Business Intelligence, Expectations, and Data Fog
February 10, 2021
Business intelligence and government intelligence software promises real time data intake, analysis and sense making, and outputs with a mouse click. Have you heard the phrase, “I have the Brooklyn Bridge for sale”? Sure, sure, I know I don’t want to own the Brooklyn Bridge, but that super spiffy intelligence software (what I call intelware), count me in.
The marketing pitch for business intelligence and general intelligence software has not changed significantly over the years. In my experience, a couple of nifty outputs like a relationship diagram and a series of buttons set up to spit out “actionable intelligence” often close the deal. The users of the software usually discover three points not making up a large part of the demos, the discussions, and the final contract for the customer’s requirements.
I read “The Age Of Continuous Business Intelligence.” The idea is appealing. Lots of information and no time to read, review, digest, analyze, and discuss the available information. In my opinion, the attitude now is “I don’t have time.”
Yep, time.
The write up asserts:
we [an outfit called KX] know that shortening the time it takes to ingest, store, process, and analyze historic and real-time data is a game changer for businesses in all sectors. Our customers in finance, manufacturing, automotive, telecommunications and utilities tell us that when processes and systems are continuously fed by real-time data that is enriched by the context of historic data, they can automate critical business decisions resulting in significant operational and commercial benefits.
The write up contains a diagram which lays bare “continuous business intelligence.”
The write up concludes:
As the research clearly shows, real-time data analytics is a critical area of investment for many firms. To ensure maximum value is derived from these investments, it is imperative that organizations – regardless of size and sector – challenge their understanding of what real-time means. By implementing a strategy of continuous business intelligence, firms can dramatically reduce the time it takes to uncover and act on insights that can materially change the game in terms of growth, efficiency and profitability.
I love that “research clearly shows.” The challenges for the continuous thing include:
- Defining real time. (According to research my team did for a project years ago, there are numerous definitions of real time, and there is a Grand Canyon sized gap among these.)
- Making clear the computational short cuts necessary to process “fire hoses”. (Yep, these compromises have a significant impact on costs, validity of system outputs, and the mechanisms for issuing meaningful outputs from sense making.)
- Managing the costs. (Normalizing, verifying, processing, storing, and moving data require human and machine resources. Right, those things.)
Net net: Software whether for business or government applications in intelligence work only if the focus is narrow and the expectations of a wild and crazy MBA are kept within a reality corral. Otherwise, business intelligence will shoot blanks, not silver bullets.
Oh, KX is hooked up with a mid tier consulting firm. What’s that mean? A sudden fog has rolled in, and it is an expensive fog.
Stephen E Arnold, February 10, 2021
An Existential Question: What Do Business Intelligence Tools Do?
February 10, 2021
Business intelligence tools are integral for enterprise systems to achieve their optimum performance, but without technology expertise it is difficult to understand their importance. Towards Data Science explains how BI tools can help a business in the article, “What BI Tools Can Do—The Six Different BI Artifacts You Should Know.”
According to the article, the six BI artifacts are spreadsheets, OLAP cube, visuals (reports and dashboards), stories, graphs, and direct access. Most BI tools do not feature all six BI tools and neither do companies. This does not allow end users to work at their best. There are work arounds and smart end users know how to utilize them.
Each artifact has its weaknesses and the only way to solve them is work around them like when there is a lack of tools:
“We basically have to do the same thing we do in the rest of our software architecture. We can build modular things, architectures where we can quickly exchange the EL in our EL (T). Where we can quickly exchange our storage, our reporting tool for a notebook based architecture. We can build evolutionary architectures, where we are perfectly clear on our fitting function, the quality of our answers to current problems. Where we know we will take small iterative steps towards providing better answers.”
It helps to be versed in all tools to improve BI structure, but it is even better to have access to the entire toolbox. Developers and workers are only as good as their tools.
Whitney Grace, February 10, 2021
A Business Case for Search in the Time of Covid and the SolarWinds Misstep
February 8, 2021
Why does one working in an organization have to make a case for enterprise search? Oh, right, I forgot. Enterprise search has a rich history: Fast Search & Transfer with jail time for the founder, Autonomy with a sentencing date looming for the founder, Entopia with financial pain for its investors, and, well, the list of issues with enterprise search can be extended with references to IBM OmniSphere or STAIRS III, Delphes, Siderean, Arikus, Attensity, Brainware, Eegi, Relegence, Hakia, and the memorable Zaizi, among others.
