April 17, 2011 at 6:16 pm
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Analytics or Flying Cars
April 18, 2011 at 6:49 am
Data, Metrics, Analytics, Reports, Statistics... etc etc etc.
Personally I love Data, I fear Data, I need Data, I loath Data. Finding the balance of showing, storing and saving the right data is often a challenge way over the head of the person consuming it. Dashboards are far to often detail reports and detail reports often do not show useful information. Good Data take time, however because you can crank out semi-useful data quickly it has become the norm and expected result. Why will it take longer for a good report? Because the creator needs to understand your needs. Often times the data requester doesn't really understand the system well enough to know what they actually are looking for. Once you start a dialogue with them to narrow down their needs they can get frustrated as they don't see it as beneficial. They just want their data.
Data has become like the rest of the 'stuff' in our glutonous american lives. We have to have it and have to keep it.
Of course this rant would not be complete without my own flying car... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulton_Airphibian
April 18, 2011 at 8:03 am
(It's the Eighties, So Where's Our) Rocket Packs
from the album "Vox Humana"
Words and Music by Terry Taylor
©1984 Twitchen Vibes Music (ASCAP)
It's the eighties
It's the eighties so where's our rocket packs
It's the eighties so where's our rocket packs?
Go anywhere, we strap them on our backs
1. (It's the eighties so where's our rocket packs?)
I thought by now I'd walk the moon
And ride a car without no tires
And have a robot run the vacuum
And date a girl made out of wires
No thing's don't change that much, do they?
We are still out of touch, by now we should discover
Just how to love each other, like Klaatu's robot man
Your looks have killed again
2. (It's the eighties so where's our rocket packs?)
I thought by now we'd live in space
And eat a pill instead of dinner
And wear a gas mask on our face a President of female gender
Though progress marches on, (new day)
Our troubles will grow strong
And my expectancies, become my fantasies
You turn my blood to sand, the earth stands still again
My hopes are running low
things moving much too slow
No space men up above
And we're still so very far from love
3. (It's the eighties so where's our rocket packs?)
I thought by now we'd build a dome
Around the world, control the weather
In every house, a picture phone; communicate a little better
But some things never change (replay!)
You are still acting strange
No way that I can see, this way we will be free
La la la la la la,la la la la la 7,6,5,4,3,2,1 Lift off!
(It's the eighties so where's our rocket packs?)
Repeat 1, 2, 3
(It's the eighties)
April 18, 2011 at 8:42 am
Data presentation -- still an art, definitely not a science. The Challenger accident is a significant occurrence where we had the data, but was never presented in a way that would have led our engineers to scrub the launch. Just the sheer weight of data (and lack of quality) can easily lead to wrong decisions.
Yes we have the data, but we are drowning in it. This is definitely a field of interest to all.
Mike Byrd
April 18, 2011 at 8:51 am
Great editorial, Steve. I appreciate your enthusiasm about learning how to cope with the influx of data that's coming our way now and in the future. Rather than worrying about being buried in data, it really is an exciting challenge to learn how to manage it!
April 18, 2011 at 10:40 am
Technically, we have more robots now than ever before, but the Sci-Fi definition doesn't match what we see. A robot is just a machine that carries out a set of tasks. We have those in thermostats, assembly lines, cars, and all sorts of places. True we don't really have robots that move, speak, etc, but I think I'm okay with that. Asimov's robots seem to always have some sort of problem and just look at those Cylons.
As for the data, maybe we can start working on Psychohistory or "Deep Thought" as mentioned in Asimov's universe. Tons of data, just need ways to really analyze it and secure it. I am definitely looking forward to better analysis tools so the regular end-user can truly look at meaningful data without the pain of putting it all together.
April 18, 2011 at 1:13 pm
This glut of data is a double edged sword. It's fascinating and fun to play with and develop for, but what is the end product of it all? Especially all of the social media data? There is an article in Business Week called, "This Tech Bubble Is Different", http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_17/b4225060960537.htm?chan=rss_topStories_ssi_5, which questions the lasting innovation from the social media explosion.
This quote stood out to me most. As Jeff Hammerbacher one of Facebook's first 100 employees with the lofty title of research scientist put it, "The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads. That sucks."
Tim
April 18, 2011 at 1:37 pm
Data presentation -- still an art, definitely not a science. The Challenger accident is a significant occurrence where we had the data, but was never presented in a way that would have led our engineers to scrub the launch. Just the sheer weight of data (and lack of quality) can easily lead to wrong decisions.
Analytics is the use of end user tool to generate canned reports what you get is based on the skill of the person who created the base code. Employers will not pay for the skilled so until there is some standard as in the relational engine, what is Analytics is a joke.
However I don't agree it is an art because it takes me two seconds to see why something is either right or wrong so there is fixed analysis and well defined results.
Kind regards,
Gift Peddie
April 18, 2011 at 2:04 pm
Data Visualization.
Unless you can literally "see" the data in a form - i.e. a visualization - that turns the data into useful information, the data is not of much value to the organization.
Then add to the visualization the ability to interact directly with it, such as drilling down on an interesting section of a pie chart to see the lower-level data beneath it, then jumping across to a different product line to see the same level information for that product line instead of the one that was originally showing. Then when you have that "A-ha!" moment and want to share your new insight with colleagues, annotate the report and send it to others. Or send them questions to stimulate collaborative problem-solving or decision-making.
These are just some examples of the kinds of things which make the data useful. If it isn't useful, you might as well not even have it because it is just costing you money to collect, store it, secure it, etc. The glut of data is indeed a double-edged sword, providing great opportunities for better understanding and decision-making, but also becoming more challenging to manage effectively as the data volumes grow each year.
April 19, 2011 at 1:18 am
Another great article with more food for thought.
I love working with data but find it frustrating at the same time. We collect ever more data, produce more reports (and more quickly) than ever before. However at the same time we only seem to scratch the surface of what we do. End users do not fully know what they need at times or ask for what is not possible at the current time - without investing more resources in a age of austerity. The increase in available data creates its own stress in that we are never following a blueprint for pulling things together and presenting it in a meaningful way.
Despite this frustration it is fun leading the way and pushing the limits of what I can provide and discovering new ways of pulling data together and producing reports more quickly than ever before. I still get a buzz when someone show appreciation for something that I am able to produce, particularly when this is the first time I have met them.
May 2, 2011 at 3:53 pm
Its not well known, but a true flying car has been invented.
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