CIS 8020 Assignment 2 FF Google Chart API - Mega Hot Pot Financial Group

The Scenario Mega Hot Pot Financial Group is a start-up insurance company in the South East. Recently it announced its purchase of 5 financial applications to manage its retail annuity business which is worth thousands of dollars. Risk Management manager, Susan builds a group of 3 Risk Assessment Analysts (RCA) working on controls established for these financial applications. They are required to follow Susan's work process perform their control testing. Susan arranges a Friday meeting for the new group and also invites her boss to the meeting.

This Friday morning Susan found that her chart couldn't be opened 10 minutes before the meeting. Luckily her assistant Mary happened to know how to create a chart from scratch by using Google Chart API. According to Susan's requirements, this chart will mark the work process for the team. It will mark the start process, the end process and each step with the percentage. It will visualize the process, standardize the process and help the team management manage their time and resources under each control test. Additionally, this chart will be easily generated, shared by everyone, and easily updated by each team member if there is some variance on the percentage phase by phase.

A Potential Solution Google provides a useful Chart API (Application Programming Interface) which can be accessed to quickly and easily produce highly customizable charts. The Google Chart API lets users generate line, bar, pie charts within a web page. The user can specify parameters such as color, size and titles. Mary created this chart by defining its type, its parameters for data and labels, its size, its title and its color in Google .

The Prototype Here is the chart prototype:

http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?cht=p3&chd=t:5,5,15,5,20,25,15,5,5&chs=550x200&chl=Start>>>Send requests(5%)|Receive the population(5%)|Request change tickets(15%)| Collect change tickets(5%)|Document the test table(20%)|Document the work paper(25%)|1st review(15%)|1st review approval(5%)|End>>>2nd review approval(5%)&chtt=IT+RCA+Control+Testing+Work+Chart|By+Mary&chco=ff0099

The Reason Why This web API is chosen for implementation because:

1. It is easier to generate

2. It is shared by all the team members

3. It can be updated by all the team members

4. It meets their requirements including marking the start, the end, the work process and the work step percentage

5. It provides a dashboard like chart visualizing their work process

This prototype is ideal for users who don’t want to buy complex charting solutions like Mega Hotpot. Other charting solutions like Excel can achieve the goal. In this scenario, Excel can't be used, so they have to build the chart from the scratch.

There are other solutions building the chart. They include:

1. Insert the chart JPG after creating a chart in a software(e.g. Excel)

2. Input some data into a database and create a chart by using data analysis tools (e.g. Crystal Reports)

But these two solutions have their drawbacks compared with the Google Chart API:

1. The process is complicated and long to create such a chart

2. The user should know how to know how to input the data into a database and how to use the tool

CIS 8020 Assignment 2 MM Google Calendar API

This blog entry shall discuss my implementation of the Google Calendar API to solve a particular business problem.

1. Introduce the scenario or the case.

Morgan Computer Consulting has a big client (Client Alpha) that requires a new ERP implementation. Morgan Computer Consulting has formed a 20-person international project team to work on this big project. Coordination among team members and project managers will prove to be essential in getting the project done efficiently.

The team needs a way to easily coordinate meetings, installations, testing, etc. Morgan Computer Consulting doesn't want to have to buy any new software or go through the trouble of installing bulky software on employees' computers. Morgan Computer Consulting needs an easy to use, cloud-based, free calendar system that all global project team members can view in order to stay coordinated and connected.

2. Explain how you can use one of the Google APIs for a potential solution.

Google Calendar offers a very easy to use API that solves the project team's needs. Google Calendar offers the flexibility of easily embedding within a dashboard or any web page (using an iFrame), and allows the customization of allowing users to see daily, weekly, monthly, or agenda item views. Every team member can see the calendar at the same time, and the calendar can be controlled by specific people (one or multiple) such as the project managers simply by logging into Google and giving Calendar permissions. The Google Calendar is free and easy to use, features an easy print option, and allows the global project team to view all project team calendar items.

3. Use Google API to build a prototype. The output can be directly integrated to the same blog entry; or you may need a separate HTML/Script gadget.

