tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post6810447039316671067..comments2024-03-25T04:32:02.396-04:00Comments on Customer Experience Matrix: Beautiful BABI: SiSense PrismCubed Offers Business Intelligence for Business AnalystsDavid Raabhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03489754392712536104noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post-21991049793790773912009-10-13T16:51:59.471-04:002009-10-13T16:51:59.471-04:00Well, I guess we're both right ;-)
Thank you ...Well, I guess we're both right ;-)<br /><br />Thank you as well!Elad Israelihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07558330790219988349noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post-57715283780096888232009-10-13T16:41:24.021-04:002009-10-13T16:41:24.021-04:00You make a good point. Clearly Excel has 85% marke...You make a good point. Clearly Excel has 85% market penetration anyway so the numbers do support your argument. <br /><br />On the data sizes, Gemini they did a DIM (direct in-memory) implementation as well. I don't know that CPAs wouldn't use GoogleSheets based on data volumes though. They do use Intuit's Quicken Online and I don't know how large a dataset that supports but it can't be that huge. Also accounting data is not that large typically IMO (if you're talking about Hyperion users that's a different ballgame).<br /><br />It is nice to have a fat client for people who prefer that for sure. However the costs of deployment/maintenance on these is really high (even with ClickOnce types of updates) and it's platform-tied and it's not firewall friendly etc. Even with thin clients you don't get the user mining advantages SaaS brings to you. <br /><br />Also IMHO with a fat client, the users can't do work from home unless they install the bits on their personal boxes which has all sorts of nasty implications (not the least of which is security, from IT's perspective). With a web browser, I can have my people working anywhere, anytime. That's valuable. What you might lose in performance is greatly made up for with convenience. And of course, one man's slow app is another's blazing fast application :) If you have a tree that's so huge as to impact node selection, I would suggest you may have implementation issues on the caching/abstraction layers. In these situations, less is more. Ditto on D&D. In either case I would think performance is a backend issue more than UX-related (at least in my experience). And performance is a subjective issue too. <br /><br />Thanks for the opportunity to share some interesting thoughts!Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17294311263645885655noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post-59283891447219380992009-10-13T15:59:57.161-04:002009-10-13T15:59:57.161-04:00"On the other hand, Face Book WOULDN'T ha..."On the other hand, Face Book WOULDN'T have billions of users if it was desktop based"Elad Israelihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07558330790219988349noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post-83289262984271348302009-10-13T15:54:52.093-04:002009-10-13T15:54:52.093-04:00Fair enough :-)
Although, take Excel and Google S...Fair enough :-)<br /><br />Although, take Excel and Google Spreadsheets for example. I once read somewhere that the main difference between GoogSheets and Excel is the amount of data a sheet can hold (Google's is ridiculously small).<br /><br />I say to that - even if GoogSheets could handle the same amount of data as Excel (not gonna happen soon) the main difference is simply in the little things that save you 2 seconds each time you do them. Drag and drop is faster. Browsing through a big tree is faster. Copy/Paste is faster. Scrolling is smoother. The browser doesn't crash because one of its plug-ins misbehaved. Etc.<br /><br />I give a lot of credit to Google's web devs and that just proves my point. No accountant would use GoogSheets as it is, even if it had unlimited sized sheets. And even if it's free.<br /><br />On the other hand, Face Book would have billions of users if it was desktop based.<br /><br />In our market (platform BI) we try to use what's best for each user segment, as we see them - powerful desktop-based dev tools and easily deployable web apps for the actual business applications.Elad Israelihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07558330790219988349noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post-9047874425406014612009-10-13T14:07:51.232-04:002009-10-13T14:07:51.232-04:00Yes it did thank you. Although I would disagree wi...Yes it did thank you. Although I would disagree with your assertion that a web-based IDE would be cumbersome and unproductive for user type 1 and 2. :)Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17294311263645885655noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post-76050111778462924582009-10-13T13:49:39.994-04:002009-10-13T13:49:39.994-04:00Jerome,
