MITS (r), provider of Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) business intelligence and operational reporting solutions, announced a major new release of its flagship business intelligence solution, MITS Discover .

MITS Discover 7.0 delivers significant enhancements to the end user experience, improved tools for creating and adjusting analysis focused data collections known as hypercubes, and numerous enhancements to performance and reliability. Existing customers, partners and prospective users will all find improvements of interest in the solution.

The release has been in beta use by select customers, who have been impressed with the improved performance of complex queries and the overall stability of the solution despite numerous enhancements.

Powerful New Dashboard Tools

"We have done major expansion and enhancement in our dashboarding capabilities, which we believe will please current users and attract new interest in Discover," says MITS Vice President of Engineering and Product Development, Gary Owen. The release includes a new, browser-based Dashboard Object Creator, which allows business users to rapidly create dashboard components in familiar grid, gauge, chart, and other formats, each of which can be incorporated into any number of dashboards. The enhancement, along with new dashboard library tools, will simplify the creation and use of dashboards while reducing the need to involve scarce IT resources in the process.

Other improvements will please both existing and prospective users. "Many of the enhancements included in this release are a direct response to input from our customers and our professional services unit," says Owen. "So, not only do we feel the new features are strong ... we're also certain they're precisely what our user community wants most."

One Report, Many Sources

With the new release, end users will be able to create reports from multiple data sources, not just from a single hypercube. This will speed and simplify the process for many queries that previously required more complicated effort.

"It's a powerful new feature," cites Owen. "For those organizations that build their own cubes and like to really push the solution to its limits, it will open a number of new doors-with a lot less pushing."

Extensive Usability Improvements

Enhancing queries and reports will get easier as well, notes Owen. "We've added drag-and-drop capabilities for relocating columns within a query or report grid. And now users can add or omit multiple columns simultaneously, instead of one-at-a-time." Performing "what if" and other more involved analysis will also be easier. Furthermore, the ability to selectively drill down within a displayed query or report by limiting results to specified values of a key data column has been substantially re-engineered.

One enhancement in particular that will deliver significant time savings to end users is the ability to add new drill-down paths to a hypercube without the need to rebuild the cube. End users who realize they need to explore data in a new way will now be able to do so without delay.

Reports and queries will be easier to navigate and view. Sorting on multiple columns is now easier, and new icons indicate the current sort order in effect, column by column. Users can hide "zero value" report rows, and navigate instantly to the beginning or end of the results.

Finally, a small but important enhancement adds a dynamic, visible status bar to queries in progress. For analyses needing several minutes to process, end users will know when results will be available.

Under the Hood: Shared Technology Breeds Flexibility, Reliability

Some of the improvements with the new version-particularly those focused on improved performance and wider application in the future-leverage the work MITS has done on its companion MITS Report product. Now, says Owen "both solutions will more fully leverage state-of-the-industry constructs and technologies-Java gateways, AJAX (Asynchronous Javascript and XML) calls and tiered application design."

"Though it will make us more flexible moving forward, the prime motivator is the end user," explains Owen. "These newer technologies let us incorporate familiar user interface models-the kind people are accustomed to using on Google(tm) and Facebook(tm) and Flickr(tm)-so it will work in a way that people will expect it to work."

Existing users are encouraged to contact their MITS provider to arrange upgrades, which involve a simple licensing formality. For more details on this or any MITS software solutions, individuals can contact a MITS representative at info@mits.com or visit the MITS Web site at www.mits.com .

SAPUG - Seattle Area Pick User Group

http://www.sapug.org
Date: Thursday, Aug 21
Time: 05:30pm
Location: TBD
SAPUG goes to the Ball Game - Oakland at Seattle

TEXMUG - Texas MultiValue User Group

http://www.texmug.org/
Date: Thursday, Jun 19
Time: 04:00pm - 08:30pm
Location: Black Eyed Pea, 1400 N Collins St, Arlington, TX

CMUG - Colorado Pick Users Group

Http://cmug.plaxogroups.com/
Date: Tuesday, Jul 8
Time: 05:30pm
Location: IBM Offices

SoCalRUG - Southern Calif Revelation UserGroup

http://www.srpcs.com/rev_socalrug.aspx
Date: Wednesday, Jul 16
Time: 09:00am - 12:00pm
Location: SRP Computer Solutions Office
Speaker: Steve Botes - RetailWare

Atlanta Area Pick Users Group - AAPUG

http://www.aapug.org
Date: Tuesday, Sep 16
Time: 06:30pm - 09:00pm
Location: Aldo's Italian Restaurant

Find out why Ideal Business Services Ltd. chose BlueFinity's mv.NET to bring their customer's systems online in an exciting new Case Study from BlueFinity International.

Ideal Business Services Ltd. is a UK-based IT solutions company with over 20 years experience in developing and supporting tracking and control solutions for various logistics industries.  They support clients across the United Kingdom and Ireland, Europe, Scandinavia and other parts of the world.  Each application they produce is developed and tailored to each customer's exact needs. One such customer is the Saint Lucia Air and Sea Ports Authority (SLASPA).  

Find out more how mv.NET solved their problems at http://www.bluefinity.com/slaspa.html

There is a new fix pack available for IBM Database Addins for Visual Studio (IBM.NET). This new release supports Visual Studio 2005 and Visual Studio 2008. Besides a number of fixes, this fixpack improves performance and adds functionality to the already powerful product. You can download IBM Data Server Provider for .NET (ADO.NET Provider). Select DB2 Version 9.5 fix packs and client downloads for 32-bit Windows operating systems on 32-bit Intel and AMD systems.

Get more information here:
http://www-306.ibm.com/software/data/db2/support/db2_9/download.html

Execu-Sys

Growing distribution company in Vermont looking for experienced PICK P/A with proven Web development skills (REDBACK a +). This position is onsite only-relocation assistance will be provided so it is an ideal opportunity for someone who would be interested in the VT quality of life. Salary 70-80K.

For additional information contact mh@eslny.com

Dear e-Xtra:

The Tech Tip from www.pick911.com you reprinted in your October 1st e-Xtra newsletter is flawed. This is the tip as written:

POS = INDEX(STRING,VALUE,1)
POS = DCOUNT(STRING[1,POS],CHAR(253))

STRING - the string we are going to search in (ex: attribute)
VALUE - the value we are looking for
POS - multivalue position

This, however, can fail if the multi-valued list is not in sequence. For example, consider the string

X10]X2]X1

where "]" represents the Value Mark, or CHAR(253).

If we are looking for the value "X1", the technique given in the tip evaluates as:

POS = INDEX("X10]X2]X1","X1",1) --> sets POS to 1, the first occurance
of "X1" POS = DCOUNT("X10]X2]X1"[1,1],CHAR(253))

POS will return a 1, not the 3 we were expecting. A better way of doing this would be:

POS = 0
LOCATE(VALUE, STRING; POS) THEN ... ELSE ...

This is an example of false economy of non-precious cycles. Techniques such as the one from www.pick911.com were common back in the 70s. Everyone tried to save every CPU cycle possible. In today's environment, program correctness is more important tha a few cycles on a fast, cheap, CPU.

At least that is the opinion we teach in our classes.

Sincerely,

Clifton Oliver
Clifton Oliver & Associates