Data mining, data warehousing, decision support and knowledge discovery
make up the universe of D S * ( dsstar ), the only executive business newsletter
supporting strategic employment of these technologies.
The On-Line Executive Journal for Data-Intensive Decision Support
*** September 8, 1998: Vol. 2, No. 36 ***
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Article retrieval instructions are at the end of this file.
For subscription information, email
dssub@tgc.com
-------------------- * --------------------
IN THIS ISSUE:
A REPORT ON KDD-98
BY ED COLET
CONFIDENTIALITY CLASSIFICATION
BY SID ADELMAN
ALTERNATIVE NEURAL ARCHITECTURES
BY WILL DWINNELL
ANALYSIS & COMMENTARY
A REPORT FROM KDD-98, THE 4TH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE
ON KNOWLEDGE DISCOVERY AND DATA MINING
by Ed Colet
This week, executive editor at large Inderpal Bhandari presents a guest
column by Ed Colet, a doctoral candidate at New York University. Until
recently Ed worked at the IBM T.J. Watson Research Center. Ed was a member
of the group that developed Advanced Scout, the data mining application for
NBA teams. His research interests focus on statistical methods as they
pertain to data mining, as well as the human factors and usability issues
of data mining systems.
Colet writes: "KDD-98...was held in New York city from August 27-31. In
keeping with it's history of co-locating with conferences of related
disciplines, this year's conference was co-located with VLDB-98 (Very Large
Databases). In the three previous annual conferences in which I attended,
there was some concern that the incredibly rapid growth and hype associated
with data mining may backfire, and the promise of data mining will diminish
to insignificance. This doesn't appear to be the case, and the field appears
to be thriving with a healthy amount of research activity."
CONFIDENTIALITY CLASSIFICATION
by Sid Adelman
Sid Adelman is President of Sid Adelman & Associates, a Sherman Oaks,
California based consulting firm specializing in data warehouse and strategic
data architecture. He co-authored a methodology and project planning tool
tailored for data warehouses. Sid is an international speaker at data
warehouse and industry conferences. He has written a number of articles on
data warehouse and has chapters on data quality and organizational and
cultural issues in Data Warehouse: A Practical Guide from the Experts.
Adelman writes: "Confidentiality classification provides the basis for the
securing of data, and the access to that data. There are varying levels of
confidentiality and security requirements. For example, hospitals and medical
laboratories must keep strict control on data about certain results such as
patients being HIV positive. The disclosure of such information can have
profound effects on the patients' lives as well as compromising the integrity
of the hospital."
ALTERNATIVE NEURAL ARCHITECTURES
by Will Dwinnell, contributing editor, The Gordian Institute
Will Dwinnell works in quantitative analysis, especially machine learning
and pattern recognition. He has a background in statistics and neural
networks, and works as a data mining consultant near Philadelphia. Will
writes regularly and has been a Contributing Editor for "PC AI" magazine
and for The Gordian Institute, since 1997. He has
also been an invited speaker at several technical conferences. He received
his B.S. in Economics and a minor in Computer Science from Villanova
University, and an M.B.A. with a concentration in Operations from the
University of Pittsburgh. Will can be reached by e-mail at
predictor@compuserve.com.
Dwinnell writes: "Of the "new" modeling technologies in use today, neural
networks are probably the most popular. They are probably also the most
diverse. Literally dozens of different neural architectures have been devised
by enterprising researchers. Taking into account variations on these
architectures and the multiplicity of training algorithms, this number easily
climbs into the hundreds. Among this expanse of architectures are many
different behavioral properties. Some neural networks are quick to train but
slow to recall. Others are quick to recall but slow to train. Still others
display different characteristics in between."
FROST & SULLIVAN STUDY SEES DB MKT SHIFTING FROM UNIX TO NT
A new study by Frost & Sullivan, the international marketing consulting
company, believes that the database market is not confronted with the
dawning of its demise, but set to experience a shift from UNIX to Windows
NT.
WALKLETT GROUP ANNOUNCES DATA WAREHOUSING
PROJECT WITH PJM INTERCONNECTION, LLC
Walklett Group has announced that they are building a market information
data warehouse (referred to as the PJM Information Warehouse) for PJM
Interconnection, LLC -- the largest electrical control area in North America
and the third largest in the world, providing electricity to nearly 23
million people in all or parts of five states and the District of Columbia.
