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First Steps with PostgreSQL
Most of my career I have spent in big organisations developing and maintaining enterprise-wide solutions. Therefore, so far I’ve mostly worked with MS SQL Server and only touched OracleDB a bit. But for a new, smaller project, I've uses PostgreSQL for the first time...
3 reasons why I like Python
3 reasons why I enjoy coding with Python, and what I use it for (beginner) I can’t be called a code monkey when compared to my colleagues, but recently I’ve found Python to be really helpful with some of my work tasks, so I signed up for a Udemy course to learn...
MongoDB University
It is always a challenge to learn how to use new software products. Of course, all of them have documentation and how-to guides to explain the basics. However, many people would rather watch videos or find a teacher as this is the best way for our brains to consume...
Where to find some open data
The OptimalBI team loves open source and is also mad about data. Alison wrote a blog on Open source datasets already, and because there's more options out there, I thought I would give you some more places to get open data from for your various data needs. I have...
New Zealand Traffic Data
When you ventured out to the supermarket during lockdown, I bet you noticed waaaay less traffic on the roads. I live in the Wellington CBD, and it was really weird walking around with no people, no traffic for weeks. It got me wondering about the data; Thankfully...
Learning Azure with Pluralsight
Cloud solutions have little to do with the solutions we have on-premises. Cloud solutions are built with ambitious and monstrously huge goals in mind, so, often it feels like no previous technology has been reused. In addition to some understandable concepts, like...
How to Model a Reporting Layer
On my first BI job, where I was an ETL developer, my team was using Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Service (SSRS) as a reporting tool. My job was to model the Data Marts and create the data flows into those tables. Our report analysts were good at SQL, I have even...
ETL is Easy Again in Azure Data Factory
Almost two years ago I was a part of the BI team in an organization that decided to move to the Cloud. As a first step they followed the lift and shift approach, so they moved their Data Warehouse and all the existing processes into the Azure environment almost...
SAS Functions Book
Over the years, we've been building up our comic-style SAS function one-page guides, drip-feeding them to you. Well, guess what?! We put them all together and made a book so they're all in the one place, to make referencing them easier for you. Thank you...
Zen and the art of database model maintenance
So there you are having created a work of beauty in Sparx Enterprise Architect that models all of your databases, and then the fly lands in the ointment. There's a new version of "stuff" coming down the pipeline and you need to update the model or things are...
Checking the File Path from Database in PowerShell
On one of my recent projects I was analysing my customer's data for migration. Their legacy application could handle documents. They were stored on the organisation's shared folder, and the file path was recorded in the database with the rest of data. As a part of the...
The best lockdown baking recipes
The nation has been hit by a baking craze! Lockdown gave some of us more time to do some of the simple things in life, like baking, and, if you were lucky enough to get flour and yeast you could create some delicious treats! I've always enjoyed baking, so loved...
Snowflake and Qlik: End-to-End BI Solution
Recently I watched a webinar organised by Snowflake, it was called "Data Warehouse Automation, Ingestion and Industry Leading Analytics with Snowflake and Qlik". In the past I could never find time for webinars, and it's amazing how life can give you opportunities to...
Being social while social distancing
The world has been social distancing for some time now, and will be for a bit longer, depending where you live. To help put off or at least mitigate going stir crazy I thought I would share what I have been doing to keep up some sort of social life. Before the lock...
Our How To blogs
We do cool sh!t with data and over the years we have shared a lot of blogs to help you do cool sh!t with data too. If you want to jump right in and see if we have something that piques your interest here are all our how to blogs. If you...
Free ETL tools in 2020
Traditionally business intelligence is an enterprise solution, as only big businesses have multiple sources that require integration and analysis. It is assumed that the rest are small fishes that could be able to analyse their data with simpler accessible tools or...
SAS Utilities: cleanwork
When a user starts and runs code in a SAS session, a number of temporary folders and files are created in the SASWork and SASUtil locations. If that session completed and exits normally these folders and files are removed, however some SAS sessions exit abnormally,...
1080 By The Numbers
If you have lived in New Zealand for long enough, I am sure you would have heard of the poison 1080, used by the Department of Conservation (DOC) as a form of pest control. 1080 can be used in bait stations or by airdrop, which is used for many of the remote and hard...