CNTC Group

(This was originally posted to the NTEN Data Warehousing group list, by Nate Wilbert. Nate has kindly allowed us to publish his work here.)

I've actually been working with a particular set of tools in the Business Intelligence / Data Warehousing space the past 7 or 8 months. I've worked in the past with many different BI reporting tools like MicroStrategy (a ROLAP tool), Oracle's Hyperion Interactive Reporting and Oracle's BI Enterprise Edition (the old Siebel Analytics ROLAP tool). I've also briefly worked with others like Business Objects and Oracle Discoverer.

CNTC organizers met with Ben Taylor and Brenda McCoy-Manfredo of CRC/NPower, to discuss shared goals and ways to help one another. This is a summary of our notes from that meeting...

CRC/NPower Goals

* Provide consulting, training, support and managed services for NPOs in Colorado
* Host annual Rural Philanthropy days, to connect orgs and resources in rural areas
* Refer most technical training to T4T, help with some high-level training there (e.g., tech planning)
* Step up marketing effort in 2009

CNTC Goals

CNTC organizers met with Teaming for Technology on February 4th, to explore overlapping goals and ways we might support one another. This is a summary of the points from the meeting.

There's a great deal of overlap in the aims of T4T and CNTC. Both seek to promote wise use of technology by nonprofits in Colorado. Both groups can easily support each others' efforts via regular communication, sharing of training space and resources, and expanding training topics and staff...
CNTC Goals

* Support use and understanding of technology, by Colorado Nonprofits

(This was originally posted to the NTEN Data Warehousing group list, by Nate Wilbert. Nate has kindly allowed us to publish his work here.)

In the first two posts I've discussed how data warehousing is similar to a large puzzle with many pieces, and how that puzzle is different from typical database "puzzles" created within an organization.

I think that perhaps I should back up and provide some reasons for even thinking about a data warehouse.

1. One version of the truth

(This was originally posted to the NTEN Data Warehousing group list, by Nate Wilbert. Nate has kindly allowed us to publish his work here.)

(This was originally posted to the NTEN Data Warehousing group list, by Nate Wilbert. Nate has kindly allowed us to publish his work here.)

I'm not really sure how many in this group have worked with data warehouses so I'm going to start this first post off with an analogy. In the group description you heard me liken data warehousing to putting a jigsaw puzzle together. Let's work that out just a bit.

The following is a summary of survey responses from the initial CNTC interest group (June 2008)...

Interested Folks
~25% independent consultants
~25% technology company employees
~25% employees of nonprofits providing services to other nonprofits
~25% employees of nonprofits

Technical Savvy
~75% high
~20% average
~5% low

Preferred Meeting Frequency
~60% monthly
~30% bi-monthly
~10% quarterly

Preferred Meeting Location
~75% Denver
~20% Between Denver and Boulder, or alternating
~5% Boulder

Hoping to Get from the Group (Common)
- Best practices and tools