BizTalk Training - This week

This week, am undergoing BizTalk Server 2006 training, let's see what i gain from there and will post all the data that i learn there.
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If you have something to share in person on this post, pl drop me a mail at dskcheck@gmail.com with the title in the subject.

XML - A Decade

Do you believe that XML took 10 years to penetrate into the industry and become a backbone for the datatransfer mechanism?

IBM published a white paper on this with the title as "Celebrating 10Yrs of XML", an interesting article.

Worth reading, suggested to read and have a copy in your personal library.

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If you have something to share in person on this post, pl drop me a mail at dskcheck@gmail.com with the title in the subject.

Notes on 3rd Day Training

Christopher Richard - Is the faculty for this training

MDX - Multi Dimension eXpression

MDX is a Key to all advanced functionality in Analysis Server

JimRoy Number -- ?

Books To Read to get to know more in detail about OLAPDM -

1) Datawarehouse Toolkit, A complete guide for DM - Ralf Kimble,
Willy Pubs

2) MDX - MDX Solutions for SQL2005 and HyperonSpace - George Spafford,
Willy pubs

Difinitions in OLAP

Slice - Members of one dimension
Dice - Members of more than one dimension display

A Cube can have upto 128 DimensionsMDX can have upto 64 Axes

While fetching the Level name can't preccede the member name

MDX Query
Example
1) select {[Measures].[Order Quantity], [Measures].[Sales Revenue]} on
columns, {[product].[categories].[bikes]} on rows from [quick start
sales view]

Result:
OrderQuantity Sales Revenue
Bikes 90268 94651172.7047148

2) select {[Measures].[Order Quantity], [Measures].[Sales Revenue]} on
columns,
{([product].[categories].[bikes]),([product].[categories].[clothing])}
on rows from [quick start sales view]

Result:
OrderQuantity Sales Revenue
Bikes 90268 94651172.7047148
Clothing 73670 2120542.524801

Note: When you are using more than one member one has to use "()" to
put each member and seperate them by ","

3) select {[Measures].[Order Quantity], [Measures].[Sales Revenue]} on
columns, {[product].[categories].[product category].members} on rows
from [quick start sales view]

Result:
OrderQuantity Sales Revenue
Bikes 90268 94651172.7047148
Components 4904 11802593.2864
Clothing 73670 2120542.524801
Accessories 8654 21586524.484
Unknonw null null

4) select {[Measures].[Order Quantity], [Measures].[Sales Revenue]} on
columns, {[product].[categories].[product category].members} on rows
from [quick start sales view] where [time
dimension].[calendar].[calendar 2001]

Result:
OrderQuantity Sales Revenue
Bikes 20268 4651172.7047148
Components 1904 1802593.2864
Clothing 11670 120542.524801
Accessories 4654 1586524.484
Unknonw null null

Note: this data is for a single calendar year by using the WHERE Clause

KPI - KeyPerformanceIndicator - Why they are at backend, they are
supposed to be at frontface as they are similar to Dashboard.

Note: These exists from quite a long time in the industry, but are new
from Microsoft's pespective and for the first time they have included
them in their product

MicroSoft Dashboard Manager or KPI Manager

Scorecard - is the information that is WRT other information
DrillThrough - Is another feature that every OLAP tool should support.

MLOP - Is the +vesFastest storage ModeRetrival is Fast-ve is Latency

RLOP - will only create the Cube and the data is still there in RDBMS

HOLAP - Details data is still there in RDBMS, where as Aggrigates are
stored at Dimensional Model, inotherwords, in Cubes

Problem:
Your client has a cube that is set to process for every 2 hrs
Solution:
?????


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If you have something to share in person on this post, pl drop me a mail at dskcheck@gmail.com with the title in the subject.

Training Notes on 2nd Day of SQL Analysis Sever

Realtime Warehouse - Do we really have such thing ?You can't analyse the data when it is not consistent for some time

Find the difference between - ER Model Vs Dimensional Model

Dimensional Model rules
1) Almost Dimensions Tables are mostly refered 1 to many to Fact Table
2) Summerizable numerical values are Measures
3) Dimension is an indipendent entity of a specific concept. For example Jan, Feb, Mar, etc are Time dimension and India, USA, Russia, etc are location dimension blah blah
4) Every thing that you see in world are grouped
5) From one Dimension one or more hierarchy is created
6) Think for only ANALYSIS, but not for information that is hidden and unwanted. The prime target of this tool is only to understand the progress and analyse the business but not for getting the details of the transacion
7) Remember that, how better you can give the user the Drill down capability

Customers - Dimension

ID CustName City State Country MaritalStatus Gender Tel eMail

How many hirarchies you can create out of the above individual labels?

