Business Intelligence Guidebook: From Data Integration to Analytics 1st Edition

This textbook is a rare thing. Not from it's difficulty in obtaining, or due to the price being well below the norm of $100. What is rare about it is that it actually feels like they are trying to make it for someone who wants to learn the information, rather than simply writing it for a class; that is, it prioritizes learning over merely informing.I found my first indication of this as I went to place sticky-note flags marking the individual chapters for later study - I typically do this so that when referencing one chapter I can more quickly get back to it. I realized that the flags were coinciding with these black markers on the side, and quickly realized that the way they printed the book off, there are black lines on the side that indicate where the part starts are, and where each chapter was. I know this is a small thing, and really not relevant to the actual content of the book, but it's just so refreshing to see that the publisher or author was concerned about efficacy rather than merely the bottom-line.As for the content itself, there is little "fluff" or waste throughout the book. As I said before, it's designed with the task of informing in mind, and as such, it does not go off on tangents or over-explain anything. Anything that requires a tangential explanation is typically all contained within the same chapter. In a classroom setting, I could see this being useful if the book is being used to explain a specific subset of a field, as you can easily skip sections irrelevant to the classroom without having to summarize the preceding section.The only thing missing from my "checklist" when it comes to textbooks would be a summation of the individual chapters - summation of chapters are typically a staple of most textbooks. However, when I considered that the chapters were written with minimal waste, I instead feel that a summary would be unnecessary. The chapters are generally as long as they need to be, ranging from 10 pages to 40, and there are pages in some chapters that give a decent enough overview of information, such as in the first chapter when it concluded with a definitions table, something that no further chapter finished with.Overall, it's a good textbook about explaining Business Intelligence, and it's nice that it doesn't cost any limbs to purchase. If I had the option to choose between this and other textbooks, I can't see any reason not to choose this book. The only other thing I'd like to note is that I am a MIS major, so it's possible that I might be overrating it by a star simply because I was more familiar with the subject matter and did not get confused with any of the sections that another might, but even if there was a section that would make less sense to someone not directly involved in the field, I still feel that it would be a useful resource well worth the price.

I am relatively new to the area of BI. However, this book is pitched just right for anbody who has a need to understand the BI landscape. Form data wharehouse to self-serve BI Visualization, thè author points out the pros and cons of a quick fix vs. a fit for purpose solution. I'd recommend to anyone who wants to undertake a successful BI project as a must read.

I wanted to give the book 3.5 stars. Good information, but the book does a poor job of breaking down the architectural framework that it introduces. Once you go through the pain of doing what the author should have done for you, you'll be well versed in the subject.

I've known Rick for about 15 years and he has always been a great ambassador in the Business Intelligence Profession. Open, honest and quite knowledgeable in providing either an end to end solution or just fixing something that broke in the middle.I'm very happy he decided to write this "Go To" and "Must Have" book. I can now find great solutions without bothering him directly! Great Book!!!

The BI Guidebook is an indispensible resource for building world-class data warehouse programs. It describes the architecture, design, and processes that put business intelligence best practices into action. This book is a must-read for all business intelligence professionals.

Fantastic coverage of BI topics to bridge both technical and non-technical audiences. If you're working on providing BI services to clients, or are involved in any level with enterprise data management, this book will be invaluable.

The book contains many printing mistakes and inconsistent information.

This book is like Matrix, when you read it, everything makes sense. Great recommendation.