“Making the Business Case for Enterprise Search” is sponsored. That means it is an advertisement, marketing collateral, and hoo hah. But what is its message. I noted this passage:
Knowledge-centric organizations know that tools such as intelligent search are critical for cutting through the noise and making relevant information discoverable. However, many executives don’t prioritize these types of tools.
Yep, and there is a reason. Consider that Elasticsearch is open source. Amazon offers search and is educating the enthusiastic for free. Put these successes against the backdrop of Google’s high profile failure: The GSA or Google Search Appliance, a fine product according to some Google engineers.
Regardless of today, large organizations typically have multiple information retrieval systems. The idea of federating the information is a really good one until the bean counters realize that the staff, professional for fee services, and the time required to figure out access controls, file formats, and how to cope with versions, rich media, trade secrets in engineering drawings and chemical formulas, and index latency cost more money than anyone revealed in a marketing pitch.
The write up notes:
In a recent survey, nearly half of all respondents said it was challenging finding the right information when they needed it.
One question: What’s right? The problem with enterprise search is that it is a fake discipline trying to gain traction in a world of business intelligence, analytics, and real time data capture, analysis, and outputs.
I laughed at the reminder “Don’t neglect security.” This is the era of the SolarWinds’ misstep. Security is underfunded in most organizations. Do responsible Boards of Directors and senior executives need to be reminded that their security systems is now Job Number One.
Enterprise search? Yeah, a hot enterprise solution. Just a solution which has become a utility and a free one via open source software at that.
Stephen E Arnold, February 8, 2021
Microsoft: Maybe Quantum Computing Can Help Out Defender?
February 1, 2021
The February 9, DarkCyber video news program contains a short item about Microsoft’s January 20, 2021, explanation of the SolarWinds’ misstep. Spoiler: Hey, Microsoft was not responsible. If you are interested in the MSFT explanation with some remarkable self promotion for its security prowess, navigate to this link. But to the matter at hand. Microsoft security will no doubt benefit from its latest technical innovation. “Microsoft Claims Breakthrough in Quantum Computing” reports:
This [MSFT and University of Sydney] team has developed a cryogenic quantum control platform that uses specialized CMOS circuits to take digital inputs and generate many parallel qubit control signals. The chip that powers this control platform is called Gooseberry.
Does this beg the inclusion of the Intel Horse Feathers — no, strike that — Intel Horse Ridge technology?
The write up continues:
There’s no doubt that both Gooseberry and the cryo-compute core represent big steps forward for quantum computing, and having these concepts peer-reviewed and validated by other scientists is another leap ahead.
I hope the technology innovators surge ahead to apply the “breakthrough” to the Redmond giant’s security for Azure and Windows 10, which of course were not the SolarWinds’ problem. The gilded lily language “supply chain” was maybe, a little, sort of tangentially involved.
Supply chain? Gooseberries and horse feathers perhaps?
Stephen E Arnold, February
Humble Brag or Majestic Wisdom: The Waymo Method of Dealing with Pesky Tesla
January 27, 2021
John Krafcik (a Googler) is the head of Waymo. That’s a name which means one get “way more” than from any other outfit. Get it? Cool?
“Waymo CEO Dismisses Tesla Self Driving Plan: This Is Not How It Works” contains some interesting and allegedly true factoids. I found this passage thought provoking:
Waymo CEO John Krafcik dismissed Tesla as a Waymo competitor and argued that Tesla’s current strategy was unlikely to ever produce a fully self-driving system. “For us, Tesla is not a competitor at all,” Krafcik said. “We manufacture a completely autonomous driving system. Tesla is an automaker that is developing a really good driver assistance system.”
Furthermore, the Google Waymo entity “rejected Tesla’ strategy years ago.” The GOOG approach? This is a characterization:
They [the Waymo experts who deliver way more] focused on building a self-driving taxi service that would never have customers in the driver’s seat…
Both approaches are interesting, but perhaps a more pragmatic approach would be to design roads that reduce the need to create really smart software. Leave a special road, and the humanoid takes over driving chores. One Highway 101, kick back and let Tesla and Waymo deliver way more than some drivers expect.
Way more than stock lift, and Google’s need to declare quantum supremacy and its greatness again an again. But, on the other hand, it’s just a down-home, mom-and-pop operation with a love for advertising and self promotion.
Stephen E Arnold, January 27, 2021
Post SolarWinds: No Kidding! Cyber Threats in 2021
January 21, 2021
KnowBe4 is a cyber security company based in Clearwater, Florida. The company offers a wide range of cyber security services and information. Like other cyber security firms, its systems and analysts did not notice the SolarWinds’ misstep. From my vantage point in rural Kentucky, this could be a miscommunication, a misunderstanding on my part, or another example of the ineffectiveness of US cyber security solutions offered by “experts.”
