Scott Howard has been with IBM for more than 22 years. Howard’s experience includes staff and management assignments ranging from microapplications programming to mainframe and systems programming. He is an internationally recognized expert on business intelligence, data warehousing, DRDA, distributed databases and multivendor database integration, and an author and contributor to many publications. Scott is an IBM certified Advanced Technical Expert for DB2 UDB, an IBM Certified Business Intelligence Specialist and Certified Technical Trainer.

Howard is currently with Learning Services, IBM Global Services and is its business intelligence and data integration curricula worldwide leader. He has worked with IBM’s Silicon Valley, Toronto, Rochester and Austin development labs for the past twelve years, developing client/server database and data warehousing courses.

I am familiar with data modeling, but now I’m being asked to reengineer or build new applications running on my databases and data warehouses.
March 4, 2004 I am familiar with data modeling, but now I’m being asked to reengineer or build new applications running on my databases...

We can have a staging area between extract and transform or we can have staging area between transform and load.
March 4, 2004 We can have a staging area between extract and transform or we can have staging area between transform and load. I would...

I am looking for definitions of business and executive sponsors as this functions retain to an information warehouse.
March 4, 2004 I am looking for definitions of business and executive sponsors as this function pertains to an information warehouse....

How do you handle the dimension key in a fact table when a row in the fact table does not relate to one of the dimension tables?
March 4, 2004 How do you handle the dimension key in a fact table when a row in the fact table does not relate to one of the dimension...

I am a DBA, new to data warehouse concepts and would appreciate if you could reply to my questions concerning issues of architecture as I prepare to implement a one terabyte warehouse.
February 4, 2004 I am a DBA, new to data warehouse concepts and would appreciate if you could reply to my questions concerning issues of...

I am working with a client that is currently enforcing a standard that does not allow direct query access to data mart dimensions and fact tables.
February 4, 2004 I am working with a client that is currently enforcing a standard that does not allow direct query access to data mart...

Can we group star schema database, ROLAP, client MOLAP and server MOLAP into OLAP strategies?
February 4, 2004 Can we group star schema database, ROLAP, client MOLAP and server MOLAP into OLAP strategies? Are there any new OLAP...

Can a single data staging area serve two masters, operational (ODS) and analytic (data warehouse)?
December 9, 2003 Can a single data staging area serve two masters, operational (ODS) and analytic (data warehouse)? Is a single data...

What are the pros and cons of horizontal database partitioning and please focus on the scenario when the database is part of a package (e.g., Siebel) which contains meta data.
November 5, 2003 What are the pros and cons of horizontal database partitioning and please focus on the scenario when the database is part...

We are using a bottom-up approach in our project.
November 5, 2003 We are using a bottom-up approach in our project. How do I integrate two data marts that are in different SQL Servers at...

I am working in the marketing department of an Iranian steel manufacturing company.
November 5, 2003 I am working in the marketing department of an Iranian steel manufacturing company so I know the industry well but I need...

How should I consider the integration of business intelligence systems and business performance management and what are the best ways to analyze these types of systems?
October 9, 2003 How should I consider the integration of business intelligence systems and business performance management and what are the...

My question is in the realm of operational reporting.
October 9, 2003 My question is in the realm of operational reporting. My client (a state government) does not want the expenses of an...

Is a data mart defined by its size or is it defined by the specific business process it supports?
October 9, 2003 Is a data mart defined by its size or is it defined by the specific business process it supports?

Have companies that have implemented data warehouses, particularly financial institutions, established a special data warehouse organization?
August 22, 2003 Have companies that have implemented data warehouses, particularly financial institutions, established a special data...

I am newly involved in the BI/BPM space.
August 22, 2003 I am newly involved in the BI/BPM space. One of the things we are experiencing with our solution is that our client's...

We are currently looking for a best-in-class, pure Web-based BI tool for reporting, ad hoc and analysis needs.
August 22, 2003 We are currently looking for a best-in-class, pure Web-based BI tool for reporting, ad hoc and analysis needs. Any...

What is the difference between the terms "business intelligence" and "data warehousing?"
August 22, 2003 What is the difference between the terms "business intelligence" and "data warehousing?" People seem to be using these...

What is the best RDBMS (Teradata, Oracle or DB2) for data warehousing based on performance and size?
August 22, 2003 What is the best RDBMS (Teradata, Oracle or DB2) for data warehousing based on performance and size? We are looking at a...

I have XML with n-tier structure (there are n level sub nodes in each node).
August 22, 2003 I have XML with n-tier structure (there are n level sub nodes in each node). I have to design a DB schema in any relational...

