most of the requirements within the enterprise

Analysis Services -- This delivers Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) and data mining functionality for Business Intelligence applications

Integration Services -- Provides a platform for building high performance for data integration solutions providing Extract, Transform and Load (ETL) processing for Data Warehousing

Replication -- A technology providing copying and distributing data and other database objects from one database to another database for maintaining the consistency and distributing data to different locations either to remote or to mobile users through LAN, WAN and dial-up-connections, etc

Reporting Services -- Delivers enterprise, web enabled reporting functionality that enables to create reports from different data sources.

Notificaiton Services -- Provides an environment for developing and deploying applications that helps the user to generate notification services by sending messages

Service Broker -- Helps the developers to build scalable and secure database applications thereby providing a message base communication platform enabling the funtionality of the independent application components as a whole

Full-Text Search -- Contains the functionality that can be utilised for issuing full- text queries against the plain character-based data in Sql Server tables

Data Direct Technologies Launches the Enterprise MySQL Drivers

2007-10-11T23:50:00.000-07:00

Data Direct Technologies Launches the Enterprise MySQL Drivers

Data Direct Technologies , rolls out the latest database drivers for support of MySQL Enterprise Server.This is basically a commercial database product supporting interactions for all major databases and ensuring the compatibility across different database application programming interface(APIs), both for ODBC and JDBC.Data Direct Technologies offers three solutions for My SQL Enterprise Server:

Data Direct Connect for 32 bit ODBC access
Data Direc Connect64 ODBC access
Data Direct Connect for JDBC access

For information refer @

http://www.adtmag.com/article.aspx?id=21420

Pentaho delivers first BI Suite 1.6

2007-10-11T00:08:00.000-07:00

Pentaho delivers the first open source Metadata and Ad hoc reporting in 1.6 Huh !!!! Pentaho now delivers the First open source Metadata and Ad hoc reporting capabilities Pentaho, the leader in the Business Intelligence Solution has now announced the delivery of Pentaho Open BI Suite 1.6.This release provides the availability of major new enhancements which includes an enterprise Business Intelligence metadata layer streamlining the utilisation of BI data.

For information on Pentaho BI Suite 1.6 locate @

http://www.pentaho.org/news/releases/20071010_pentaho_delivers_first_open_source_metadata_and_ad_hoc_reporting_capabilities_in_new_pentaho_open_bi_suite_1_6.php

Data Dictionary

2007-09-27T05:10:00.000-07:00

In the context of data base management system, data dictionary is read-only set of tables and views.This is a file that defines the basic organization of the database which contains the list of all files in the database, name and types of each filed and the number of records. The DataDictionary contains the metadata about other data dictionary items. The Data Dictionary is usually hidden from the end users so as to prevent the data being destroyed.
It’s basically a collection of descriptions of the data objects. The first step is the data modeling which helps to to identify each object and their relationship with the other objects. Each data object is given a descriptive name, its relationship, the type of data are described. This collection can be organized for reference bound to a book called "Data Dictionary" The information contained in the Data Dictionary is as follows:

the name
when it was created and when it was last accessed
names and data types of its attributes (structural information)
the owners who may read write (the security information)
where the data is stored (physical information)

Oracle utilizes the “Data Dictionary" for system catalogs. The oracle database has set of system tables and views which stores the information comprising of both physical and logical database. This cannot be modified manually by any database user. The ORACLE RDBMS automatically updates the data in these specific objects in response to actions made by the user.

Pervasive's New Database Engine

2007-09-23T22:21:00.000-07:00

Pervasive SQL (PSQL)

Pervasive Software, a global leade in data management and integration software has announces the avaialbility of Pervasive PSQL Summit v10.This database engine is designed for latest technologies, including the new operating system.The various enhancements in the to PSQL which would benefit the organisation as a whole are as follows:

Windows Vista Compatability : PSQL is designed to run effectively on Windows Vista and also support to the future version of Microsoft operating system Window Server 2008

64-bit platform support : Provides support to the latest 64- bit technology, thereby increasing the business value

Extreme Input/Output : Basically designed for large volume of applications thereby providing for high performance

Expanding SQL Syntax:Provides compatibility for columns, views, names, stored procedures

InstallShield:The installshield is built using the advanced technology using the Windows MSI.

For information on PSQL refer @

http://ww1.pervasive.com/company/press/releases_show.asp?cid=664l

Restoring the MS SQL Server database using transaction logs

2007-09-17T03:59:00.000-07:00

Restoring the MS SQL Server database using transaction logs

It becomes more crucial when we loose our important information, that too if lost from the production database.Oops we go panic!!!!!!!

