Applied Microsoft Business Intelligence

Book description

Leverage the integration of SQL Server and Office for more effective BI

Applied Microsoft Business Intelligence shows you how to leverage the complete set of Microsoft tools—including Microsoft Office and SQL Server—to better analyze business data.

This book provides best practices for building complete BI solutions using the full Microsoft toolset. You will learn how to effectively use SQL Server Analysis and Reporting Services, along with Excel, SharePoint, and other tools to provide effective and cohesive solutions for the enterprise. Coverage includes BI architecture, data queries, semantic models, multidimensional modeling, data analysis and visualization, performance monitoring, data mining, and more, to help you learn to perform practical business analysis and reporting. Written by an author team that includes a key member of the BI product team at Microsoft, this useful reference provides expert instruction for more effective use of the Microsoft BI toolset.

  • Use Microsoft BI suite cohesively for more effective enterprise solutions

  • Search, analyze, and visualize data more efficiently and completely

  • Develop flexible and scalable tabular and multidimensional models

  • Monitor performance, build a BI portal, and deploy and manage the BI Solution

  • Table of contents

    1. Introduction
      1. Overview of the Book and Technology
      2. How This Book Is Organized
      3. Who Should Read This Book
      4. Tools You Will Need
      5. What's on the Website
      6. Summary
    2. Part I: Overview of the Microsoft Business Intelligence Toolset
    3. Chapter 1: Which Analysis and Reporting Tools Do You Need?
      1. Selecting a SQL Server Database Engine
      2. Selecting SQL Server Analysis Services
      3. Working with SQL Server Reporting Services
      4. Working with SharePoint
      5. Working with Performance Point
      6. Using Excel for Business Intelligence
      7. Which Development Tools Do You Need?
      8. Summary
    4. Chapter 2: Designing an Effective Business Intelligence Architecture
      1. Identifying the Audience and Goal of the Business Intelligence Solution
      2. What Are the Data Sources?
      3. Using a Data Warehouse (or Not)
      4. Implementing and Enforcing Data Governance
      5. Planning an Analytical Model
      6. Planning the Business Intelligence Delivery Solution
      7. Considering Performance
      8. Considering Availability
      9. Summary
    5. Chapter 3: Selecting the Data Architecture that Fits Your Organization
      1. Why Is Data Architecture Selection Important?
      2. How Do You Pick the Right Data Architecture?
      3. Summary
    6. Part II: Business Intelligence for Analysis
    7. Chapter 4: Searching and Combining Data with Power Query
      1. Downloading and Installing Power Query
      2. Transforming Data
      3. Introducing M Programming
      4. Summary
    8. Chapter 5: Choosing the Right Business Intelligence Semantic Model
      1. Understanding the Business Intelligence Semantic Model Architecture
      2. Understanding the Data Access Layer
      3. Implementing Query Languages and the Business Logic Layer
      4. Comparing the Different Types of Models
      5. Which Model Fits Your Organization?
      6. Summary
    9. Chapter 6: Discovering and Analyzing Data with Power Pivot
      1. Understanding Hardware and Software Requirements
      2. Enabling Power Pivot
      3. Designing an Optimal Power Pivot Model
      4. Optimizing the Power Pivot Model for Reporting
      5. Summary
    10. Chapter 7: Developing a Flexible and Scalable Tabular Model
      1. Why Use a Tabular Model?
      2. How Do You Design the Model?
      3. How Do You Enhance the Model?
      4. How Do You Tune the Model?
      5. Summary
    11. Chapter 8: Developing a Flexible and Scalable Multidimensional Model
      1. Why Use a Multidimensional Model?
      2. How Do You Design the Model?
      3. How Do You Enhance the Model?
      4. How Do You Tune the Model?
      5. Summary
    12. Chapter 9: Discovering Knowledge with Data Mining
      1. Understanding the Business Value of Data Mining
      2. Getting the Basics Right
      3. Applying the Microsoft Data Mining Techniques with Best Practices
      4. Developing and Deploying a Scalable and Extensible Data Mining Solution
      5. Maintaining Data Mining Models
      6. Integrating Data Mining with Your BI Solution
      7. Summary
    13. Part III: Business Intelligence for Reporting
    14. Chapter 10: Choosing the Right Business Intelligence Visualization Tool
      1. Why Do You Need to Choose?
      2. What Are the Selection Criteria?
      3. How Do You Gather the Necessary Information?
      4. What Are the Business Intelligence Visualization Options?
      5. How Do You Create and Complete the Evaluation Matrix?
      6. How Do You Verify and Complete the Process?
      7. Summary
    15. Chapter 11: Designing Operational Reports with Reporting Services
      1. What Are Operational Reports and Reporting Services?
      2. What Are Development Best Practices?
      3. What Are Performance Best Practices?
      4. What Are Functionality Best Practices?
      5. Summary
    16. Chapter 12: Visualizing Your Data Interactively with Power View
      1. Where Does Power View Fit with Your Reporting Solution?
      2. Power View System Requirements
      3. Creating Power View Data Source Connections
      4. Creating Power View Reports
      5. Filtering Data with Power View
      6. Exporting Power View Reports
      7. Summary
    17. Chapter 13: Exploring Geographic and Temporal Data with Power Map
      1. How Power Map Fits into Reporting Solutions
      2. Optimizing Your Data Model for Power Map
      3. Working with Geospatial and Temporal Data
      4. Deploying and Sharing Power Map Visualizations
      5. Summary
    18. Chapter 14: Monitoring Your Business with PerformancePoint Services
      1. Where Does PerformancePoint Services Fit with Your Reporting Solution?
      2. Extending PPS Dashboards
      3. Deployment Best Practices
      4. Security and Configuration Best Practices
      5. Summary
    19. Part IV: Deploying and Managing the Business Intelligence Solution
    20. Chapter 15: Implementing a Self-Service Delivery Framework
      1. Planning a Self-Service Delivery Framework
      2. Inventorying Tools and Skillset
      3. Defining Success Criteria
      4. Summary
    21. Chapter 16: Designing and Implementing a Deployment Plan
      1. What Is a Deployment Plan?
      2. How Do You Deploy Business Intelligence Code?
      3. How Do You Implement the Deployment Plan?
      4. Summary
    22. Chapter 17: Managing and Maintaining the Business Intelligence Environment
      1. Using SQL Server Reporting Services
      2. Configuring Memory
      3. Working with SQL Server Analysis Services
      4. Using SharePoint to Improve Performance
      5. Summary
    23. Chapter 18: Scaling the Business Intelligence Environment
      1. Why Would You Scale the Business Intelligence Environment?
      2. How Do You Scale Each Tool?
      3. Summary
    24. End User License Agreement

    Product information

    • Title: Applied Microsoft Business Intelligence
    • Author(s): Patrick LeBlanc, Jessica M. Moss, Dejan Sarka, Dustin Ryan
    • Release date: May 2015
    • Publisher(s): Wiley
    • ISBN: 9781118961773