GLOSSARY
API
An application programming interface (API) is a particular set of rules and specifications that a software program can follow to access and make use of the services and resources provided by another particular software program that implements that API. It serves as an interface between different software programs and facilitates their interaction, similar to the way the user interface facilitates interaction between humans and computers.
Application Service Provider
An application service provider (ASP) is a business that provides computer-based services to customers over a network. Software offered using an ASP model is also sometimes called On-demand software or software as a service (SaaS). The most limited sense of this business is that of providing access to a particular application program (such as customer relationship management) using a standard protocol such as HTTP. The need for ASPs has evolved from the increasing costs of specialized software that have far exceeded the price range of small to medium sized businesses. As well, the growing complexities of software have led to huge costs in distributing the software to end-users. Through ASPs, the complexities and costs of such software can be cut down. In addition, the issues of upgrading have been eliminated from the end-firm by placing the onus on the ASP to maintain up-to-date services, 24 x 7 technical support, physical and electronic security and in-built support for business continuity and flexible working. The importance of this marketplace is reflected by its size. As of early 2003, estimates of the United States market range from 1.5 to 4 billion dollars. Clients for ASP services include businesses, government organizations, non-profits, and membership organizations.
Automation
A process control or automation system is used to automatically control a process such as chemical, oil refineries, paper and pulp factories. The PAS often uses a network to interconnect sensors, controllers, operator terminals and actuators. A PAS is often based on open standards in contrast to a DCS (Distributed Control System), which is traditionally proprietary. However in recent times the PAS is considered to be more associated with SCADA systems. PAS is the lowest level of automation, while MES (Manufacturing Execution System) is considered to be directly positioned above a PAS. Process automation involves using computer technology and software engineering to help power plants and factories in industries as diverse as paper, mining and cement operate more efficiently and safely. Automation of internal processes removes the possibility of human error, improves speed and efficiency, but most importantly lowers a company's overall costs.
Business Process Management
Business process management (BPM) is a holistic management approach focused on aligning all aspects of an organization with the wants and needs of clients. It promotes business effectiveness and efficiency while striving for innovation, flexibility, and integration with technology. BPM attempts to improve processes continuously. It can therefore be described as a "process optimization process." It is argued that BPM enables organizations to be more efficient, more effective and more capable of change than a functionally focused, traditional hierarchical management approach. An empirical study by Kohlbacher (2009) indicates that BPM helps organizations to gain higher customer satisfaction, product quality, delivery speed and time-to-market speed.
Business Intelligence
Business intelligence (BI) refers to computer-based techniques used in identifying, extracting, and analyzing business data, such as sales revenue by products and/or departments, or by associated costs and incomes.BI technologies provide historical, current and predictive views of business operations. Common functions of business intelligence technologies are reporting, online analytical processing, analytics, data mining, business performance management, benchmarking, text mining and predictive analytics. Business intelligence aims to support better business decision-making. Thus a BI system can be called a decision support system (DSS). Though the term business intelligence is sometimes used as a synonym for competitive intelligence, because they both support decision making, BI uses technologies, processes, and applications to analyze mostly internal, structured data and business processes while competitive intelligence gathers, analyzes and disseminates information with a topical focus on company competitors. Business intelligence understood broadly can include the subset of competitive intelligence.
Cognos
Cognos (Cognos Incorporated) was an Ottawa, Ontario-based company making business intelligence (BI) and performance management (PM) software. Founded in 1969, at its peak Cognos employed almost 3,500 people and served more than 23,000 customers in over 135 countries.Originally Quasar Systems Limited, it adopted the Cognos name in 1982. On January 31, 2008, Cognos was officially acquired by IBM. The Cognos name continues to be applied to IBM's line of business intelligence and performance management products. In January 2010, as part of a reorganization of IBM Software Group, Cognos software and software from recently acquired SPSS were brought together to create the Business Analytics division.
Collaboration
Collaborative software (also referred to as groupware, workgroup support systems or simply group support systems) is computer software designed to help people involved in a common task achieve their goals. It is usually associated with individuals not physically co-located, but instead working together across an internet connection. It can also include remote access storage systems for archiving common use data files that can be accessed, modified and retrieved by the distributed workgroup members.
SAP
SAP AG is a German global software corporation that provides enterprise software applications and support to businesses of all sizes globally. Headquartered in Walldorf, Germany, with regional offices around the world, SAP is the largest enterprise software company in the world (as of 2009). It is also the largest software company in Europe and the fourth largest globally. The company's best known products are its SAP Enterprise Resource Planning (SAP ERP) and SAP BusinessObjects software.