I spotted an article written by a KnowBe4 professional called “Top IT Security Threats in 2021.” This “content strategy and evangelist” seems to operate from the KnowBe4 office in South Africa.
Yep, there are cyber security threats. The SolarWinds’ misstep and the failure of heavily promoted cyber security and threat intelligence vendors to “notice” the breach remains fresh in my mind. FireEye is thinking about the misstep as well. That company released a free cyber tool to help entities figure out if their systems are compromised. (Quick comprehension test #1: What if the tool does not locate a breach? Is the system actually secure? Take the time needed to answer this question. Hint: Think about false positives for Covid tests?)
What are the threats in 2021? KnowBe4’s “content strategy and evangelist points out:
- Phishing
- Ransomware
- Remote working
- Passwords
- Disinformation.
Comprehensive, but isn’t something missing? (Quick comprehension test #2: What’s missing?)
The SolarWinds’ misstep?
If KnowBe4-type solutions worked, wouldn’t SolarWinds be off the security radar?
I like companies which have crystal ball capabilities; that is, the outfits know before? Marketing is more important than performance maybe?
Stephen E Arnold, January 21, 2021
Digital Content: Confused Yet? I Am
January 19, 2021
I read “CMS Vs. DMS: Understanding the Key Differences.” The write up did not unlock my understanding. From my vantage point, there is a trade association called ARMA. You can get information about this organization from its Web site. As I recall, there are individuals who receive certification to deal with certain types of “records”; for example, nuclear power plant information. Other groups get involved with the nuclear industry, and there are hoops through which one can jump to figure out how to keep track of engineering change orders, the entities touching specialized components, and figure out who has been trained on what.
I am not exactly sure how other entities got involved in some of these often complicated tracking and managing functions. An organization called the Association for Intelligent Information Management used to be called something else. Maybe “imaging” when that seemed to be a great way to get members and run conferences.
What’s this abbreviated history have to do with the CMS versus DMS thing?
Yep, that’s a very good question. For the life of me, it seems as if document management evolved from the records management effort. But the document management experts quickly figured out that lawyers and pharmaceutical companies had to keep track of their information and had some specialized needs which ARMA either couldn’t or didn’t want to upset its apple cart.
Then the Web happened and the content produced for Web pages was even crazier and more disorganized, volatile, and multi-media enhanced than anything the vendors of software and services for nuclear, pharma, and legal eagle sectors possessed.
Enter content management systems. Wow. These were often tricky beasts, whether it was the wonderful Broadvision or the more Volkswagenish Ektron, a new business was born. The customers for CMS were not nuclear types or the chemical structure folks inventing drugs to help people at very reasonable cost absolutely everywhere.
Now let’s get the straight scoop from the CMS versus the DMS write up. Ready? Here we go:
The differences between document and content management systems are nuanced and depend on the scale to which you are using them…
I interpret this to mean that there is no difference. Your mileage may vary.
And how about this:
Where a DMS excels is at the preservation and organization of company documents (records), a CMS is often focused at content presented at websites, which is not specifically locked in individual documents, according to Elmendorp [another expert]
But what about systems focused on company records. Maybe the type of records the ARMA professionals are trained to manipulate, archive, and retrieve?
But do these systems work? Ho, ho, ho.
But here’s the key to the “key” in the title:
Where BPM, EFSS and CCM Fit In
What? What are these acronyms? But even more stunning is the inclusion of “multi-repository search tools known as Enterprise Search.”
Whoa, Nellie! Enterprise search is a solution to the management of content within an organization. News flash! Enterprise search is a utility often embedded in crazy software wrappers to allow someone to have a shot at locating the information needed to answer a business question or an eDiscovery mandate. Chemical structures, linked engineering change orders? Ho, ho, ho.
Who can figure out the differences, whether “key” or not?
Gartner. A diffused group of experts who have to sell information about the vendors to the potential licensees of these systems.
Confusion is the fertilizer for growing consulting revenues. What’s the “key”? Hire consultants. There you go. Insight.
Stephen E Arnold, January 19, 2021
2021: Virtual Conferences and Even Virtual Products
January 19, 2021
I want to keep this note short. Navigate to “The Best Tech of CES 2021 Isn’t Real.” The write up states:
the “beauty” of shows like CES is the ability write about our hands-on experiences with products. But since we couldn’t roam the halls of CES in person this year, it was the perfect time for brands to announce gadgets that weren’t ready for store shelves.