We separate between (roughly) three types...Jerome,<br /><br />We separate between (roughly) three types of users:<br /><br />1. Developers: These types of users usually handle the data preparation side (consolidation, cleansing, centralization, etc). This is done (and stored) using our ElastiCube feature that can be set up either locally (on a desktop) on a server to service multiple user requests.<br /><br />2. Power Users: Users who use power tools for advanced analytics, reporting and publishing. They use the PrismCubed environment to perform ad-hoc analysis, create reports or establish "starting point" applications for business users.<br /><br />3. Business Users: These types of users would usually prefer to use "canned" applications (in contract to free form applications) that serve a business case. An example of existing applications like this is Google Analytics.<br /><br />For the first type of user (and in many cases the second type as well), using a web-based (zero footprint) environment to do this would be similar to using a web-based Visual Studio - cumbersome and unproductive.<br /><br />This is not true for the third type of user that simple wants to work within the confines of a pre-package solution without too many irrelevant features to distract or complicate.<br /><br />Web based solutions have a few critical advantages:<br /><br />1. Easy deployment (no installation and no firewall problems due to unstandard ports and protocols).<br /><br />2. They accessible from anywhere (business users typically need to see BI reports/dashboards on the road or from multiple machines without having to install anything.<br /><br />3. They are platform independent.<br /><br />Please note that we do not currently provide "hosted services" and maybe this is where you confusion is.<br /><br />We provide a server that can be installed on premise or on a cloud. Both the data and the web server resides on a server machine. Some or our partners and OEMs use this server to provide hosted solutions to their own customers but this is not our focus as a company. We are a platform provider, and it has yet to be proven that generic hosted BI platforms are practical (actually, I tend to believe the opposite). For vertical solutions, sure. Not for platforms.<br /><br />So, PrismCubed provides a server that handles data storage and access as well as access to web apps created with the PrismCubed environment.<br /><br />I hope that cleared things up?<br /><br />EladElad Israelihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07558330790219988349noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post-33325554971323951732009-10-13T12:56:40.938-04:002009-10-13T12:56:40.938-04:00Elad,
Actually I know you're right about clie...Elad,<br /><br />Actually I know you're right about client-side BI applications being fairly common out there. I guess my confusion then is: where does the actual data reside. I imagine it has to be server-side if you're in the TB game right?<br />Also I would venture to guess that economically, web-based (hosted) solutions would be cheaper and quicker to bootstrap. I don't see where the firewall issues are on those though. From a UX perspective, I'd be interested in understanding what exactly can be done in a client app that cannot be accomplished as nicely in RIA these days. <br />Thanks.<br />J.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17294311263645885655noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post-27696867944898268252009-10-13T12:21:31.972-04:002009-10-13T12:21:31.972-04:00Hi guys,
We will be making our zero-footprint web...Hi guys,<br /><br />We will be making our zero-footprint web server publicly available in the upcoming weeks (it is currently under a private beta at select customers).<br /><br />This product will allow publishing of BI apps created with PrismCubed to be seamlessly deployed as interactive zero-footprint solutions.<br /><br />As far as the authoring (="development") environment, we believe that the desktop is more suitable for this, considering the type of features and functionality a typical person needs when building BI apps from scratch (ETL, development, etc).<br /><br />Finally, you'd be surprised how many of the BI solutions out there are not implemented as web solutions. It really depends on what you need, your budget, how many users would be using it, firewall issues, etc. But, obviously we agree with you and that is why we are releasing this new functionality in the immediate future :-)<br /><br />David, thank you for the professional and thorough report.Elad Israelihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07558330790219988349noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post-62377119555850886662009-10-13T12:00:47.754-04:002009-10-13T12:00:47.754-04:00Hi Jerome. Good question. I'd guess that the...Hi Jerome. Good question. I'd guess that they just haven't gotten around to adding a Web-based client, given that their original product was a desktop system and the Web server is brand new. But I've forwarded the question to SiSense so hopefully they'll answer directly.David Raabhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03489754392712536104noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34368959.post-1452666093598508382009-10-12T21:32:49.182-04:002009-10-12T21:32:49.182-04:00Dave, I'm curious why they don't support a...Dave, I'm curious why they don't support a web-based interface. Why have a thick footprint Windows client these days? <br />Thanks.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17294311263645885655noreply@blogger.com