Do you underestimate the complexity of Dates in your BI and analytics projects?
What would happen to you when it is discovered that your report gave the wrong results by moving a few transactions into the wrong month?
Do they shoot the messenger? You bet they do.
In all of IT, there is no other area that seems so simple on the surface but is filled with risks, uncertainty and frustration. What happens if your logic places a transaction in the wrong week, month or quarter? This month goes down, last up. Month to month percent change drops, decisions are made. Money is spent.
Maybe nothing, but sometimes it can be a job-losing mistake.
Are you discounting the complexity? If so read on.
Did you know that daylight saving time is implemented in only about 1/3 of countries? The start and stop dates are different too? Or that it is suspended in some countries during religious periods? Can that one hour difference at the right moment move a transaction into another week or month? What about creating a global report... isn't the question of when also a "where" question. User: "What happened on Tuesday" ...You: "Where"?
Let's face it, almost all BI and analysis involves dates and times. You need to be good at using them for a successful career in BI and Analytics but how much background do you actually have? Have you ever seen a book, or even a chapter in a book on the proper approaches and techniques for working with dates and times? I haven't.
In our globally connected world, Dates and times become much more confusing.
Most developers learn in the school of hard knocks. This way can be quite expensive in reputation, status, trustworthiness and career.
Very little attention is paid in traditional instruction and books to dates and times beyond the syntax of the functions. But applying them is where you actually create value and earn your keep. Right?
Having a sound understanding and techniques for dealing with the practical use of dates and times will add value to your career today and for the future.
By mastering date and time calculations you will:
- Minimize aggregation errors and risks.
- Minimize the risks of regulatory infractions.
- Better Communicate the uncertainty related to dates and times to your user community and eliminate the risk to you.
- Develop fully informed requirements.
- Transfer some of the responsibility for inaccuracies to your users.
- Look more professional to your peers and managers
In this book, you will find coverage of the various problems of dates and times, especially the challenges that arise in Business Intelligence and larger unit of time like weeks, months, quarters etc. You will understand the realities of dealing with time zones and Daylight Saving Time globally.You will come to understand that you are typically NOT comparing apples to apples.
Next comes a cookbook of 30 date and time formulas ... things like year to date, current quarter, 2 Wednesdays ago, last year, N business days ago, last fiscal quarter and many more.
You will also find a coverage of big picture and little picture approaches to date and time problems. You will find a solid list of awareness-raising questions to ask your users.
Finally, you will find an appendix covering popular BI and Analytic tool specific critical date functions for your reference. Oracle, SQL Server, Teradata, DB2, Cognos, Business Objects, Crystal Reports, and Excel are all listed.
Get this Ebook today and begin to master dates and times before they master you. This book is a keeper and will come to your aid for a long time.