We have a method of restoring the SQL server database using the transaction logs.The restoration process is illustrated below, assuming the database recovery mode is set to FULL .

Restoration process

The primary step in this process is to perform the back up of the existing database, which has to be included in the restoring process.
The secondary step is to locate database back up files in the machine or in the network.Else it can also be copied to the target server if restoring of the database takes place in the different server.The script below applies the full backup file to the New database database.

RESTORE DATABASE SampleDatabase
FROM DISK = 'D: \BackupFiles\TestDatabaseFullBackup.bak'
WITH
MOVE 'PreviousDatabase' TO 'D:\DataFiles \TestDatabase.mdf',
MOVE 'PreviousDatabase_log' TO 'D:\DataFiles \TestDatabase_Log.ldf',NORECOVERY

The above code specifies the location of the full back up database is on the server's D drive and we are restoring files to the database named sampledatabase.The above code also moves both the data file and the log file from the full backup tonew files for the TestDatabase database.The last statement in the above script,NORECOVERY, is actually one of the modes implemented regarding the status of the restoration.

NORECOVERY : Informs SQL Server that the restoring the database is not finished and subsequent restore will occur.When the database is in this state, the database is not available for access and no connections are allowed.

RECOVERY: Informs SQL Server that the restoring the database is finished and ready to use.

STANDBY:Informs SQL Server that current database is not ready and yet sot be recovered and further log files has to be restored.

Once restoring the fullback using the NORECOVERY option is done, then the transaction log back ups or the differential backup

Differential Backup : This is a backup of any changes to the database that have occurred since the last full database backup.Suppose if there are multiple differential backups,the last one is restored.In this situation, as there are no differential backups, so it can be moved directly to the transaction log back ups

Transaction log backups: This keeps in track of all the transactions that have occurred since last transaction log backup.

RESTORE LOG SampleDatabase
FROM DISK = ''D: \BackupFiles\TestDatabase_TransactionLogBackup1.trn'WITH NORECOVERY
RESTORE LOG SampleDatabase
FROM DISK =''D: \BackupFiles\ TestDatabase_TransactionLogBackup2.trn'WITH NORECOVERY
RESTORE LOG SampleDatabase
FROM DISK =''D:\BackupFiles\ TestDatabase_TransactionLogBackup3.trn'WITH NORECOVERY
RESTORE LOG SampleDatabase
FROM DISK = ''D: \BackupFiles\TestDatabase_TransactionLogBackup4.trn'WITH RECOVERY

In the above situation, restoring of the database occurs at the end of the last transcation log.If the database recovery has to occur to a specific point before the end of the transaction log, we can utilize the STOPAT option

RESTORE LOG SampleDatabase
FROM DISK =''D: \BackupFiles\ TestDatabase_TransactionLogBackup4.trn'
WITH STOPAT = N'6/28/2007 4:01:45 PM', RECOVERY

In the above situation the restoring the database occurs at the fourth transaction log in the log sequence to 4:01 PM.

Reporting tools

2007-09-14T02:43:00.000-07:00

In today's competetive and busy schedule, the reporting tool is one of the essential component in today;s business industry.There are various reporting tools. A quick glimpse of few of the reporting tools below.

Cognos: Cognos is one of the leading business reporting tool. The latest version of the reporting tool is Cognos 8 BI.It performs the operation of the reporting, analyzing, scorecarding, dashboards, business event management, data integration.

Crystal Reports:Crystal Reports is a complete reporting solution which helps the users to create, manage and deliver reports over the web.It is a very powerful reporting tool because of its unique functionalities and features in them.

IntelliVIEW : IntelliVIEW offers the capability of reporting and analytic solution for enterprises, traditional reporting, query analyzing and business intelligence capabilities.

Pentaho BI:Pentaho BI manages more efficiently and effectively the enterprise reporting, analysis, dashboard, data mining which helps the management to operate in a more easier way.

Jasper Reports: Jasper Reports in one of the leading open source Java reporing engine.Its mainly utilised for Business Intelligence which implies for reporting, OLAP in web and in desktop applications.

