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Big Data Notes 013: Data dictionary

Attempting to define the term data dictionary could conjure up imagery of a dog chasing its tail. Nevertheless, when it comes to understanding and analysing your data, the data dictionary plays a key role. Big Data Notes explains more.

Big Data Notes 012: Olap (Molap, Rolap, Holap)

Online analytical processing – or OLAP, by its obligatory acronym – is an established method for business intelligence reporting. With its new incarnations, it is primed for working with big data too. Big Data Notes explains.

Big Data Notes 011: Telematics

The world around us is becoming connected to a degree that most of us can’t (or perhaps try not to) fathom. Telematics and everything it involves is playing a key role in this but what exactly is it? Cue Big Data Notes.

Big Data Notes 010: System dynamics

In the world of big data we all know that many of the jargon-heavy terms can be a real source for confusion. One such example: system dynamics. Fear not, here comes Big Data Notes to help cut through the cra... complicated stuff.

Big Data Notes 009: In-memory

Among the ever expanding echelons of the world’s collective big data taskforce, there are innumerable diverging schools of thought on the best way to operate, in no small part because the overarching development covers such a broad range of applications. Here Big Data Notes explores in-memory.

Big Data Notes 008: ISO 27001

With all of the talk of high profile hackings and breaches and the devastating ramifications of such, dealing in information might seem like a daunting business. By following the ISO 27001 standard, organisations should be able to sleep easy. Big Data Notes explains.

Big Data Notes 007: Squawka

Consumer uses of big data are rising apace. With Euro 2012 around the corner and our tendency to jump on any excuse to write about football like a rat up a drainpipe, we present Squawka. Read on to find out who Roy Hodgson would have picked in his England squad had big data ruled the roost.

Big Data Notes 006: The rise of NoSQL

The biggest barrier to business technology for anyone that doesn’t come from a tech background is often the bamboozling jargon, acronyms and general linguistic idiosyncrasies. After calls from our members to explain some database vernacular, Big Data Notes duly obliges.

Big Data Notes 005: MapReduce

At the heart of big data and what it allows you to do is ‘MapReduce’. This is not a tool for shrinking navigational aids, however. Here is a breakdown of just what you need to know about this fundamental part of big data.

Big Data Notes 004: Scope and scale

To some extent big data has been the biggest hindrance in its own development; the ‘big’ in big data has caused confusion since the term’s rise to prominence. The use of a subjective term for a technological trend raises the key issue of just how big is big?

Big Data Notes 003: Hadoop

‘Hadoop’?!

Though it sounds like a trick shot that a basketball player might perform, the name actually has no meaning. Hadoop was simply the name of a stuffed toy elephant that belonged to the son of its creator Doug Cutting.

OK. So what actually is it?

Big Data Notes 002: Midata

Corporations and the general public are often at a stand-off where data use is concerned, with security, accuracy and distribution all sources of friction. Government has looked to grease the wheels of the relationship with its midata scheme, backed by 26 leading UK enterprises and supporting organisations.

Big Data Notes 001: Big Data

Big data is a term we hear a lot here at The Cloud Circle. It is being touted as ‘the next big thing’ for 2012. But what on earth is it? Luckily Dominic Pollard is on hand to tell you what you need to know.