Unemployment rate and the sale of new homes are two economic indicators. I would like to analyze both sets of data in one visualization to see how they relate. I have one spreadsheet with the monthly unemployment rates for the U.S. since 2003 that I will use as my primary data source. I have another spreadsheet with the the monthly data for seasonally adjusted annual rate of new home sales that I will use as my secondary data source.

To integrate or blend this data, I will use date (month and year) as the common dimension. If the name of the linking field matches, Tableau will automatically link the data fields. In my case, the name differs slightly in my primary and secondary data sources, so I have to define custom mapping between the fields using the Data Menu and choosing Edit Relationships.

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Some quotes from the article:

“One tactic is having detailed — and frequent — crime analysis, down to the city block level.”

“Every two weeks, a group of about 25 law enforcement officials, ranging from undercover detectives from the Wayne State University Police Department to state troopers, the Wayne County Sheriff’s Office, urban planners and the heads of security for leading Midtown employers, gather for a detailed meeting. The corporate involvement includes DTE Energy Co., Henry Ford Health System and the Detroit Medical Center.”

“The meetings, which began in 2009, are centered on a data reporting and management system called CompStat. The system allows law enforcement officers to review detailed crime mapping. The information identifies crime hot spots, repeat offenders and crime trends. It uses a combination of police reports, a criminal database and Google Earth to pinpoint precise locations of where and when crimes took place.”

Angela Belcher: Using nature to grow batteries

We live in fascinating times. So many more technological changes are coming to us soon.

The Self Organizing Computer Course

Impressive account of a course in which students start with nand gates and ultimately build a computer, operating system and a game like tetris. The course is self-organizing, so people can download the courseware and do the exercises.

Shimon shares his thoughts about the graffiti he saw: “High Tech Schmai Tech … the important thing is to be a mensch” [Definition of a “mensch”: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mensch]

Since there is no standard definition of what a “Business Intelligence” platform is, it is helpful to see how Gartner defines it. In the report “Magic Quadrant for Business Intelligence Platforms”, Gartner defines a BI platform as delivering 14 capabilities that are grouped under three headings:

• Integration
• Information Delivery
• Analysis

These 14 capabilities are listed below:

• Integration
• BI infrastructure
• Metadata management
• Development tools
• Collaboration
• Information Delivery
• Reporting
• Dashboards
• Ad hoc query
• Microsoft Office integration
• Search-based BI
• Mobile BI
• Analysis
• Online analytical processing (OLAP)
• Interactive visualization
• Predictive modeling and data mining
• Scorecards

Click here to read the Gartner report.

Perrysburg, OH, February 7, 2011 – Metric-X, a local technology consulting firm, has earned the Silver Data Platform Competency through Microsoft’s Partner Network. This achievement awarded by Microsoft indicates a superior level of confidence to deliver Microsoft products and solutions.

To earn this certification, Metric-X had to complete various levels of training and submit approved implementation methodology along with client testimonials. Microsoft’s Partner Network recently made significant changes to their certification process, increasing the requirements needed to achieve an advanced competency.

“We understand that to help our customers stay competitive, Metric-X needs to be well-versed on the new solutions offered by Microsoft,” stated Saad Shah, Founder of Metric-X. He continued, “these competencies gives our customers the confidence in our ability to deliver these leading-edge Microsoft-based solutions.”

For over ten years, Metric-X has provided IT consulting services to clients spanning various industries. In addition, Metric-X provides project management services, custom software development and specialized staffing services. The company is based in Perrysburg, Ohio with offices in Rochester Hills, Michigan and satellite resources stationed around the globe.

We would like to thank our customers for giving us the opportunity to do interesting work for them over the past 10 years. Metric-X was founded in 2000, and we are lucky to have been able help our customers’ businesses get ahead while also pursuing our career interests and creating career opportunities for others.

Over the past decade, the proliferation of technology in the workplace has provided ample opportunity for us to be creative and apply our gifts. The company has served various sized businesses from small businesses with ten employees to large, Fortune 100 companies providing a variety of information technology services. The key has been is embracing new technology and being able to deliver services consistently well.

Our business has gone through many changes also. Initially, we focused on building Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems to help companies serve their customers better. Now, most of our projects involve building business intelligence systems to help companies make decisions with the data collected by their systems.

We look forward to the next ten years.

XLhub, the Excel add-in for managing and sharing data in spreadsheets is available free for 30-day evaluation.

Sign up and download XLhub today!

XLhub is an Excel add-in that integrates Excel to a database. It can be used by end users to develop collaborative applications in which Excel is the front-end. Using XLhub, users can:

– Quickly consolidate data produced in separate workbooks

– Preserve historical versions of the data

– Combine the data in workbooks with data from other sources