Software as a Service
Software as a service (SaaS, typically pronounced [sæs]), sometimes referred to as "on-demand software," is a software delivery model in which software and its associated data are hosted centrally (typically in the (Internet) cloud) and is accessed by users using a thin client, typically a web browser over the Internet. While practically every Internet service (such as Web search engine or web-based Email) is driven by some underlying software, the term software-as-a-service is often used in the context of business software, and in some cases even more narrowly as software in a category which has on-premise software; i.e., equivalent software that is installed in businesses' computer networks or personal computers. SaaS has become a common delivery model for most business applications, including accounting, collaboration, customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise resource planning (ERP), invoicing, human resource management (HRM), content management (CM) and service desk management.
SDK
A software development kit (SDK or "devkit") is typically a set of development tools that allows for the creation of applications for a certain software package, software framework, hardware platform, computer system, video game console, operating system, or similar platform. SDKs may have attached licenses that make them unsuitable for building software intended to be developed under an incompatible license. For example, a proprietary SDK will probably be incompatible with free software development, while a GPL-licensed SDK could be incompatible with proprietary software development. LGPL SDKs are typically safe for proprietary development.
Security
Internet security is a branch of computer security specifically related to the Internet. Its objective is to establish rules and measures to use against attacks over the Internet. The Internet represents an insecure channel for exchanging information leading to a high risk of intrusion or fraud, such as phishing. Different methods have been used to protect the transfer of data, including encryption.
Service-Oriented Architecture
Service-oriented architecture (SOA) is a flexible set of design principles used during the phases of systems development and integration in computing. A system based on a SOA will package functionality as a suite of interoperable services that can be used within multiple, separate systems from several business domains. SOA also generally provides a way for consumers of services, such as web-based applications, to be aware of available SOA-based services. For example, several disparate departments within a company may develop and deploy SOA services in different implementation languages; their respective clients will benefit from a well understood, well defined interface to access them. XML is commonly used for interfacing with SOA services, though this is not required. SOA defines how to integrate widely disparate applications for a Web-based environment and uses multiple implementation platforms. Rather than defining an API, SOA defines the interface in terms of protocols and functionality. An endpoint is the entry point for such a SOA implementation. Service-orientation requires loose coupling of services with operating systems, and other technologies that underlie applications. SOA separates functions into distinct units, or services, which developers make accessible over a network in order to allow users to combine and reuse them in the production of applications. These services and their corresponding consumers communicate with each other by passing data in a well-defined, shared format, or by coordinating an activity between two or more services. One can consider SOA a continuum, as opposed to distributed computing or modular programming.
Mashup Portal
In Web development, a mashup is a Web page or application that uses and combines data, presentation or functionality from two or more sources to create new services. The term implies easy, fast integration, frequently using open APIs and data sources to produce enriched results that were not necessarily the original reason for producing the raw source data. The main characteristics of the mashup are combination, visualization, and aggregation. It is important to make existing data more useful, moreover for personal and professional use. To be able to permanently access the data of other services, mashups are generally client applications or hosted online. Since 2010, two major mashup vendors have added support for hosted deployment based on Cloud computing solutions; that are Internet-based computing, whereby shared resources, software, and information are provided to computers and other devices on demand, like the electricity grid.
Microsoft .NET Framework
The .NET Framework (pronounced dot net) is a software framework for Microsoft Windows operating systems. It includes a large library, and it supports several programming languages which allows language interoperability (each language can use code written in other languages). The .NET library is available to all the programming languages that .NET supports. The framework's Base Class Library provides user interface, data access, database connectivity, cryptography, web application development, numeric algorithms, and network communications. The class library is used by programmers, who combine it with their own code to produce applications. Programs written for the .NET Framework execute in a software (as contrasted to hardware) environment, known as the Common Language Runtime (CLR). The CLR is an application virtual machine so that programmers need not consider the capabilities of the specific CPU that will execute the program. The CLR also provides other important services such as security, memory management, and exception handling. The class library and the CLR together constitute the .NET Framework. The .NET Framework is intended to be used by most new applications created for the Windows platform. To develop new applications, software developers can also use Microsoft's SDK for Windows 7 or .NET Framework 4 (or newer) or Visual Studio 2010 on top of the .NET Framework.