H1) GenderwiseMaritalstatusTelnumber - Wrong Hierarchy
H2) H1+eMail - Wrong Hierarchy
H3) StateWiseGenderMaritalStatus

Note: Hierarchies are created only the grouping possible labels, where as Tel and eMail can't be grouped, using them in hierarchy is a bad design

Types of Hierachies
1) Balanced - All leafs will have equal number of Members / LevelsRule 1 - All leave memebers should be at the same levelRule 2 - The parent member don't have the values, they are procured from the childs

2) UnBalanced - Not necessarily you will have the equal number of levels or members

3) Ragged - Ragged are more similar like Balanced but just missing some parents
Never Make the OLTP Primary keys same PKs of Application System
Dimension tables are almost smallFact Tables are generally huuuuuuuuuuuuge

Schemas
1) Snow-Flake - Bad Design
2) Star

Thing to remember: If report is taking long time to conceptualise, it is inotherwords conveying that the database design is bad. So, if the report is taking less time to conceptualise on the DB what you have, is a good design as, visualised the report while designing
"Change the granularity is beyond the scope"

Dimension are not required to create repeatedlyRole Playing Dimension - Similar to the Table Alias

Measures are of 3 types
1) Additives
2) Semi Additive
3) Non Additive

Slowly Changing Dimension

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If you have something to share in person on this post, pl drop me a mail at dskcheck@gmail.com with the title in the subject.

Interesting Tips from AcitveWin

ActiveWin is a forum that is similar other forums by microsoft towards the knowledge share. They have a section called Tips under the name of TechTips, with general and regular tips contributed by users from across the globe. Though it is lastly updated on 24th June 2004, has some useful tips.

Try some from there.

Understanding Security - MSDN

With the mentioned title, you have a special section for Security at MSDN. This section has many details explaind in simple. You have Webcasts, Trainings and Events listed there.

Did you see that?

Windows Vista Team Blog for public

Windows Vista Team from Microsoft had initiated a blog and opened for external people to post their views and reviews. It is an initiative of first kind from Microsoft opening such a public forum even before the actual product comes into market.

This forum started way back duing Apr 2006. Many of the Vista Team members are contributing their knowledge in terms of articles / news about the new releases / examples / blah.. blah..

Did you read any article from www.windowsvistablog.com ?

CLR Inside out - MSDN Magazine

Nov 2006 issue from MSDN Magazine has an interesting article about CLR. I've read for about thrice, still wanted to read for one more time. I read this article not just i don't understand, but every time i read the article it teaches me some new thing.

And it leaves me with such a strange feeling that i know less in .net. It talks about many-a-things like GC Performance, Diff counters that can be given attention while dealing with CLR, blah.. blah..

Did you read this article?

MSN Messanger 8.1 - Ready

MSN Messanger v8.1 is ready to download. Did you try this?

And some of the cool features of this messanger as a startup for a new revolution, 2 VOIP calls free, in other words, PC-to-phone calling with 2 free calls to virtually any phone in the world.

For the first time, i could see our project name and company's name at the Microsoft website. Read the last lines as mentioned bellow

*With XXXXXXX Web Calling, you can make two free three-minute phone calls to virtually any landline or cell phone worldwide. Offer applies to new Verizon Web Calling customers only.

AppVerifier - Tool for Unmanaged code

AppVerifier is simply explained at this tutorial. And i suggest every .NET developer should read this, as this gives you an extra notch to understand how the code is managed and the developer should be aware of ..

This article also explains in step-by-step with images for each step.

What do you say?

Must read articles

1) Michael Sutton, recently posted an article titled, "Top 10 signs you have an insecure Web App". Great study, i thought of posting some thing similar such from long sime time.

2) Cross-Site Scripting: Attacker's New favorite flaw

Vista Reviews

DarkReading, is popular for critising. Y'day, they have published an article, "Microsoft beckons early adopters", talking about Vista. Interesting topic to read the views of an end user of a product from Microsoft.

This article is really impartial and talks about more indetails from the purspective of a realy USER.

What your comments on this?

Coding4Fun Blog

This blog from Microsoft, is really cool and has many interesting projects coded and explained in simple words.

There are projects like Screen Savers, Photo Booths, Disco Floor, Skype Home, X10, CD Tray, blah.. blah.. wow..

Out of all my pick of the day is X10. Read about this with out fail.

What do you say ?

Security in ASP.NET

While going through MSDN articles, came across an article about the mentioned subject. This article is really cool and explains from the basics of the Security to high level.

I've never come across of such detailed, fully explained version on this topic. I'll try to take a printout of this.

What do you say?

MAX from Microsoft

Max from Microsoft is ready roll out with full features. Y'day they have announced the closing of the survey or feedback from the external world.

The code name Max seems to be more or a tool that has many a features from Riya, RSS Reader, blah.. blah..

Did you try this?