Cognos to Acquire Applix

2007-09-12T00:42:00.000-07:00

Cognos, the leading Business Intelligence Software developer in today's business industry, plans to acquire "Applix" , the company offering a complete business and analytical software solution, for @339 millions in cash.This will inturn increase the Cognos' customer utility and the need for financial perfmance and the analytics capabilities would be increased. Applix , will complement Cognos' latest BI software namely Cognos 8 Planning, 8 Controller, 8 Business Intelligence by adding an additional ability and optimising the complex financial performance

For information on Acquisition refer @

http://www.cognos.com/news/releases/2007/0905.html

http://www.applix.com/news_events/db_press_detail.asp?pressrelease=5303

Microsoft Sql Server 2008

2007-09-07T05:45:00.000-07:00

Now Microsoft has come up with SQL Server 2008, the next release.The more secured, reliable, manageable, scalable for all critical applications in today's business industry.In a nutshell the SQL Server 2008 is a boon to all business applications. What's new in Sql Server 2008

Mission Critical Platform
Dynamic Development
Beyond Relational Data
Pervasive Business Insight

For improvement features and detailed description in sql server
2008 locate @

https://connect.microsoft.com/SQLServer/content/content.aspx?ContentID=5470

Reporting Tool Functionalities

2007-09-04T04:51:00.000-07:00

Reporting Functionalities

The Data would be of less importance if it does not reside in the DataWarehouse, hence the presentation layer is of more important.Any business reporting tool should have the following capability for to sustain, they are as follows

Data source connection potentiality: The reporting tool so selected should have the power to connect to two types of data source namely the relational database and the OLAP multidimensional data source

Scheduling and distribution abilities:The prime focus of a reporting tool, is that it should have the power of handling the scheduling.The prime focus of the reporting tool is to handle the scheduling of " n" reports at various instances of time.The scheduling forms the major criteria for a reporting tool.The report has to be fired automatically to the mailbox, so that the end users can take up for further analysis.

Security Features:Because the reporting tool are geared towards "n" number of users, it is essential to restrict the users to view the other data.The authorization and authentication in viewing the report is of significance.Usually companies adopt the authentication mechanism known as " single sign-on" policy as a security measure to prevent the unauthorized users in accessing the data

Customization:Generally we work on the presentation reports for hours to make it feel more pleasing while presenting to our boss.It requires enormous amount of time to make the report more attractive.If the reporting tool offers the ability of pre-set the reports in the way it has to be adhered to the corporate standards it makes the task of the report analyst more convenient and time saving

Export Capabilities:The apt reporting tool must have the power of delivering the report in the most mode that is accessible by the end user like excel,pdf,word ,csv format,

Integration with Microsoft Office:In today's technology world we have many users utilizing the Microsoft Office Products, most frequently excel for manipulating data.Here comes the need for the reporting tool to offer the power of working with the Microsoft Office like editing environment, so that all formatting can be carried within the Reporting tool itself

Reporting

2007-08-26T23:07:00.000-07:00

Reporting

The next important tool in the Data Warehousing is the Reporting tool.The Reporting tool makes our life much easier as it enable us to create reports within few minutes The Reporting tool is one of the significant tool in the Data Warehouse industry.Based on the requirement in the business application,the reporting tool is being designed.The main criteria on which it is depending on are as follows :

Number of reports :If the number of reports to be designed and created are enormous, the Reporting tool should be chosen based on its utility.

Desired Report Distribution mode: The accessing of the reports would be better if its accessed in a variety of channels rather than accessing it via browser.This implies viewing the report in excel,.csv ,pdf ,html,etc.

Adhoc report creation: The ability of the reporting tool lies in the creation of the ad-hoc reports.This requires the strong metadata layer to be built so that the application can be built on .

OLAP Tools

2007-08-21T05:18:00.000-07:00

OLAP Online Analytical Processing

The foremost element of OLAP is OLAP server, residing between the client and a database management systems(DBMS).There are two types of OLAP server based on the functionalities.They are as follows:

ROLAP : An acronym of Relational Online Analytical Processing,which utilises the relational database source
MOLAP:An acronym of Multidimensional Online Analytical Processing, which utilises the multidimensional database source

Functionalities:

Power to render parallelism furnished by RDBMS and hardware : This enhances the tool's performance and more apparently assists in loading the data quickly
Performance:In addition to rendering parallelism,the tool should have the ability in loading and reading the data from the cube
Customization efforts:In today's world the rate at which OLAP tools are used as reporting tool are increasing and for certain ROLAP implementations, the same OLAP tools are being utilized as the reporting tool.Hence the ease of customization must be handled efficiently
Security Features: Since OLAP tools are being utilized by ' n ' number of users, the security is a BIG concern.The data must be authenticated for every login user.Usually SSO (Single Sign On) policy is adopted for security concerns.
Metadata Support:The support of the Metadata in an OLAP tool is essential,because OLAP tools combines the data into the cube and also serves as the front- end tool.