Microsoft BizTalk Server
Microsoft BizTalk Server, often referred to as simply "BizTalk", is an Enterprise Service Bus. Through the use of "adapters" which are tailored to communicate with different software systems used in an enterprise, it enables companies to automate business processes. Offered by Microsoft, it provides the following functions: Enterprise Application Integration, Business Process Automation, Business-to-business Communication, Message broker, and Business Activity Monitoring. Recently, the BizTalk Server is repositioned not only as the Application Integration Server but also as the Application Server.
Microsoft CRM
Microsoft Dynamics CRM is a multi-lingual Customer Relationship Management software package developed by Microsoft. Out of the box, the product focuses mainly on Sales, Marketing, and Service (help desk) sectors, but Microsoft has been marketing Dynamics CRM as an XRM platform and has been encouraging partners to use its proprietary (.NET based) framework to customize it to meet many different demands.Microsoft CRM - Microsoft Dynamics CRM is a multi-lingual Customer Relationship Management software package developed by Microsoft. Out of the box, the product focuses mainly on Sales, Marketing, and Service (help desk) sectors, but Microsoft has been marketing Dynamics CRM as an XRM platform and has been encouraging partners to use its proprietary (.NET based) framework to customize it to meet many different demands.
Microsoft SharePoint
Microsoft SharePoint is a popular web platform developed by Microsoft for small to large organizations. It is designed as a centralized replacement for multiple web applications, and supports various combinations of enterprise website requirements. It is typically associated with web content management and document management systems.
Microsoft SQL Server
Microsoft SQL Server is a relational model database server produced by Microsoft. Its primary query languages are T-SQL and ANSI SQL.
Object Oriented Programming
Object-oriented programming (OOP) is a programming paradigm using "objects" – data structures consisting of data fields and methods together with their interactions – to design applications and computer programs. Programming techniques may include features such as data abstraction, encapsulation, messaging, modularity, polymorphism, and inheritance. Many modern programming languages now support OOP.
QlikView
QlikTech is a business intelligence (BI) software company based in Radnor, Pennsylvania. QlikTech is the provider of QlikView, a business intelligence solution that enables organizations to make better and faster decisions. QlikView delivers enterprise-class analytics and search with the simplicity and ease of use of office productivity software. Its in-memory associative search technology makes calculations in real-time, enabling business professionals to gain insight through intuitive data exploration. QlikView can be deployed on premise, in the cloud, or on a laptop or mobile device for a single user to a large global enterprise.
Data Quality
Problems with data quality don't only arise from incorrect data. Inconsistent data is a problem as well. Eliminating data shadow systems and centralizing data in a warehouse is one of the initiatives a company can take to ensure data consistency. The market is going some way to providing data quality assurance. A number of vendors make tools for analysing and repairing poor quality data in situ, service providers can clean the data on a contract basis and consultants can advise on fixing processes or systems to avoid data quality problems in the first place. Most data quality tools offer a series of tools for improving data.
Data Profiling
Initially assessing the data to understand its quality challenges.
Data Standardization
A business rules engine that ensures that data conforms to quality rules.
Geocoding
For name and address data. Corrects data to US and Worldwide postal standards.
Matching
Matching or Linking - a way to compare data so that similar, but slightly different records can be aligned. Matching may use "fuzzy logic" to find duplicates in the data. It often recognizes that 'Bob' and 'Robert' may be the same individual. It might be able to manage 'householding', or finding links between husband and wife at the same address, for example. Finally, it often can build a 'best of breed' record, taking the best components from multiple data sources and building a single super-record.
Monitoring
Keeping track of data quality over time and reporting variations in the quality of data. Software can also auto-correct the variations based on pre-defined business rules.
Batch and Real time
Once the data is initially cleansed (batch), companies often want to build the processes into enterprise applications to keep it clean.
Data Cleansing
Data cleansing or data scrubbing is the process of detecting and correcting (or removing) corrupt or inaccurate records from a record set, table, or database. Used mainly in databases, the term refers to identifying incomplete, incorrect, inaccurate, irrelevant etc. parts of the data and then replacing, modifying or deleting this dirty data. After cleansing, a data set will be consistent with other similar data sets in the system. The inconsistencies detected or removed may have been originally caused by different data dictionary definitions of similar entities in different stores, may have been caused by user entry errors, or may have been corrupted in transmission or storage. Data cleansing differs from data validation in that validation almost invariably means data is rejected from the system at entry and is performed at entry time, rather than on batches of data. The actual process of data cleansing may involve removing typographical errors or validating and correcting values against a known list of entities. The validation may be strict (such as rejecting any address that does not have a valid postal code) or fuzzy (such as correcting records that partially match existing, known records).
