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What Makes BI SaaS Architecture Multitenant?

Posted by Boris Evelson on November 15, 2009

Boris Evelson

Boris Evelson By Boris Evelson

I'd like to drill into some more details on my BI SaaS blog from September 2009. A key critical point to "what differentiates one BI SaaS vendor from another" discussion is what really constitutes multi-tenant architecture. Here are some initiall thoughts to stimulate the discussion:

  • DBMS. There's got to be back end, DBMS architecture that allows for one of the following:
    • Automatically generate a separate DBMS instance for each client  
    • Use same DBMS instance for multiple clients, but automatically generate a set of unique tables for each client  
    • Use same DBMS instance and tables for multiple clients, but automatically assign unique keys to to each client so that they can only update and retrieve their own rows  
  • Application. Similar functionality has to exist in the application tier:
    • Automatically connect to the appropriate, client specific DBMS instance, or 
    • Automatically use views that only point to client specific tables, or
    • Append "where" clause to each SQL statement to only retrieve client specific rows  
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The Top 19 Customer Management Technologies To Watch

Posted by William Band on November 13, 2009

  • 216 Recommendations
William Band

In this podcast, Bill describes what technologies comprise the customer management applications ecosystem, and which ones offer the most value based on Forrester's combined knowledge.

http://a964.g.akamaitech.net/7/964/714/05946339a34115/www.forrester.com/imagesV2/uplmisc/Bill_Band_11_12_09.mp3

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The Top 19 Customer Management Technologies To Watch

Posted by William Band on November 13, 2009

  • 216 Recommendations
William Band

In this podcast, Bill describes what technologies comprise the customer management applications ecosystem, and which ones offer the most value based on Forrester’s most recent research.

http://www.forrester.com/role_based/images/author/imported/forresterDotCom/Podcasts/BPA/bill%20band%20podcast%2011-12-09%20mixed.mp3

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How To Differentiate Advanced Data Visualisation Solutions

Posted by Boris Evelson on November 11, 2009

Boris Evelson

Boris Evelson By Boris Evelson

I get many inquiries from clients on how to select a data visualization vendor / solution. The criteria that my clients often site are

  • Thick and thin client
  • Dynamic visualizations, not just static charts 
  • Ability to pull data from multiple sources
  • OLAP-like functionality
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Ten Strong Hints Your Enterprise May Not Have A BI Strategy

Posted by Boris Evelson on November 6, 2009

  • 279 Recommendations
Boris Evelson

Boris Evelson By Boris Evelson

You know that you don't have an enterprise BI strategy if:

 

Want more hints and best practices? Take our BI maturity self assessment test. Then if you actually want to compare your BI strategy and BI maturity against other Forrester clients, take our BI maturity survey. Good luck!

  1. Your end users keep pointing to IT as the source of most BI problems

  2. Your business executives view BI as another cost center
  3. IT staff keep asking end users for report requirements
  4. Your BI is supported by IT help desk
  5. You can’t tell the difference between BI and Performance Management
  6. You can’t measure your BI usage
  7. You can’t measure your BI ROI
  8. You think your BI strategy is the same as your DW strategy
  9. You don’t have a plan to develop, hire, retain and grow BI staff
  10. (My personal favorite) You actually don’t know if your enterprise has a BI strategy!

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    Policy-based SOA Will Enable Increased Business Value And Agility

    Posted by Randy Heffner on November 3, 2009

    Randy Heffner

    One of my favorite Forrester survey statistics to quote about SOA is the proportion of service-oriented architecture (SOA) users that see how important SOA can be for changing their business. In our Enterprise And SMB Software Survey, North America And Europe, Q4 2008 (taken after the start of the current economic crisis), 38% of Global 2000 SOA adopters said they are using SOA for strategic business transformation. This is a very high level of business impact — and far more value than was ever credited to object-oriented or component-based development. Why is this important to note? Many think of SOA first as a technology for reuse, like objects and components, and miss the reality that SOA is much more about business design and flexibility. By missing the business perspective on SOA, they miss the fact that SOA is the foundation for a much broader shift in application architecture and its relationship to the design, monitoring, and optimization of business processes.

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    PeopleSoft Seeks A New Place In The CRM Sun With Release 9.1

    Posted by William Band on October 30, 2009

    William Band

    William Band By William Band

    Since the acquisition of PeopleSoft by Oracle in 2004, the PeopleSoft CRM solution seemed to go underground. Relatively little has been heard about the product since that time. However, Oracle has been continuing to invest. PeopleSoft CRM 9.0, a major step forward, was released in August 2006, and the company will soon announce PeopleSoft CRM 9.1.

    My take on Oracle's PeopleSoft CRM in the past has been that the product line has a significant base of loyal customers who value the usability and benefits of integration to PeopleSoft's HR and ERP suites. It offered a broad range of functionality across all the major components of CRM, with particular strengths in sales, customer service, and analytics. It had less robust, but sound, capability for marketing, field service, eCommerce, and customer data management.

    Although, the solution does not offer a SaaS deployment option, it provided unique support for specific industries such as the public sector, particularly education. It also provided strong support for the financial services, utilities and telecommunications sectors. All-in-all, PeopleSoft CRM was well-suited for existing PeopleSoft customers who need a broad-based CRM platform to build on.

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    Is COBOL The Root Of All (Technical) Evil?

    Posted by Phil Murphy on October 28, 2009

    Phil Murphy

    OK, so I used a tongue-in-cheek title to attract your attention, forgive me. A recent blog about the Boomer retirement phenomenon provoked some comments by a colleague with strong opinions about COBOL's useful life. I felt that his comments raised a topic that is substantial enough to warrant its own place in the blogosphere. The comments read, in part:

    " I am a boomer myself ... But as a software architect who has to look ahead and figure out what customers and users want I can't wait for the 3270 green screen boomer generation to retire.  It will allow for the acceptance of a new application paradigm. Those stepping up to the plate will not hesite to dump the COBOL garbage and use modern tools to create modern mobile apps that will finally end the drama of IT as today's business disabler. ..."

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    Boomer Retirement And IT - Are You An Ostrich, Chicken-little, Or an Owl?

    Posted by Phil Murphy on October 27, 2009

    Phil Murphy

    The rock-band R.E.M. sang a song about the "end of the world as we know it" and to hear some people talk - the end is near! 

    The Chicken-littles of the world would have us believe that retiring Baby Boomers will wreak untold havoc. Half the world's population will suddenly disappear from the workforce - collapsing world markets, straining national pension systems to the breaking point, and burdening younger generations with unmanageable national debt.

    Other folks are at the opposite end of the spectrum - they're in denial, like ostriches with their heads deep in the sand - if they don't look at how bad the problem is, it can't hurt them, right? No staffing problems here - look we can still hire people, let's deal with today's problems and not go looking for tomorrow's troubles!

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