In a corporate information factory model, how does the 3NF enterprise data warehouse capture slowly changing dimensions if in the source system the dimensional attributes get updated (Type 1)?
July 2, 2003 In a corporate information factory model, how does the 3NF enterprise data warehouse capture slowly changing dimensions...

According to Mr.Inmon, data cleansing is most important phase for data warehousing.
July 2, 2003 According to Mr.Inmon, data cleansing is most important phase for data warehousing. He says that it's almost 60 percent of...

How can business systems analyze customer's personalized needs?
May 2, 2003 How can business systems analyze customer's personalized needs?

How effective is data warehousing for the manufacturing industry?
May 2, 2003 How effective is data warehousing for the manufacturing industry?

We met with one of the BI vendors to discuss query and reporting and multidimensional reporting.
April 2, 2003 We met with one of the BI vendors to discuss query and reporting and multidimensional reporting. As the discussion...

Please give me a definition of an enterprise-wide solution.
April 2, 2003 Please give me a definition of an enterprise-wide solution. What are the advantages and disadvantages of using this method?

I am currently involved with a start-up for-profit graduate and undergraduate educational project.
February 3, 2003 I am currently involved with a start-up for-profit graduate and undergraduate educational project but I want part of the...

I have a small problem relating to the relationships that exist between a dimension table and a fact table.
February 3, 2003 I have a small problem relating to the relationships that exist between a dimension table and a fact table. There are two...

When it comes to the design technology of enterprise data warehouse (EDW), some people are insisting we use Inmon's approach of top-down methodology.
December 2, 2002 When it comes to the design technology of enterprise data warehouse (EDW), some people are insisting we use Inmon's...

Can we and should we adopt different data modeling schemas during the extraction, transformation and staging method?
December 2, 2002 Can we and should we adopt different data modeling schemas during the extraction, transformation and staging method? What...

What is the data modeling schema which is used for building a matrix schema?
December 2, 2002 What is the data modeling schema which is used for building a matrix schema? What tool supports all the types of schema...

We have a project that requires us to integrate up to 10 legacy customer-centric databases after a merger to build a customer marketing data mart.
November 5, 2002 We have a project that requires us to integrate up to 10 legacy customer-centric databases after a merger to build a...

We are using MicroStrategy7 as our reporting tool against our data warehouse which is DB2 on an IBM OS/390 mainframe.
November 5, 2002 We are using MicroStrategy7 as our reporting tool against our data warehouse which is DB2 on an IBM OS/390 mainframe. We...

What is the current state of data warehousing and data mining in terms of its widespread use, its growth and technological advances?
November 5, 2002 What is the current state of data warehousing and data mining in terms of its widespread use, its growth and...

Can you please direct me to a resource that touches on how you can place value, preferably financial value, on data, intellectual property and information quality management?
November 5, 2002 Can you please direct me to a resource that touches on how you can place value, preferably financial value, on data,...

What strategy do you suggest to update dimensions using flat files as a source that do not have a time stamp?
November 5, 2002 What strategy do you suggest to update dimensions using flat files as a source that do not have a time stamp? I've tried to...

I’m building a DW/DM for an educational institution which has many campuses.
October 3, 2002 I’m building a DW/DM for an educational institution which has many campuses. I’m tasked with building a DM template that...

The ROI for data warehousing is an interesting approach.
October 3, 2002 The ROI for data warehousing is an interesting approach. Anyway it is only focusing on monetary aspects. Do you know...

Managers have always received financials and management reports in Excel spreadsheets that were prepared by the end-user community.
October 3, 2002 Should a data warehouse be used to produce management reports in specific subject areas that will be sent to the managers...

Is BI reporting and reporting embedded in applications different?
October 3, 2002 Is BI reporting and reporting embedded in applications different? Are there any tools that do both or should two...

I am trying to prove a business case to demonstrate the quantifiable business benefits of implementing data standards to support our heterogeneous ERP environment.
October 3, 2002 I am trying to prove a business case to demonstrate the quantifiable business benefits of implementing data standards...

I have been challenged by a big manufacturing company, which consists of dozens of individual plants (through acquisitions but still function independently with their own data centers and some with their own DW) to build an enterprise data warehouse.
October 3, 2002 I have been challenged by a big manufacturing company, which consists of dozens of individual plants (through acquisitions...

What are some of the companies with the biggest data warehouses?
October 3, 2002 What are some of the companies with the biggest data warehouses?

