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Sharepoint Installation Part III
Part three of the multi-part Sharepoint installation series. This part covers how to upgrade a stand-alone installation to a server Farm
Understanding Business Intelligence
I wanted to pass along a couple more thoughts on understanding Business Intelligence and Business Insight. Here’s what Jason had to say:
"American Heritage Dictionary definitions:
intelligence: the capacity to acquire and apply knowledge
insight: the capacity to discern the true nature of a situation
I still like the term Business Intelligence (BI), and find it completely relevant. The term ‘Intelligence’ is an established, commonly used and appropriate term for the tangible collection of information gathered through research and active monitoring of a subject. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with it… it’s spot on.
I would not use the term ‘Business Insight’ to describe a product or solution set, as I believe Microsoft has done with it’s new SharePoint campaign. Business Insight sounds too intangible, too ambitious, more like a marketing device and not consistent with a ‘BI for the Masses’ message.
To me, insight sounds like it pertains to isolated moments, while intelligence conveys a regularly, actively employed faculty to apply a means to an ends.
So, how do I use these terms in explaining to a customer:
– I describe the technology and related services as a Business Intelligence platform and solution… I refer to intelligence gathering activities and processes.
– Through the regular application of this BI tech/solution, users (management) more quickly gains Visibility and Insights pertaining to business operations, and users can more readily share information with their counterparts."
…and Ralph writes "I think that I would differentiate between "Business Intelligence" and "Business Insight?" as follows:
• "Business Intelligence" is gained from analyzing the data within a corporate database in order to determine trends, performance metrics, etc., the chart the course of the business and, hopefully, enables corporate management to forecast, to some extent, the near term future.
• "Business Insight", on the other hand is not necessarily confined to the data derived from analyzing the corporation’s data but frequently comes from having the imagination to extrapolate, often in seemingly unrelated ways, from the Business Intelligence so that one anticipates the trends and events with which the business/corporation will have to deal.
While it is reasonably easy to automate Business Intelligence, it is far more difficult to automate Business Insight."
Did You Know?
Did you know that you can audit and log logins for your SQL Server? At the server properties level, you can enable the option to log logins. You have the option of logging success, failure or both. This can be a great way to watch for login issues, or, if you’re trying to find out what logins are in use overall, this can help with that as well. Check out the login auditing and consider enabling failed logins. At the very least it can help show if someone is having trouble logging in. It may even help show you if you have a security issue with someone trying to break in as well.
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