Posts Tagged ‘center of excellence’

The discovering of relationships within data (between fields) is an important part of any data mining project (in the Crisp-DM methodology, this is described as part of the “Data Understanding” stage). This “relationship discovery” is part of developing a predictive model but is also helpful in answering specific business questions -perhaps even what originally motivated […]

SPSS CLEM is the control Language for Expression Manipulation, which is used to build expressions within SPSS Modeler streams. CLEM is actually used in a number of SPSS “nodes” (among these are the Select and Derive nodes) and you can check the product documentation to see the extended list. CLEM expressions are constructed from: Values, […]

Another interesting feature of SPSS Modeler is its built-in ability to sample data. It is pretty typical to have (in one or more files) hundreds of thousands of records to process, and using complete sets of data during testing can take a huge amount of your time and is inefficient in terms of computer processing […]

Consider the scenario where you have to convert information held in a “categorical field” into a “collection of flag fields” – found in a transactional source. For example, suppose you have a file of transactions that includes (among other fields) a customer identifier (“who”) and a product identifier (“what”).  This file of transactional data indicates […]

Transactional datasets (especially those originating from databases) may contain duplicate records that must be removed before any modeling can begin.  There are simply two situations where duplicate records occur are: Datasets ARE erroneous (causing the same record to multiple times) Datasets ARE NOT erroneous (but records appear multiple times because information is collected different moments […]

In TM1, you may be used to “integer or string”, in SPSS Modeler, data gets much more interesting. In fact, you will need to be familiar with a concept known as “Field Measurement Level” and the practice of “Data Instantiation”. In TM1, data is transformed by aggregation, multiplication or division, concatenation or translation, and so […]

If you have a TM1 background it is a quick step to using SPSS Modeler -if you look for similarities in how the tools handle certain tasks like, for example, importing data. With TM1, source data is transformed and loaded into cube structures for consolidation, modeling and reporting using its ETL tool TurboIntegrator. In SPSS […]

If you’ve ever attempted to perform a performance test on a TM1 application, you know that there is not really an effective way to manually create sufficient load on a model. Getting “real users” to execute application operations – over and over again – is nearly impossible. Thankfully, an automated testing product can solve for […]

TM1 TurboIntegrator is the programming or scripting tool that allows you to automate data importation, metadata management, and many other tasks. Scripts built with TurboIntegrator or “TI”, can be saved, edited and, through the use of chores, be set up to run at regular intervals.  TI scripts can be used to process existing TM1 data […]

General Coordination From a general testing perspective, consider the following: Identify and visit the test site before the planned testing days Establish an “onsite” coordinator – usually someone associated with the facility (hotel or facilities manager, perhaps) who will be responsible for any facility provided accommodations Inspect and Validate any and all facility provided accommodations […]

Overview The purpose of this post is to provide a strategy for approaching and resolving a “concern” that has been identified within a application. Overall, the idea is to “add structure” to the process of responding to defects (remediation) in your application. Steps to Remediation Using a resolution methodology referred to as CERT, the steps […]

Typically, a TM1 project will include work to create reports. Most finance groups will have a number of Excel workbooks that they are using for both their forecasting and planning as well as for reporting. These workbooks will become the “templates” for designing your TM1 input sheets and reports. For the reports, you will be […]