In a simple star schema design for a data mart, does it matter if the relationships from the dimension tables to the fact tables are indirect relationships rather than direct relationships?
October 3, 2002 In a simple star schema design for a data mart, does it matter if the relationships from the dimension tables to the fact...

Many organizations have an interest in enterprise application integration (EAI) lately.
July 26, 2002 Many organizations have an interest in enterprise application integration (EAI) lately. How are business intelligence...

I am currently working on a data mart project where the client is requesting an ad hoc reporting capability.
July 26, 2002 I am currently working on a data mart project where the client is requesting an ad hoc reporting capability. After further...

I have been asked to do a study of DW features of SQL 2K and Oracle 9i. How do I proceed with such an exhaustive study?
July 26, 2002 I have been asked to do a study of DW features of SQL 2K and Oracle 9i. How do I proceed with such an exhaustive study?

My company wishes to study changes to its customer file.
July 26, 2002 My company wishes to study changes to its customer file. A customer may be ranked a "10" one day and only a "9" the next....

We have Oracle as our RDBMS for all the applications.
July 26, 2002 We have Oracle as our RDBMS for all the applications. Because the infrastructure exists for Notes already, they want to use...

I want to start a bank project on a data warehouse. How do I go about it?
July 26, 2002 I want to start a bank project on a data warehouse. How do I go about it?

What is the difference between summary and aggregate data?
May 3, 2002 This is a simple data mart question. What is summary data? Most books and white papers state that the star schema contains...

Is DTS suitable as a sole ETL tool?
May 3, 2002 Is DTS (MS SQL) really suitable as the sole ETL tool when it comes to the daily operation (and support) of a data...

What are the recent trends in terabyte-size data warehouse backups?
May 3, 2002 What are the recent trends in data warehouse backups where the size of the warehouse is in terabytes? Are full online...

My company is now investigating whether you could use one database model and/or one database for both OLTP and OLAP worlds.
May 3, 2002 My company is now investigating whether you could use one database model and/or one database for both OLTP and OLAP...

Before I begin, I must stress that I am an absolute beginner to data warehousing.
May 2, 2002 Before I begin, I must stress that I am an absolute beginner to data warehousing. I am trying to find good references to...

I am busy building a data warehouse for an e-business virtual retail bank (virtual = no branch infrastructure; e-business = clients only have access to the bank via the Internet).
March 13, 2002 I am busy building a data warehouse for an e-business “virtual” retail bank (virtual = no branch infrastructure;...

How important it is to have a separate ETL tool when our target RDBMS supplies ETL capabilities, e.g., PL/SQL in Oracle and DTS in MS SQLServer?
March 13, 2002 How important it is to have a separate ETL tool when our target RDBMS supplies ETL capabilities, e.g., PL/SQL in Oracle and...

I have a question about OLAP.
March 13, 2002 I have a question about OLAP. OLAP is very popular recently. Before when we were talking about BI, we wanted to know our...

There are some lively discussions going on regarding the appropriate use of surrogate keys versus natural keys.
March 13, 2002 There are some lively discussions going on regarding the appropriate use of surrogate keys versus natural keys. What is your...

How would you characterize the difference between Bill Inmon's philosophy on data warehousing and Richard Kimball's?
January 25, 2002 How would you characterize the difference between Bill Inmon's philosophy on data warehousing and Richard Kimball's? As a...

I am looking into data warehousing conferences for training purposes.
January 25, 2002 I am looking into data warehousing conferences for training purposes. I have found two, one sponsored by The Data...

We are developing a VLDB that will probably use aggregate tables as well as database partitioning.
January 25, 2002 We are developing a VLDB that will probably use aggregate tables as well as database partitioning. Which databases are...

I'm designing a star schema for a client for reporting on the use of several systems.
January 25, 2002 I'm designing a star schema for a client for reporting on the use of several systems. Every single usage of a system is...

We are at a crossroad.
January 23, 2002 We are at a crossroad. We need a bigger server to get the ETL load times down, but as a company I am not 100 percent convinced...

What is the difference between data warehousing and business intelligence?
January 22, 2002 What is the difference between data warehousing and business intelligence?

In using a true DW design, if data integration techniques and standards are created and followed, are there other things that make it difficult to add additional data design (tables, fields, etc.) in later stages?
December 13, 2001 In using a true DW design, if data integration techniques and standards are created and followed, are there other things that...

Could you direct me to facilitation training courses and/or material?
November 20, 2001 Could you direct me to facilitation training courses and/or material?

Please provide clear information on the differences between BI, OLAP and data mining.
November 20, 2001 Please provide clear information on the differences between BI, OLAP and data mining.