Dave's Adventures in Business Intelligence

I have done conference presentations before. I have done more than one presentation for the same conference. I have even done a double presentation (a longer two-part session stretched over two hours) before. But never have I done two unrelated sessions, in different rooms, in back-to-back time slots on the same day. 😯 I did my first session as a co-presenter with Brian Durning, where we talked about picking out the proper client tool to use. As soon as I got finished there, I had to shut down my laptop and get to my next session, which was all about managing changes in a universe design. I was quite pleased with the turnout for both sessions, and also pleased with my delivery. Some might think that after so many years of doing this it becomes second nature… and some parts do. But every year is a new subject and a new challenge, and I always want to do my best to share what I have found to be useful.

Brian and I had a lot of fun with our first session. The fact that we work together (and occasionally play together) really helped with the presentation style, which was very easy and laid-back. We created three specific (and exaggerated) scenarios that showed that Web Intelligence was the best tool for casual or interactive reports, Crystal is the best for reports with prompts, and Xcelsius provides the only tool with “what if” capability. I will be posting the presentation file here shortly.

The second session from me today was related to the concepts of change management for universe designers. I am often asked questions like:

• What is different between these two universes?
• What changes were made in “break fix” that now have to be applied to development?
• What are you getting ready to move into production?

I concluded the presentation by doing a live demonstration of a universe change detection script that I have written in VBA. I took several suggestions for changes in a universe from the audience (change an object name, remove some joins from a context, and change a join from a shortcut to a regular join) and my script found them all. Whew! I will be posting that presentation here shortly, and the script should follow soon after.

There is also a lot to talk about regarding BOB and ASUG and other developments, but that’s worthy of a separate blog post to come later.

That means that the good news is that I’m done with presentations for this conference! The bad news is that I have not done much of anything else (other than saying “hi” to some old friends and meeting some new ones) so I don’t have anything to report. Tomorrow I hope to get to some other sessions and be able to share some tidbits from the conference.

Until then, it’s time for a good night’s sleep. 😎