Darryl Burling

Upcoming BI Training

darryl — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 11:37:00 +1200

There are some great Business Intelligence courses coming up that I thought I’d let you all know of.

One day BI Launchpad course

Firstly there is one later this month with Peter Ward (SQL Server MVP from Australia) who is running a one day hands on course designed to show how SQL Server 2008 can be used to solve different types of business intelligence problems, from data warehousing to real time operational reporting and analytics. If you go, you will:

…learn how to use the SQL Server BI toolset to collect data from heterogeneous data sources and then display the data in a meaningful format to assist in making business decisions and then measure and monitor the results. This course provides an end to end overview of the entire SQL Server BI stack from extracting data using Integration Services to building cubes with Analysis Services and then displaying the results using Reporting Services.

Full details of this course is available in a PDF for both Auckland, (July 20) and Wellington, (July 21). FWIW, Peter is very knowledgeable, and SQL Server is his specialty, so this is bound to be a good investment of one day of your time.

Four day BI Depth course

In addition, Altis Consulting are pleased to announce a four day Kimball Group course to be h eld in Sydney in October 2009. This course is entitled “Microsoft Data Warehouse in Depth” and will run in Sydney from October 20-23rd. It is presented by Warren Thornthwaite and Joy Mundy, co-authors of the best selling Microsoft Data Warehouse Toolkit.

This course is designed to appeal to all major roles on a data warehouse project on the Microsoft platform. It’s for DW team managers, system architects, ETL system architects and developers, data warehouse operational staff, and BI application designers and developers. Every attendee in this class will receive a copy of the Microsoft Data Warehouse Toolkit.

You can download the course brochure here, registration is available now from here. Additional information is available from the Altis Consulting web site.

Tech Ed Tickets are still available

darryl — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 11:44:38 +1200

Last year Tech Ed sold out in three weeks. This year more than a month has past since we opened Tech Ed sales and we still have tickets available – it must be a consequence of the current economic climate…

Anyway, this is just a reminder that if you haven’t bought tickets, there are still tickets available, so get yours today.

In the SQL Track, we will have some excellent speakers here this year, which I’ll reveal more about in due time. Rest assured Tech Ed will be well worth it this year!

*UPDATE* We’ve now got seven Canon IXUS 100 digital cameras to give away if you register before July 31. Full details here.

Wellington Silverlight User group

darryl — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 17:08:59 +1200

Hey look – another user group!

This time its focused on Silverlight and it looks like it is more technically oriented. The blurb:

The Wellington Silverlight Usergroup is brand spanking new, with the wrapping paper still on.

It was created specifically to quickly disseminate to the Wellington area's developers and designers the knowledge necessary to build engaging web and RIA applications, in the hottest and fastest growing technology on the web today. We have the luck of having several very knowledgeable presenters willing to present over the coming months, starting with Andrew Tokeley, with many more to follow, covering front-end, backend, design, and everything in between.

The first evening will be a presentation on Silverlight accessibility. The abstract for Andrew’s presentation follows:

Much has been written about how to make traditional, HTML based, web sites accessible to users of all abilities. There are published guidelines, validation tools and an abundance of online resources. However, the increasing popularity of Rich Internet Applications (RIA), like Silverlight, raises interesting questions about how to achieve the same levels of accessibility.
We'll take a close look at using Silverlight under the latest version of the New Zealand e-Government Web Guidelines (www.e.govt.nz/standards/web-guidelines) and discuss strategies for maintaining compliance while still leveraging the power of Silverlight. You’ll even discover that, in some cases, Silverlight can make your sites more accessible than is possible with just HTML and CSS.
Plenty of demos - including a look at the recently launched www.buttercupreader.net application, specifically built for the blind and partially sighted

Looks like fun. The first event is 6pm Wednesday, July 1 at Xero, Level 1, 98 Customhouse Quay, Wellington. RSVP to skysigal (at) xact-solutions.com.

Its everybody’s business…

darryl — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 16:55:00 +1200

Jack Welch is well known as the former CEO of General Electric. I remember years ago listening to the audible version of his book “Jack” and enjoyed hearing about the success he had at GE and the way he did things.

Jack and his wife Suzy (former Editor of Harvard Business Review) are now in a reality show featuring online which has been made by the creators of “The Office”. This is a Microsoft sponsored show, which is now freely available online.

The first episode is up with a few more to come. If you are a business junkie, watch the first 20 minute episode. It follows the story of Jack and Suzy’s discussion with Connect – a car sharing company started by Hertz in the US. I really enjoyed the strategic business thinking in this episode and I’m looking forward to more.

Sign up for SQL 2008 R2 CTP notification

darryl — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 14:12:55 +1200

SQL Server 2008 has some cool new features including:

New spatial features such as routing
Master data services
Extended self service BI capabilities

As well as reducing still further the management overhead and enhancing the core product even further.

If you are itching to get your hands on a copy, I suggest you sign up here to be notified when SQL Server 2008 R2 hits the first CTP milestone. Let me know how you go – I’m keen to hear your feedback.

