#8monthstogo

                                                     (Elliott, 2013)

Reflecting back on my Mastery journey timeline I wrote for my third-class Business Intelligence Technologies that “During my Mastery journey this course will teach me the design and creation skills of a data warehouse, which will help me to transform data for my target audience. I look forward to using case analysis and real-work examples while learning how to access, analyze, and distribute organizational information”. I also established three goals that I planned to achieve during this course and a strategy for each goal to help me achieve each goal.

My first goal was to understand the technologies used to create data warehouses, and the strategy I chose to help me achieve this goal was to read Article An Overview of Business Intelligence Technology by Surajit Chaudhuri, Umeshwar Dayal, and Vivek Narasayya, available on EBSCOhost. After reading this article and completing this course I was able to better understand the technologies that are used to create data warehouses. My second goal was to understand what a data warehouse is, and the strategy I chose to help me achieve this goal was to complete this class at Full Sail University. After completing this course, I now have a better understanding of what a data warehouse is.

My third goal was to understand How to access, analyze, and distribute organizational information., and the strategy I chose to help me achieve this goal was to watch the video “Data collection and management data warehouse” on Lynda.com. Watching the video on Lynda.com and after completing this course I feel confident in my understanding of how to access, analyze, and distribute organization information.

Overall, this class has been very beneficial and informative. I learned the following:

Explore what business intelligence entails. 

Understand why effective BI strategies don’t revolve around departmental implementations, but instead are formulated with the entire organization in mind.

Evaluate vendor's overall product attributes and market position

Evaluate in a matrix format the most suitable products and the leading vendors.

Develop a business justification and a business strategy for BI decision-support initiatives

Assess strengths and weaknesses of the OLAP tool

Assess the tool's ability to be deployed quickly, adopted easily, and maintained cost-effectively

Assess the tool's ability to automatically drill from summary and calculated data, which is managed by the OLAP server, to detail data stored in the data warehouse relational database

Conduct the ETL tool evaluation and selection process

To recognize which extraction method to choose? This influences the source system, the transportation process, and the time needed for refreshing the warehouse

Summarize the method you should choose to provide the extracted data for further processing? This influences the transportation method, and the need for cleaning and transforming the data

Understanding the context in which data infrastructure (ranging from cloud hosting to traditional onsite facilities) exists

Describe the whole purpose of data infrastructure and is to be there for your data as described above – protecting it and converting it into information.

Specify the criteria or standards that will insure that data that is protected can also be quickly and accurately restored.

Rapid development and deployment of customer-facing environments

Access to any data, even social media and cloud sources, from any device

Embedded data quality and master data management, to ensure information accuracy and consistency

Maximum security to keep sensitive information protected

Unmatched scalability to support large numbers of users InfoApps™, which make it simple and easy for business users to interact with analytics content

Explain how BI adoption has to be supported by a strong case for change

Summarize how BI creates value for the business

Express a business problem as a manageable analytical question

Identify the drivers, strategic business goals, and BI application objectives

Estimate costs for building and maintaining a successful BI decision-support environment 

Assess the risk in terms of technology, complexity, integration, organization, and project team and financial investment

I look forward to applying what I learned from this course as I proceed on your BIMS Program Journey. I am also looking forward to what my next course has to offer; Business Intelligence Analytics.

Elliott, T. (2013, August 8). BI Cartoons. Retrieved August 2018, from Blog SAP: https://blogs.sap.com/2013/08/08/bi-cartoons

Full Sail University. (2018). Full Sail University Business Intelligence Master's Course Schedule. Retrieved August 2018, from Full Sail University: https://www.fullsail.edu/degrees/business-intelligence-master/courses

8.

I’ve always liked this one. For so many reasons. The one few times everyone’s been happy. Friends and family. You being included. My mum’s face. Aimee’s excited blur. My favourite thing about this one is the way you’re looking at me. I didn't register your face during this moment. But I recognise that look. I feel it on my face every time I look at you and I think you don’t notice. But you probably do. Your hand laying so politely on my lap. Telling me that you’re there. And that you always will be. I know it’s a comfort for you too. I like to believe in that moment, amongst the chaos and rogue laughter, you saw only the two of us, spinning in a whirlwind of bright colours. My insides melt every time I see this one because I feel it so vividly. I feel you looking at me that way you do. I’m transported back to that moment where everything was perfect. And this wouldn't have been perfect without you. There wouldn't have been a moment without you. I look forward to our life of infinite perfect moments. 

It’s been the most difficult last few days we’ve went through. I was hurt more than I could ever imagine.

I spoke of how I would use number 8 as a reminder to how close we came to losing it all. But that would be wrong.

I was hurt so bad for a reason. I felt like it was all gone. Just like that. The real reason I was hurt though? I felt guilty. We both did. We know its not easy right now but we don’t make it any easier sometimes.

I was hurt because that honesty and mutuality had been damaged. But we can salvage it. Like we have done with one another since that chance meeting a lifetime ago.

I can’t live without you. You’re in my veins. In my blood and heart. In my soul. The pain I felt was multiplied when I seen you break down. I didn’t want to see that. I was hurting for myself. The hurt I felt for you breaking down in front of me was 10 times worse.

My best friend looking lost and despaired. Without hope. Knowing I couldn’t help at that moment because I was hurting too.

My life stopped for a while. I needed to open my eyes again and see everything we dream of. I did. I went over every detail in my head and thought of our future. My future. The one and only detail though that was a certainty, a constant was you.

You’re in my everything. You are my everything. My life is yours. Yours to break or yours to treasure. You jolt me into life everyday. I’m in your hands.

You creep into the slumber of my soul at 7am every morning and wake me up. You gently touch my thoughts and say “Gary, wake up. You’ve got me to protect. I’ve got you to look after. Get up Gary. We’ve got a purpose now”.

I wake up and look for the message. If its there my heart skips a beat. I don’t always look at it straight away. I sometimes go shower first then come back to read it just to prolong the excitement of hearing you say “moooooorning!”

If the message is not there I feel content knowing I can give you that feeling. That energy kick in the morning. That assurance that we are there for each other to take on the day. Take on the world.

So yeah, this is a reminder.

A reminder that we are human. That we do and will make silly mistakes. That we need to try harder than ever for these next 8 months. That we can break. We can bend. But that we are resilient.

Most importantly though?

It’s a reminder that we are strong. We can get through problems. We are honest but need to maintain that more than ever these next 8 milestones. White lies happen but can’t right now.

I actually had the thought of how many white lies you told the others. How many black lies you told them. And how many of them that you finally confessed to.

I assume you didn’t confess many if any at all. I know all your black lies. Your white lies. I know everything. That means the world to me.

You confess them to me. You show your sins. As do I.

We can trust but can trust more. We will have to over the next 8 chapters. I know we will though.

So a reminder.

A reminder we love each other. A reminder you’re my life. A reminder my future is you. A reminder we are stronger than ever. A reminder that in 8 months time we’ll live together. A reminder that we will travel the world together. A reminder that we will have pets. A reminder that we will get married. A reminder that we will have children. A reminder that we will have grandchildren. A reminder that we will spend the rest of our lives together. A reminder we will die together.

A reminder that you are my best friend.

A reminder that I, Gary, love you, Julie, with everything I have. I always will.

A reminder that you are my soulmate.

My everything.