ACTION ITEMS
Tessera Builds Integrated Marketing System with Eddie Bauer,
1.2 Terabyte DW Project Completed in Less Than a Year
Tessera Enterprise Systems (TES), a marketing systems integrator and
provider of customer relationship management (CRM) solutions and Eddie Bauer,
a wholly owned subsidiary of Spiegel, Inc. and international specialty
retailer of active casual lifestyle merchandise, have announced the
completion of Eddie Bauer's new consolidated database marketing system. The
Eddie Bauer integrated marketing system, built by Tessera, provides Eddie
Bauer with the tools to understand, anticipate and respond to customer needs
and preferences.
SAS Software Takes Top Medals in KDD Data-Mining Competition
SAS Institute Inc.'s Enterprise Miner software and a product built on SAS
software's analytic toolset have won silver and gold medals, respectively, in
the 1998 KDD Cup, a data-mining competition sponsored by the
4th-international Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining. The
Institute, the only enterprise-wide vendor to medal in the contest, and
two other companies prevailed over 54 other contestants.
Silicon Graphics Driving Knowledge Discovery Solutions
Silicon Graphics, Inc. introduced MineSet 2.6, building on the success of
its flagship data mining and visualization software. Bolstered by
high-performance features that create a truly scalable data mining solution,
the evolving MineSet solution is designed to be a compelling means to
capitalize on information-rich data warehouses.
Advanced Visual Systems Ships AVS/Express Version 4.0
Advanced Visual Systems Inc. (AVS) announced a new release of its flagship
product, AVS/Express Version 4.0, software for transforming complex data into
visual information solutions. Version 4.0 includes new Web-enabling features,
expanded animation, and interfaces to Oracle 8 Spatial Cartridge and ESRI's
Spatial Data Engine. In addition, AVS/Express can now be used to generate
Active-X components quickly and easily create or modify applications.
Wells Fargo Chooses SAS Enterprise Miner
Software for Target Marketing
SAS Institute Inc., a market leader for analytic solutions, has announced
sales of its data-mining product, Enterprise Miner software, to Wells Fargo
& Company. Wells Fargo, the nation's tenth-largest bank holding company is
using Enterprise Miner software to further hone its already successful
target-marketing strategies.
Platinum to Ship New Microsoft Repository
Platinum Technology later this year will ship the Microsoft Repository 2.0
on Unix and mainframe platforms, but many data-warehousing capabilities will
wait until a follow-up edition, expected in 1999. Platinum will release
versions of Microsoft's Repository 2.0 meta-data integration utility for
Solaris, HP-UX, and IBM OS/390 platforms. Versions supporting Oracle, Sybase,
and DB2 running on Windows NT also are due in that time frame.
Compaq Announces New NonStop Himalaya Solution Server for DSS
Compaq Computer has announced the new NonStop Himalaya Solution Server for
Decision Support Systems (DSS Server). DSS Server is a packaged solution that
incorporates NonStop Himalaya servers and the software needed for DSS
environments. It is a highly scalable system that is specifically designed
for customers with mid- to large-scale DSS requirements, in the range of 250
gigabytes to one terabyte. Priced competitively with UNIX system-based
solutions, DSS Server delivers a flexible, growth-oriented environment that
reduces decision support life-cycle costs and improves the customer's return
on investment.
BASE Consulting Group, LLC Announces
Strategic Technology Consulting Practice Line
BASE Consulting Group, LLC, a leading provider of consulting and training
services in the areas of Data Warehousing and Decision Support Systems (DSS),
has announced the formation of their Strategic Technology Consulting (STC)
practice line. The addition of this new practice line formally extends BASE's
consulting services into the strategic management consulting arena.
IBM and SAP Team Up to Extend SAP R/3
Applications to Java Developers
At SAP TechEd '98, the SAP AG U.S. technical education conference, IBM
Corp. and SAP announced that IBM VisualAge for Java is an initial
Java-integrated development environment to fully support the Business
Application Programming Interface (BAPI) standard for Java and to be BAPI
validated by SAP.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
(T)he notion that the simpler model is also more accurate is not
correct and will fail in most domains..."
CONFERENCES & SEMINARS 09.8.98
D S * INFORMATION
D S * welcomes bylined comments for publication.
All comments regarding editorial content should be sent to:
dseditor@tgc.com
[
FIRST ARTICLE
]