Excel add-in for SQL Server 2012 Master Data Services - Part 1

SQL Server 2008 R2 introduced Master Data Services (MDS) as Master Data Management (MDM) platform for managing enterprise master data centrally in a consistent, clean and up-to-date manner. There were three ways to manage master data in MDS.  First is the Master Data Manager which is a web based user interface.  Second is loading data through a staging process.  Third  is using the MDS WCF services to programmatically manage the master data. These are fine, but there are many users who want to manage data in MS-Excel in bulk rather than managing each record one at a time in the Master Data Manager UI. The SQL Server team heard this requirement and introduced a brand new Excel add-in for MDS server in SQL Server 2012 to manage master data. With this new option, now the questions are, how to get started with this new add-in, how to manage data in bulk with this add-in and how publish it to MDS server?  Check out this tip to learn more.

SQL Server Reporting Services vs. PerformancePoint Services - SSRS vs PPS

When we are done creating a SSAS cube we often think of whether to use SSRS (SQL Server Reporting Services) or PPS (PerformancePoint Services) for the reporting UI. The question is what are the pros and cons of each of these approaches and in what scenario should one be chosen over the other or can they be used together to compliment each other?

For more information click here.

Getting Started with Data Quality Services of SQL Server 2012 Using SSIS

In my earlier articles, I talked about the Data Quality Service (DQS) in SQL Server 2012, which helps ensure data integrity and quality by data profiling, matching, cleansing, correcting and monitoring overall status of the data cleansing process. We also talked about using the interactive Data Quality Client tool and in this article we will walk through how to do data cleansing in a automated mode using SSIS, for more information click here.

Creating a knowledge base and cleansing data using Data Quality Services in SQL Server 2012

This is third article of the series. In the first article I talked about data quality challenges and its source, then I talked about the Data Quality Service in SQL Server 2012 and its processes. In the second article, I talked about different components of DQS and how to go about installing and configuring DQS and then I talked, how DQS works. In this article, I am going demonstrate step by step how you can create a knowledge base and do data cleansing, for more click here.

Getting Started with SQL Server 2012 Data Quality Services

The amount of data is increasing on a regular basis and so is the responsibility to ensure the quality of data remains intact. Data quality issues consist of inconsistency, incompleteness, invalidity, inaccuracy, duplicates, etc. These data quality issues can arise from different sources like erroneous data entry, corruption in transmission or storage, data consolidation issues from different sources with different standards or formats, etc. These types of issues can lead to incorrect data analysis, data mining and reporting, which ultimately impacts the business. I have heard that SQL Server 2012 has a brand new feature called Data Quality Service (DQS) which greatly helps to ensure the data integrity and quality by data profiling, matching, cleansing, correcting data and monitoring overall status of the processes. Let's explore this feature in this tip series:

Getting Started with SQL Server 2012 Data Quality Services - Part 1

Getting Started with SQL Server 2012 Data Quality Services - Part 2

Getting Started with Master Data Services (MDS) In SQL Server 2012

Master Data Services is a new feature introduced in SQL Server 2008 R2 and further enhanced in SQL Server 2012. Master Data Services is an extensible Master Data Management (MDM) platform, which is built on top of the SQL Server database engine and Windows Communication Foundation (WCF).

MDS allows you to create a centralized hub for creating and managing enterprise master data and provides many functionalities, to learn more click here.

Creating a Custom Report Template in SSRS

When we start creating reports at the enterprise level, we need to ensure the consistency in the look and feel of reports throughout the organization. For example, the header of all reports should have the company logo and address whereas the footer should have other company information or page layout information across all reports in a consistent manner. Now the challenge is, at the enterprise level there might be several departments/developers creating reports, so how do you ensure report layout consistency?
Fortunately, SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) allows us to create standard/custom report templates with the desired report layout and use the same custom template every time when creating a new report. With this, you can ensure consistent report layout across departments of the organization, for more information click here.