Great Free Data Sets For your Bi Testing

One of the biggest problems I have had in my BI career is creating real world data sets to either test or play with the BI applications I work with. Thanks to the team at PowerPivot Info, they have put together a blog post that details a number of freely available data sets that you can download and play with.
I used the 'Federal Aviation Administration' data set which includes over 10 years of flights by airport and on time status. Amazing set of data.
The original blog article with all the data sets is linked below.

http://powerpivot-info.com/post/50-list-suggested-datasets-to-test-powerpivot

Happy mining ;)
Steve

Great Free Data Sets For your Bi Testing

One of the biggest problems I have had in my BI career is creating real world data sets to either test or play with the BI applications I work with. Thanks to the team at PowerPivot Info, they have put together a blog post that details a number of freely available data sets that you can download and play with.

I used the 'Federal Aviation Administration' data set which includes over 10 years of flights by airport and on time status. Amazing set of data.

The original blog article with all the data sets is linked below.

http://powerpivot-info.com/post/50-list-suggested-datasets-to-test-powerpivot

Happy mining ;)

Steve

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Updated Whitepaper Kerberos and Microsoft BI

The Microsoft Business Intelligence stack contains many programs and layers that need to integrate and communicate seamlessly. With the best practice security, you need to secure data at the database end of the communication chain. This requires the user ID to be passed from the SharePoint front end, to the data in the back end. The reference document provides an excellent path to getting this set up.

The article, 'Configuring Kerberos authentication for SharePoint 2010 Products', is available here; http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff829837.aspx

I really liked the white paper as it provides various scenarios to chose from rather than trying to be a one size fits all solution. The document provides information that reviews will review the concepts of identity in Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Products, how Kerberos authentication plays a foundation in authentication and delegation scenarios, and the situations where Kerberos authentication should be used or may be required in solution designs. Scenarios include business intelligence implementations which secure access to external data sources such as SQL Server.

The document also shows how to configure Kerberos authentication end-to-end within your environment, including scenarios that use various service applications in Microsoft SharePoint Server. Additional tools and resources are described to help you test and validate Kerberos configuration.

The"Step-by-Step Configuration" sections of this document cover the following scenarios for SharePoint Server 2010.

Scenario 1: Core Configuration
Scenario 2: Kerberos Authentication for SQL OLTP
Scenario 3: Identity Delegation for SQL Analysis Services
Scenario 4: Identity Delegation for SQL Reporting Services
Scenario 5: Identity Delegation for Excel Services
Scenario 6: Identity Delegation for PowerPivot for SharePoint
Scenario 7: Identity Delegation for Visio Services
Scenario 8: Identity Delegation for PerformancePoint Services
Scenario 9: Identity Delegation for Business Connectivity Services

Download the white paper

Configuring Kerberos Authentication for Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Products and Technologies (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=196600) (7.3 MB)

Thanks,
Steve Young

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Own Your Future: Update Your Skills with Resources and Career Ideas from Microsoft

For any people out there who know of students who will be entering the workforce soon, or really just people who may want some hints in the job hunt; Microsoft have released a free e-book that may help.

The link page is available here; http://www.microsoft.com/learning/student-career/en/us/career-e-book.aspx 

The book is filled with tips on training, certifications, career opportunities, and how to market yourself.  Tips for anyone interested in a career or job change in IT or generally tech.

Steve