The DaAnalytics Blog has moved.

The DaAnalytics Blog will re-launch on the DaAnalytics website – http://daanalytics.nl/blog. Over the last years I have been blogging about Oracle Analytics. It started as; Oracle BI By Bakboord. OBIBB being a reference to Oracle’s Analytics flagship at that time; OBIEE. After a few years I re-branded the blog to; DaAnalytics Blog. DaAnalytics (of course) as reference to Daan and Analytics.

Early 2018 I started the year with a “Happy New Year for a new challenge!“. The first and most important one, was me joining Pong. Within Pong I am responsible for the Data & Analytics Business Unit. I have written down a few of my motives in this article (Dutch). Apart from being busy at Pong, I still deliver consultancy services. That’s why I maintain a personal website. Part of this website is the DaAnalytics Blog. This means that the old blog on http://blog.daanalytics.nl and / or http://obibb.wordpress.nl will remain online but won’t be maintained anymore. As from now all new content will be posted here on the DaAnalytics website blog.

My plan right now is that the ‘new’ blog will contain all sorts of content related to:

I will cover topics like Front-end Analytics (with a focus on the Cloud) but will also look at topics related to Data Integration, Data Management and Data Warehouse automation and Data Modelling (Data Vault 2.0). All these things are not possible when there is a focus on things like Data Strategy and Data Government. All the buzzwords above are useless if we forget to keep the Business (context) in mind. We have to make sure that we begin, involve and end with the Business. The Business should be able to take action based on their (relevant) data. Check my DaAnalytics Standpoint blog, to find out more

Thanks for reading.

Cheers,

Daan Bakboord

DaAnalytics – Seasons Greetings

I started this year with a “Happy New Year for a new challenge!“. After about 20 years of being employed, I decided to start of 2018 als a self-employed Data & Analytics consultant at DaAnalytics (a combination of Daan & Analytics). A series of interesting challenges lied ahead.

The first and most important one, was me joining Pong. The reason I joined Pong as a Self-Employed professional, is that Pong offers me the possibility to work together with a number of enthusiastic, experienced entrepreneurs. Within Pong I am responsible for the Data & Analytics Business Unit. I have written down more of my motives in this article (Dutch).

Apart from joining Pong there were a few other hi-lights. I will mention a few.

In January I attended the Full Scale Data Architecture College Tour. As mentioned in a postI wrote back then; Ronald Damhof (the host of the event) and Sylvia Butzke (COO at PGGM Investments) gave an unique opportunity to step into the boardroom and find out what an executive thinks about IT, architects, architecture and data in particular.

At the beginning of June we hosted the nlOUG Tech Experience at the Rijtuigenloods in Amersfoort. This is an event with 69 speakers from 19 countries, who give more than 70 sessions on ground-breaking topics in the field of Oracle (related) Technology. I had the privilege to take the stand in one of the old train wagons. In my presentation I covered the Challenges & Pitfalls of Data Visualization.

I uploaded my slides on SlideShare.

Since the acquisition of Siebel by Oracle, I have been active doing all sorts of projects tied ands closely related to Oracle Analytics. This year I stepped out of my comfort zone several times.

I attended Alteryx Inspire Europe 2018 – https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/looking-back-alteryx-inspire-europe-2018-daan-bakboord/

I visited several (almost all organised in NL) Snowflake-sessions. – https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/breakfast-insights-snowflake-daan-bakboord/

Along the way I also spend some time with other tooling like; Looker, Talend and WhereScape.

In oktober Oracle’s Open World was held in San Francisco. I was not able to attend, but there were several opportunities afterwards to get a glimpse of the event:

It has been a nice ride in 2018, but I am glad the Holiday Season is about to start. Time for family and friends and an opportunity to re-charge my battery.

Next year will be challenging as always. Some nice opportunities ly ahead. Not only for me personally but also for me as part of Pong. and the Nederlandse Oracle User Group (nlOUG).

Please keep an eye on my LinkIn Pages to stay informed:

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year 2019 

We already celebrated the past year at Pong. with a Christmas diner / get together in the DoubleTree by Hilton SkyLounge. It was a great event.

I wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy and Healthy New Year 2019.

Originally published on LinkedIn.

Oracle Data Visualization -Hands on Lab


Triggered by both Mike Durran and the Amis Oracle OpenWorld & CodeOne review I went through the OOW18 Session Catalog. The Oracle Data Visualization Hands on Lab is an easy way to get in touch with this product. I decided to give it a quick try.

Next to this I am also trying out the Oracle Cloud. I already provisioned an Autonomous Data Warehouse Cloud database (ADWC). It could be nice to combine part of the Hands on Lab with the Oracle Cloud trial.

Impact of Social Media Campaigns on
Product Sales

According to Mike, the Hands on Lab material can be downloaded here.

The Hands on Lab material consists of a pdf with the different steps to be taken. Next to that there are two .xlsx-files with the data.

I decided to try and use Oracle SQL Developer to load the .xlsx-files into my Autonomous Data Warehouse Cloud database. This proces is relatively straightforward.

Make sure you have a SQL Developer connection to ADWC. How you should achieve that is described in the Oracle Help Center.

Via an Right-Mouse-Click, you can Import Data.

Import Data

As from here it is just following the wizard and load the .xlsx-files into ADWC.

Data Preview
Import Method
Choose Columns
Column Definition

Make sure all column names are valid. In the above example ‘DATE’ is a reserveren word. Special characters, like ‘#’, also need special attention.

Column re-Definition
Finish

If everything goes well, the data is loaded into a table, specified in the ‘Import Method’. In this case it is the table: KOOLKART_SALES_DATA.

Table imported

Repeat similar steps for the other .xlsx-file.

