BI - Business Intelligence

A repository is a collection of database tables in which information about something is stored in a central place.BI tools like IBM Cognos or SAP BusinessObjects for example store security information like user and user group data, access permissions, documents and meta data information in such a repository, stored in a separate RDBMS.

A dashboard is an easy consumable BI user interface which can represent anything that is interesting to monitor or measure (mostly tactical or operational) in an integrated and visual way. Mostly the visualization of the data is done through interactive dials, sliders, check boxes, gauges, maps, traffic lights and other highly visual components. It records actuals performance and tells us how we are doing. A dashboard is not to be confused with a scorecard.

Report bursting is the possibility to deliver a single report to multiple destinations simultaneously. During the refresh of the report you make use of only one simple data fetch and deliver it to the corresponding destinations depending on a changing parameter, often also linked to certain security settings. As an example, a monthly sales report which is send to 50 account managers, who each time only get the sales to their customers in the report they receive.

Data mining or knowledge discovery in a database process (KDD) can be described as the search to discover strategic information and extracting patterns in bigger databases by making use of large datasets. In this process, users are "digging” into the data and make use of artificial intelligence and statistical functions. It helps enterprises and scientists to select the essential information out of massive quantities of data and create prediction models.

Business Objects Xcelcius is a Windows application that allows to create attractive, interactive visual dashboards, analysis, tables and graphs based upon plain Excel spreadsheets.It is completely integrated with the Microsoft Office products and does not require any programming skills. The output can be exported immediately into PowerPoint, Adobe PDF, Outlook or the web.Originally an acquisition by Business Objects, the product is meanwhile much better integrated in the latest SAP BusinessObjects releases.

The purpose of Business Intelligence is the gathering of data about a specific business process and to use this information to create a tactical and competitive benefit. Business Intelligence typically can be split into two different parts, the ETL & data warehouse part and the enduser reporting & analysis part. In the ETL part, data is extracted out of different sources and loaded into a data warehouse. In the reporting part, the data is fetched from a data warehouse and processed in reports and analysis.

OLAP stands for On Line Analytical Processing. OLAP tools offer the possibility to look at the data in a multi-dimensional way. It gives users the power to analyze data from different angles (dimensions) quickly, as aggregates are often precalculated and stored. Interacting with data through the use of OLAP tools is also known as "slice and dice”.