The source did not mention that fabulous fakes were the grace note for that memorable year 2020; for example:
- Fake news
- Fake queen of England outputs, and
- Fake cyber security with a lot of sunshine going you know where.
CES: Virtual conference, virtual products, and fake products. Yeah!
Stephen E Arnold, January 19, 2021
Google: Big Is Good. Huge Is Better.
January 15, 2021
I spotted an interesting datum factoid. The title of the article gives away the “reveal” as thumbtypers are prone to say. “Google Trained a Trillion-Parameter AI Language Model” does not reference the controversial “draft research paper” by a former Google smart software person named Timnit Gebru. The point at issue is that smart software can be trained using available content. Bingo, the smart software reflects the biases in the source content.
Pumping up numbers is interesting and begs the question, “Why is Google shifting into used car sales person mode?” The company has never been adept at communicating or marketing in a clear, coherent manner. How many blog posts about Google’s overlapping services have I seen in the last 20 years? The answer is, “A heck of a lot.”
I circled this passage in the write up:
Google researchers developed and benchmarked techniques they claim enabled them to train a language model containing more than a trillion parameters. They say their 1.6-trillion-parameter model, which appears to be the largest of its size to date, achieved an up to 4 times speedup over the previously largest Google-developed language model (T5-XXL).
Got that?
Like supremacy, the trillion parameter AI language model” revolutionizes big.
Google? What’s with the marketing push for the really expensive and money losing DeepMind thing? Big numbers too.
Stephen E Arnold, January 15, 2021
Selling Technology in a Tough Market Roasting in Solar Waves
January 13, 2021
I read a post on Hacker’s News. You may be able to locate it at this link: http://solarleaks.net/. I don’t know if this is a scam or the answer to the question “Where’s the beef?” The message states:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA256 Happy new year! Welcome to solarleaks.net (mirror: 5bpasg2kotxllmzsv6swwydbojnfuvfb7d6363pwe5wrzhjyn2ptvdqd.onion) We are putting data found during our recent adventure for sale. [Microsoft Windows (partial) source code and various Microsoft repositories] price: 600,000 USD data: msft.tgz.enc (2.6G) link: https://mega.nz/file/1ehgSSpD#nrtzQwh-qyCaUHBXo2qQ1dNbWiyVHCvg8J0As8VjrX0
The Solar Leaks’ post then provides information about the cost of the MSFT, Cisco, and FireEye, et al software. Prices begin at $50,000 for some alleged FireEye goodies and soar to $600,000 for the Microsoft crown jewels.
What’s important, however, is the post-SolarWinds’ misstep marketing environment. Sales professionals of products that provide enhanced cyber security, threat alerts, and the assorted jargon enhanced assertions have to close deals.
Just in time is a helpful write up from Entrepreneur Magazine called “8 Psychological Tricks to Increase Conversion Rates for SaaS Startups.” That’s on time and on target.
I am tempted to summarize the ideas with references to Machiavelli, Al Capone, and high school lovers promising to be together forever. But I will not. I will highlight three of the ideas, and you can pony up some cash to read the full entrepreneurial check list yourself.
Suggestion 1:
Offer fewer choices.
Okay, Amazon, Microsoft, and others offering secure cloud environments, are you listening? Fewer choices. The point of offering choices is to create an opportunity to confuse a customer and allow MBAs with spreadsheet fever to cook up pricing options guaranteed to lead to big surprises when the system is up and running. Cross that threshold and beyond the invoice! Outstanding.
Suggestion 2:
Introduce a third product.
You have to read the article to appreciate the wonderfulness of offering a print subscription, a digital subscription, and a com9bo subscription or an option that forces the “brain to focus on the two closest options.” I am confident that this is backed by an MBA-type book called “Thinking Slow and Slower.”
Suggestion 3:
Increase quantities rather than reduce the price.
Ah, yes, buy five packages of cookies and get an extra 20 percent discount. That’s okay, but I don’t have any place to put extra bags of cookies in my one bedroom trailer parked in Sunrise Acres in Bullet County, Kentucky. More, more, more. Yes, bullet proof. No pun intended.
With cyber security delivered via the cloud in the great SaaS approach, the trick to making sales is to shift from professional sales person to a street hustler offering “original” watches as tourists exit the bus from a tour of the Forbidden City.
What about clarity, factual information, and services which work, well, maybe just mostly work.
Good enough.
Stephen E Arnold, January 13, 2021
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