Popular Tools

Business Objects
Cognos
Hyperion
Microsoft Analysis Services
MicroStrategy

ETL Tools

2007-08-08T23:05:00.000-07:00

ETL an acronym of Extraction Transformation and Loading is an important process in the Data Warehousing.The determination of ETL tool depends on three things namley:

Complexity of the data transformation

Data Cleansing needs:This depends on the type of the data being stored in the Data Warehouse,if the data requires more cleansing, the ETL tool should be selected accordingly

Data Volume:If the data volume is huge the tool should be chosen based on it.

ETL Functionalities :

Functional capability: The prenominal aspect of the ETL tool includes both the "transformation" and the "cleansing".Generally the ETL tool has strong capabilities in both the process.Merely if the data is filthy,it requires enormous amount of cleansing and hence the ETL tool chosen should have the more cleansing potentiality.So based on the requisite, the tool can be determined.

Power to interpret directly from data source:Every organisation utilises different set of data sources।Hence the ETL tool selected should have the ability to connect with the data source

Metadata Support: The ETL tool plays a vital role in Metadata because it maps the source data to the destination.

Popular Tools for ETL are as follows :

IBM WebSphere Information Integration (Ascential DataStage)
Ab Initio
Informatica

Various Datawarehousing Tools

2007-08-08T04:53:00.000-07:00

The various tools that are used for Data Warehousing are as follows:

Database,Hardware
ETL (Extraction,Transformation and Load)
OLAP
Reporting
Metadata

Database/Hardware :There are several factors that needs to be considered.
They are as follows:

Scalability: The Data Warehouse system is a centralised system which is used to large amount of data.The data storage is quite enormous।The system should be selected in such a manner that it can handle large amount of data efficiently

Parallel Processing Support: Today's powerful computers utilize multiple CPU's where in each of the process can perform apart of the task,all at the same time

RDBMS/Hardware Combination: The RDBMS physically resides n the hardware platform,so the choice of the RDBMS should be based on the efficencyof the hardware to handle enormous data

RDBMS: Its a Relational Database Management System which stores the data in the form of related tables and they are very powerful because its requires few assumptions the way in which the data is related and they are extracted from the database

Few of the popular Relational Databases and OS platforms are listed below:

Relational Databases

Oracle
Microsoft Sql Server
IBM Db2
Teradata
Sybase
MySql

OS Platforms

Linux
FreeBSD
Microsoft

Types of Datawarehouse

2007-08-07T22:02:00.000-07:00

A Data warehouse, a relational/ multidimensional database , in which the environment often consists of an ETL solution, an OLAP engine ,client analysis tool and other applications that can manage the process of data gathering and delivering to business users.

Basically Data Warehouse, a dedicated database, a central repository containing the data from the various operational sources in an organization.It includes detailed,stable,non-volatile and consistent data which can be analyzed in the time variant.

Types of Datawarehouse:

Enterprise Data Warehouse: Provides a central database for decision support throughout the enterprise.

ODS(Operational Data Store) : Having a broad enterprise wide scope,but unlike real enterprise datawarehouse, data is refreshed in real time and used for routine business activities

Data Mart: A subset of data warehouse,supporting a particular region,business unit or business function.

What is Datawarehouse?

2007-08-01T22:45:00.001-07:00

A Data Warehouse is a repository of integrated information, available for queries and analysis.Data and information are extracted from heterogeneous sources.It is merely a collection of data marts representing historical data from various operations in the company.

Data mart :

Its a segment of data warehouse that can provide data for reporting and analysis on a section, unit, department, (e,g). sales,payroll,production.

Why Data warehousing?

Benefits:

Datawarehouses are designed to perform aggregate queries running on large amounts of data .

The structure of data warehouse is easier for end users to navigate and understand.
Queries that would be complex in very normalized database could be easier to build and maintain in data warehouses decreasing their workload on transactions.
Efficient way to manage demand for lots of information from lots of users.
Efficient way to manage and report on data that is from a variety of sources, non uniform and scattered throughout a company.
Provides the capability to analyze large amounts of historical data that can provide an organisation with competitive advantage

Components of Data Warehouse:

Data Warehouse system consists of three components namely,

A database :Pulls the selective data from the existing operational databases such as Accounting, Forecasting, HumanResources, Marketing, Engineering & Sales
A query tool : This tool enable the users to access to the real time Data Warehouse database for query generation, creating a report, analysing the reports and also for exporting the data to numerious formats
Database interfaces : It allows for updating the database daily, weekly or on a monthly basis.In other words it acts as a simple bridge for transfer of data between operations database to the data warehouse