If you want to proceed with the Hands on Lab you need to connect Oracle Data Visualization Desktop (DVD) to ADWC. The Oracle A-Team has dedicated a blogpost to this process. When DVD and ADWC are connected, a Data Set can be created.

Create Data Set

From this point onwards, it’s easy to follow the Hands on Lab.

It’s nice to see how easy various components within the Oracle stack can communicate together. This blog only covers the first 58 or so pages. I guess the other steps can be followed just as easy. If there is anything worth mentioning or when I will take a sidestep again I will post again.

Good Luck.

Amis Oracle OpenWorld and CodeOne review

Last October 22nd until 25th San Francisco  was the place to be for Oracle OpenWorld 2018 and Oracle Code One 2018. Oracle OpenWorld is the yearly event where Oracle-experts share their knowledge and expertise. Oracle Code One (The successor of JavaOne) is focussing on modern (application and integration) architectures and software development.

For those less fortunate and unable to attend (like myself) there are several sources to stay up to date.

Watch the Keynotes and some of the sessions On Demand.

Check the Session Catalogs from both Oracle OpenWorld and CodeOne for downloads of the presentations and sessions.

Amis Oracle OpenWorld & CodeOne review 

As always Amis has send a delegation to the Oracle conferences. Thanks to Amis and Lucas Jellema and Robert van Mölken in particular I had the chance to get up-to-date. Like every year the organised a Oracle OpenWorld & CodeOne review. In this review Lucas and Robert coverd the following topics (among others):

  • Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), the Generation 2 Cloud
  • Containers and Kubernetes in the Oracle Cloud
  • Blockchain
  • Machine Learning
  • Autonomous everything
  • IoT
  • Moderne architectures like MicroServices, ServerLess, CQRS & Event Sourcing

Check out the different slides on SlideShare:

Announcements, Analysis and Overviews on Data, Analytics and Machine Learning – https://www.slideshare.net/lucasjellema/amis-oracle-openworld-codeone-review-pillar-1-data-5-november-2018 …

Takeaways & Interpretations on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure – https://www.slideshare.net/lucasjellema/amis-oracle-openworld-codeone-review-pillar-1-cloud-infrastructure-5-november-2018 …

Blockchain, Integration Cloud, ServerLess and MicroServices – https://www.slideshare.net/RobertvanMlken/blockchain-integration-serverless-microservices-oow-2018-review

Custom Application Development – https://www.slideshare.net/lucasjellema/amis-oracle-openworld-codeone-review-pillar-2-custom-application-development-5-november-2018 …

SaaS & Business Applications – https://www.slideshare.net/lucasjellema/amis-oracle-openworld-codeone-review-pillar-2-saas-and-standard-applications-5-november-2018 …

Thanks Lucas and Robert, I have enough homework to keep me busy until next year.

Originally published on LinkedIn.

Looking back at Alteryx Inspire Europe 2018

Last week I stepped out of my comfort zone and attended Alteryx Inspire Europe 2018. When I joined Pong. earlier this year, I found out that we have an Alteryx license. Working in Oracle environments for so long, I had not run into Alteryx before. I was very curious about the possibilities of the project. Lucky for me Werner Maurits made it possible for me to attend the event.

I had a few questions upfront.

“What is Alteryx and why would I use it?” 

The event was made up of a few different tracks. I decided to attend several different trainings to make sure I would make my hands dirty. These Platform Trainings gave me a lot of hands-on insight of the product, next to things like…..

  • ……the Keynotes (e.g. Dean Stoecker, Founder + CEO, Ashley Kramer – SVP of Product Management and a lot more)
  • …..Sponsor Expo (great to see the integration with third party solutions like Snowflake DB), 
  • …..Breakout Sessions
  • …..ALTER.NATION ( Community, User Groups, AFG, User Experience Lab, Social Lounge, Product Showcase). 
  • …..The Solutions Centre, which was a bit off limits for me. If you would have an challenge to conquer, the (and I quote) brilliant minds of Alteryx development, product management, professional services, and Customer Success Group associates are there to help you. 
  • …..CODE.CHELLA, the Inspire gala event was fun too.

For another impression of the event, check out the #alteryxeu18 hashtag (while it lasts).

Back to the question; “What is Alteryx?”. Alteryx is an end-to-end analytics platform which tries to bring Business Users and Data Engineers / Scientists together. One single platform where different types of user can “discover, transform, model, and analyze data using a single governed, collaborative, and scalable enterprise analytic solution”.

  • Discover and Collaborate – Alteryx Connect helps users to search & find the right analytic assets at the right time, combining data cataloging and metadata.
  • Prepare, Analyze and Model – Alteryx Designer provides a self-service capability to cleanse, prepare and blend data from all relevant datasources.
  • Share, Scale and Govern – Alteryx Server allows to create, publish, and share analytic applications and data connections. It helps to schedule and automate workflow jobs, next to controlling data access.
  • Deploy and Manage – Alteryx Promote makes it easy to deploy, manage, and monitor production based analytic models.

Although the event is a great opportunity to get together with Alteryx enthusiasts, I spend most of my time exploring Alteryx Designer. Another great way to get to know about Alteryx (including Designer) is the Alteryx Community.

During the event lots of Use Cases have been presented, also by the various attending and presenting customers. That gave me an impression for my second question; “Why would I use Alteryx?”. The opportunities seem to be endless. Alteryx Community is another place where I could find some possible use cases, per department, industry and product.

All in all I have been experiencing three very inspiring days. Far too much for me to absorb everything, but a very nice opportunity to get to know more about the Alteryx product.

The coming weeks / months I will spend some more time in the Alteryx Academy and the Tips & Tricks. This way I will be better equipped to get more out of Alteryx for Pong. It is a happy couple anyway.