SharePoint Conference

darryl — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 11:22:48 +1200

In a couple of weeks I’ll be attending the New Zealand Community SharePoint conference. While community might not say much, the calibre of people who are coming from around the world to speak at this conference is top notch.

So if you are considering SharePoint or have SharePoint, this conference will help you get your head around issues you are either going to encounter or already facing. The topics at the conference cover everything from design and architecture through to taxonomy and information management.

The cost is $500 (discounts available), but given the people who are speaking and the airfares, accommodation and other costs they’ll incur, this is excellent value for money for two days of full on conference. Notable speakers include Adam Cogan, Debbie Ireland, Erica Toelle, Ian Morrish, Joel Oleson, and many more.

I’ll be there at the Microsoft stand. If you are interested in talking about SharePoint (good or bad), I’m keen to hear about it.

Full details and registration is available from http://www.sharepointconference.co.nz See you there!

Expanding portfolio - SharePoint

darryl — Wed, 27 May 2009 16:46:44 +1200

Over the last few months I’ve enjoyed stretching my legs into the new world of marketing at Microsoft.

I feel I’ve finally got my head around SQL Server, Visual Studio and BizTalk Server and I think I’m making a difference.

As no consequence to this at all, I’ve recently acquired a new product to add to the Application Platform stack – SharePoint Server. So now, I am the New Zealand Product Manager for SQL Server, SharePoint Server, Visual Studio and BizTalk Server.

Over the next few weeks I’m interested in talking to customers and partners about their experiences around SharePoint, good and bad in order to help get my head around the current situation in the market and put together plans for the next financial year to help both customers and partners with their SharePoint solutions.

In addition to SharePoint, I will also be driving the Business Intelligence message in New Zealand, and owning both SQL Server and SharePoint from a marketing perspective will be a great benefit to ensuring that the message is consistent and helps build clarity from a customer perspective.

So – if you are interested in talking to me about SharePoint, use the contact link and we’ll catch up. I’m going to be in Christchurch and Auckland over the next few weeks and have a little bit of time to spare in each location at this stage.

A model for building a business case…

darryl — Thu, 21 May 2009 21:17:30 +1200

A while ago I did a presentation for the Auckland SQL Server User Group (and last years SQL PASS Community Connection). The topic was building a business case for SQL Server.

Since then several people have asked me to post the slides to my blog, but while I’m not going to post the slides here at this stage, I thought I’d do the next best thing and post the model I used to build the business case.

To do this effectively we need to have a framework for building the business case. The framework I used is a model that Mark Carroll a colleague from my DPE days came up with (incidentally Mark came up with this model before he joined Microsoft). Mark called the model the 8 business drivers, I’m going to call it the “Mark Carroll business driver model” because it sounds more official and gives Mark the credit for it. The model looks approximately like this:

Tangible costs (How much does the product cost to purchase or maintain?)
Skills availability (How easy is it to get people to work on it or solve short term skills shortages?)
Customer requirements (Does it meet the stated business requirements? What about unstated requirements?)
Third party products and services (What sort of ecosystem and partner network is there for this product?)
Standards and Methodology fit (How will it fit with my business methods? How does it work with established standards?)
User Functionality requirements (How easy is the product to learn (i.e. discoverable)? Is there a consistent user experience/paradigm?)
Timeliness (What is the time from order to deployment? How quickly can it be modified or customized?)
Life expectancy (How long will the vendor be around? How long will they support the product for? Will there be a migration path to the next version?)

If you use these 8 business drivers to build your business case, you’ll find the answers that you are looking for.

Perhaps in a future post I’ll plug SQL Server into this and show how it measures up against this model.

Considering SQL Server Certification?

darryl — Wed, 20 May 2009 10:35:00 +1200

If you are interested in looking into SQL Server Certification there are a couple of live meeting events that you might be interested in putting into your diary.

The first is “Jumpstart SQL 2008 Skills”. The abstract reads: “If you are new to SQL 2008, this session provides you with information on why and how to jumpstart your skills to SQL Server 2008. Our speaker will share real-life application examples and putting knowledge into context. Register NOW!” This session is scheduled for May 26 at 4:30pm via live meeting.

The second is for those who are looking to “Upgrade your SQL skills” to SQL Server 2008 from SQL 2005: "If you have been running existing databases and applications on SQL Server 2005, this Webcast session show you exciting new capabilities to improve your applications and reduce support needs within a familiar management interface. REGISTER NOW!” This session is scheduled for May 28 at 4:30. Both sessions are an hour long.

These sessions are free and will also provide you with an opportunity to ask questions of a real person (shocking I know…) about your certification steps.

Don't forget to take advantage of the 50% off MS press books if you are considering certification.

50% off MS Press books

darryl — Tue, 19 May 2009 11:08:42 +1200

In the market for books? Don’t bother with Amazon. We can do a deal for you!

MS Press Australia is celebrating its first birthday by providing customers with the opportunity to take 50% off all books.

To take up the offer, do your shopping and then use MSPRESS1 as the checkout code to take 50% off.

I wonder if we should see if we can get MS Press to Tech Ed… thoughts?