InetSoft's Business Intelligence Tools for Accessing an OLAP Server

Since 1996, InetSoft has offered a software platform for dashboards, visual analysis, and reporting to be used in conjunction with OLAP servers or any combination of open standards data sources. InetSoft's mission is to deliver such business intelligence solutions with a focus on making them easy, agile and robust.

Easy to deploy, easy to learn, easy to use, and easy to administer
Agile by enabling maximum self-service which increases business user satisfaction and adoption and reduces IT and DBA support requirements
Robust by being able to scale up for enterprise deployments by running on a secure, high performance infrastructure

OLAP Server Business Intelligence Example

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Option for Reporting from an OLAP server

OLAP Cubes + Operational Databases

Traditionally, business intelligence solutions have focused on corporate departments that serve strategic functions. Because of the targeted user population, traditional BI focused on historical data analytics such as OLAP analysis and other slice-and-dice functions where users typically evaluate large volumes of historic data. As a consequence, traditional business intelligence solutions have been associated with OLAP cubes, data warehouses, data marts and other centralized, large scale, aggregated data stores.

Traditionally a BI or OLAP tool has been modeled, designed and engineered to address strategic business decisions. Fittingly, a typical BI implementation scenario has been as follows:

A dedicated expert team builds the front-end BI tools and back end data warehouse, often using an OLAP server.
Data needs to be Extracted, Transformed and Loaded (ETL) from different sources into a central data warehouse and OLAP cubes. Data quality issues are addressed in this ETL process.
Data models are structured for clearly defined static requirements. Changes typically require high-level expertise and lengthy customization.
Analysis and presentations are concentrated on high-level views from aggregated data using an OLAP tool.
End users are highly trained analysts and managers who value power far more than flexibility or ease of use.
The OLAP tool is too complex for business users to learn.

This cumbersome process clearly has its disadvantages of cost and effort.

Now, business intelligence applications such as that offered by InetSoft are powerful and agile enough to access both OLAP cubes and operational databases in their native format. In fact, even more value is derived out of a business intelligence solution when multiple data sources are accessed and data mashups are produced.

AssetPoint Case Study

AssetPoint, a leading provider of (EAM) Enterprise Asset Management and (CMMS) Computerized Maintenance Management Software solutions chose InetSoft in order to offer KPI dashboards and advanced analytics to craftsmen and maintenance managers.

Clients receive out-of-the-box interactive dashboards and an optional upgrade that provides dashboard development and data mashup tools to create integrated views of other data sources within the organization. AssetPoint's TabWare EAM/CMMS is an easy-to-use solution for managing all processes of maintaining industrial equipment and the operational facilities of any organization.

View live interactive examples in InetSoft's dashboard and visualization gallery.

AssetPoint users span many industries including Manufacturing, Mining, Oil and Gas, Food and Beverage, and Facilities Maintenance. With a single platform users can manage assets, maintenance work schedules, and spare parts to maximize asset performance, control costs, and improve operations.

Eleven key performance indicators are monitored in the primary operational dashboard that is powered by InetSoft such as equipment downtime, maintenance backlog, and MRO inventory as a percentage of equipment replacement value. The KPI dashboard helps customers quickly spot areas of concern and drill down to the details. With the optional upgrade, users can build any type of performance management dashboard and perform visual analysis on any data.

Additionally, any maintenance-related data stored in the TabWare solution can be mashed up with relevant enterprise data, whether it is stored in a data warehouse, departmental, operational or financial systems, and even spreadsheets created by individuals or vendors. Interactive dashboards include intuitive point-and-click controls like filter lists, range sliders, and drop-down boxes which allow for deep data exploration and thorough ad hoc reporting and analysis.

Read the top 10 reasons for selecting InetSoft as your BI partner.

AssetPoint found InetSoft Technology's dashboard interface a great match for the TabWare EAM/CMMS solution. TabWare is easy to learn and easy to use, meaning customers can be up and running quickly and thus realizing its benefits sooner. The company found InetSoft dashboards similarly user friendly, while giving detailed information at a quick glance. The ability to drill-down into each metric has given managers powerful information quickly.