Datawarehouse
A data warehouse (DW) is a database used for reporting. The data is offloaded from the operational systems for reporting. The data may pass through an operational data store for additional operations before it is used in the DW for reporting. A data warehouse maintains its functions in three layers: staging, integration, and access. Staging is used to store raw data for use by developers (analysis and support). The integration layer is used to integrate data and to have a level of abstraction from users. The access layer is for getting data out for users. This definition of the data warehouse focuses on data storage.
Integration
A system integration is an aggregation of subsystems cooperating so that the system is able to deliver the over-arching functionality. System integration involves integrating existing (often disparate) subsystems. The subsystems will have interfaces. Integration involves joining the subsystems together by “gluing” their interfaces together. If the interfaces don’t directly interlock, the “glue” between them can provide the required mappings. System integration is about determining the required “glue”.
Web-based Application
A web application is an application that is accessed over a network such as the Internet or an intranet. The term may also mean a computer software application that is hosted in a browser-controlled environment (e.g. a Java applet) or coded in a browser-supported language (such as JavaScript, combined with a browser-rendered markup language like HTML) and reliant on a common web browser to render the application executable. Web applications are popular due to the ubiquity of web browsers, and the convenience of using a web browser as a client, sometimes called a thin client. The ability to update and maintain web applications without distributing and installing software on potentially thousands of client computers is a key reason for their popularity, as is the inherent support for cross-platform compatibility. Common web applications include webmail, online retail sales, online auctions, wikis and many other functions.
WebMethods
WebMethods, was founded in 1996 and is now the WebMethods product suite, offered by Software AG which acquired the company in 2007 for $546 million. The WebMethods suite is software for process improvement, SOA enablement, IT modernization and business and partner integration.
Widget
In computing, a widget toolkit, widget library, or GUI toolkit is a set of widgets for use in designing applications with graphical user interfaces (GUIs). The toolkit itself is a piece of software which is usually built on the top of an operating system, windowing system, or window manager and provides programs with an application programming interface (API), allowing them to make use of widgets. Each widget facilitates a specific user-computer interaction, and appears as a visible part of the computer's GUI. Widget toolkits can be either native or cross platform. Widgets that are provided by a toolkit typically adhere to a unified design specification, including aesthetics, to lend a sense of overall cohesion among various parts of the application and between various applications within the GUI.
XML
Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a set of rules for encoding documents in machine-readable form. It is defined in the XML 1.0 Specification produced by the W3C, and several other related specifications, all gratis open standards. XML's design goals emphasize simplicity, generality, and usability over the Internet. It is a textual data format with strong support via Unicode for the languages of the world. Although the design of XML focuses on documents, it is widely used for the representation of arbitrary data structures, for example in web services. Many application programming interfaces (APIs) have been developed that software developers use to process XML data, and several schema systems exist to aid in the definition of XML-based languages. As of 2009, hundreds of XML-based languages have been developed, including RSS, Atom, SOAP, and XHTML. XML-based formats have become the default for most office-productivity tools, including Microsoft Office (Office Open XML), OpenOffice.org (OpenDocument), and Apple's iWork.
XSD
XML Schema, published as a W3C recommendation in May 2001, is one of several XML schema languages. It was the first separate schema language for XML to achieve Recommendation status by the W3C. Because of confusion between XML Schema as a specific W3C specification, and the use of the same term to describe schema languages in general, some parts of the user community referred to this language as WXS, an initialism for W3C XML Schema, while others referred to it as XSD, an initialism for XML Schema Document—a document written in the XML Schema language, typically containing the "xsd" XML namespace prefix and stored with the ".xsd" filename extension. In the draft of the next version, 1.1, the W3C has chosen to adopt XSD as the preferred name, and that is the name used in this article. Like all XML schema languages, XSD can be used to express a set of rules to which an XML document must conform in order to be considered 'valid' according to that schema. However, unlike most other schema languages, XSD was also designed with the intent that determination of a document's validity would produce a collection of information adhering to specific data types. Such a post-validation infoset can be useful in the development of XML document processing software, but the schema language's dependence on specific data types has provoked criticism.
