22 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Whats the point? Frequently inaccurate, shallow, derivative, March 20, 2000
This review is from: Professional Data Warehousing with SQL Server 7.0 and OLAP Services (Paperback)
While WROX Press usually covers programming topics well, this title is an exception. I've read all three books on MS OLAP. Many of the MDX examples are incorrect in syntax (no quotes where required, or CREATE SET SESSION instead of CREATE SESSION SET). It also blithely talks about syntax that MS OLAP doesn't support (like sets in the WHERE clause) without letting you know you're wasting your time trying it. Some errors, like multiple descriptions of and references to the non-existent CREATE SET GLOBAL, or stating that drill-down functions don't work on tuples when they do, state clearly that the author doesn't really know Microsoft's MDX. The author makes other odd claims, for example that virtual dimensions are useful for security (how?)
I found it really interesting that area after area (discussions of preparing a database, discussions of MDX, database optimization, many of the diagrams, the discussion of NULL values and invalid member references, a large number of small asides) follow the outline, diagrams, examples and occasionally unique terminology of "Microsoft OLAP Solutions" fairly closely, including idiosyncrasies such as the attention to dealing with irregular hierarchies in more depth than leveled hierarchies early on, and yet goes into far less depth. It strains belief that the author didn't study this prior work and borrow heavily.
It also disappoints in the areas where it could have offered some unique insights. Unlike the other two books, it devotes a small chapter to types of data mining, and offers in chapter introduction that it will discuss whether OLAP Services supports data mining. At the very end of the chapter, he only says that "Microsoft has yet to come up with a ... product that performs such tasks and handles gigabytes of data" and that "Excel is the best representative of Microsoft products in this regard". Huh? Meanwhile, possible application of OLAP Services' statistical functions to forecasting is completely unmentioned, although the same statistical functions (correlation, regression) are mentioned as data mining components. Yes, you can too do forecasting with MS OLAP!
Data warehousing with SQL 7 is very thin. If you have "The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit," "90 Days to the Data Mart", and any SQL Server reference, you'll be way ahead. Stay away! Buy "Microsoft OLAP Solutions" and get a deeper treatment of OLAP Services features and MDX, and buy "Microsoft OLAP Unleashed" and get a ton of DTS and client ADO programming.
I'll give this one star instead of zero, as it at least has some information in it.
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15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
NOT a good choice, September 1, 2000
By A Customer
This review is from: Professional Data Warehousing with SQL Server 7.0 and OLAP Services (Paperback)
The writing in this book is very incoherent. It is really hard to read and the author rambles on and on about useless obvious things. The examples provided are erroneous. What the author calls a very complex sql query is actually a very basic sql query and on top of that is incorrect. Example: in trying to count the num of transactions, the author made the mistake of sum(tran_id) instead of count(tran_id). If he cannot write a simple select statement how could he provide input on data warehousing. I got more information from SQL OLAP Tutorial in the books online than from reading the 1st 4 chapters. Also the author does not provide any solid examples drawn from his experience. It appears as though he is summarizing the books online and another great data warehousing book, "The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit" by Ralph Kimball.
Save your money and look for another book.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Misleading title, July 19, 2000
By A Customer
This review is from: Professional Data Warehousing with SQL Server 7.0 and OLAP Services (Paperback)
A better title maybe "Professional Data Warehousing with OLAP Services in SQLServer 7.0". As a designer and developer of a data warehouse back-end, I thought I had found a great book to enlighten me as to SQLServer7 specific data warehousing techniques, but in reality the author rarely deviates from discussing OLAP in SQLServer and data cubes. If you're looking for information on creating and optimizing a data warehouse as a back-end system, I would highly suggest looking elsewhere. Although there is basically no discussion of data warehousing, the book "Transact-SQL Programming" offers a much more well rounded approach to the awsome capabilities of SQLServer.
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