A key part of business intelligence is the collaboration between the business user and the BI IT professional and so Microsoft are running a one day seminar addressed to both of these audiences. The well renowned BI guru Rafal Lukawiecki is running this on 26th March at Microsoft’s office in Cardinal Place, Victoria London. Hopefully you can pair up with you opposite number on the business side and use this event to help shape your current thinking and improve that vital collaboration. I think this

Der Support für Microsoft SQL Server 2000 ist ausgelaufen. Das Produkt wird somit nur noch im Extended Mode (Vertrag) unterstützt. Wie können Sie Ihren Kunden dabei helfen, veraltete Datenbanksysteme in deren IT-Infrastruktur aufzuspüren? Wäre es nicht schön, wenn Sie die Möglichkeit hätten, die gesamte IT-Landschaft zu untersuchen und eine Liste mit allen Versionen von SQL Server inklusive Edition, Service Pack und Instanzen zu bekommen? Möchten Sie zusätzlich Empfehlungen haben, wie Sie die SQL

Working for Microsoft is strangely like working for the government, yu are essentially trying to please everyone, but there are significant minorities on any given issue who aren’t that satisfied. Let me explain with a real world example.. The lack of 64 bit jet and odbc drivers mean that anyone trying to get data into 64 bit SQL Server from Excel and Access has to do all sorts of chicanery.  Clearly those affected feel this is a big issue - after all this is simply a case of moving data from

Despite my love of SQL Server and my respect for Oracle, and MySQL the worlds number one database is excel.  I know that many purists and DBA’s will shudder at me grouping a spreadsheet with a database, but look at this form the perspective of number of hours of users using excel and the volume of data and I am sure Excel would be in pole position. The problem is that while our users love it IT Professionals constantly struggle to cope with the volume and complexity of data stored in it. 

I am ploughing through my inbox now I am not on the road anymore, and I have picked up quite a lot of flak around the costs of Performance Point.  I have passed specific queries on to the licensing guys, but the sort of thing I was getting both on-line and off-line form the TechNet road shows was Can't I just buy ProClarity and therefore cut down my licensing costs? It's going to cost megabucks to roll out in my company so I can't afford it. Dealing with each of these in turn: ProClarity licensing

1. Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server 2007 Technical training . This four day instructor-led workshop provides students with the knowledge and skills to architect and build Business Intelligence solutions using Microsoft® Office PerformancePoint Server 2007. This session covers both Monitoring and Analytics and Planning. Through extensive hands on exercises participants will build on their base knowledge. An outline of the course is attached. Dates currently scheduled are: November 20 – 23