Here is the implementation of the Google Calendar. Some sample calendar entries have been entered:



4. Explain why you chose this web API for implementation; if possible, compare to other possible solutions.

This particular API's huge advantage is that it's extremely easy to implement and customize. Other advantages are that it's free and visibly aesthetic. Other solutions would be Microsoft Outlook or Microsoft Sharepoint, neither of which are free or particularly easy to use. Those products would provide too much bulk and overhead to be an effective, efficient solution.

Google Calendar offers real-time coordination without the need for backup or maintenance. Printing is very easy using Google Calendar, and can be easily embedded in an iFrame for easy web, dashboard, or mashup implementation. It's a great solution for this particular problem.

CIS 8020 Assignment 2 BC Google chart API--Sinopec stock valuation

China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (Sinopec) is one of the largest petroleum companies in China. Sinopec has recorded a strong financial performance in recent years. However, because of over high crude oil price, the company suffered loss in its 2008 fiscal year. Still, many portfolio managers desire to invest in Sinopec during 2009 and they need to take a look at its recent financial data to valuate its stock market performance.

Google Chart API is a good candidate solution for this problem. Google API chart generates bar chart as well as line chart images which shows the company's yearly and first quarter net profit and Earnings per share(EPR) data. The charts is prototyped as following:







Based on the Google chart API, we can see that the company’s annual and first quarter net profit is highly correlated with its Annual and first quarter EPS. The graph shows that its first quarter EPS increased in FY 2009 compared with that in FY 2008. As we can see, this company is a valuable stock to invest in now as part of the portfolio.

Google API charts are much more straightforward and illustrative than examine Sinopec's financial statement and balance sheet for their profit analysis. This application can be nicely integrated to the website as well.

Here I attached the video that Dr. Zheng suggested to upload in our blog. This video gives a very good example helping us to understand how abnormal data is analyzed in the existing database using SSIS' data profiling function.

MegaHotPot's presentation handout:

This is a digital version of our handout for tonight.  Hope you guys enjoy it:

Abstract and Reading for Today's Topic: The ETL process in Data Warehousing

Abstract of Presentation:

Data warehousing is one approach for data integration. Today, Our's topic is mainly focusing on ETL process for data warehousing.We would start with introducing data integrations approaches. One way to another, data warehousing is one of the most commonly used data storage methods used by data integration system designers. Advantaged and Drawbacks of data warehouse will all be covered in our presentation.

ETL is the process used in data warehousing. What ETL does, the issues within ETL and what's the general solutions to the problems would lead us to a practical world for data warehousing. SSIS is a platform for building enterprise-level data integration and data transformation solutions. Its features and development will also be discussed in our presentation.

Last but not least, most interesting part is from Mike's demostration! Please stay tuned and enjoy.

Reading materials suggestions:
1. Take a look at this website: http://www.datawarehouse4u.info/
It shows how ETL work in data warehouse, which could give you a intuitive view of data integration process within data warehouse.
2. http://communication.howstuffworks.com/data-integration.htm
This would be your startpoint in understanding data warehouse from data integration perspective. How data warehouse is better than other approached? Check it out.
3. Data Cleaning: Problems and Current Approaches. This article is for data cleaning and ETL, which is suggested by Dr, Zheng. It's a super important paper, highly related to our topic and presentation materials.
4. Another one suggested to read before our presentation would be:High impact Data Warehousing with SQL Server Integration Services and Analysis Services.(take a look at first few slides).

There are many other materials we've read for preparing our presentation. We included them in our presentation slices(the last slide as bibliography). Please check them out for further your further study.
(thanks bing, minor edits - mtm)

Data Warehouse

Thanks to Dr.Zheng's suggestions on our presentation! And we will be able to focus more on a new topic on Data Warehouse. I did some preliminary researches on Data Warehouse and found that Data Warehouse is closely related to an important component of ERP systems - Online Analytical Processing (OLAP). Luckily, one of the groups provided us a vivid presentation on ERP system at the beginning of this semester. Based on this knowledge, we will be able to expand further on OLAP.
OLAP includes decision support, modeling, information, retrieval, ad hoc reporting/analysis, and what-if analysis. Data Warehouse plays an important role in supporting business analysis applications. It is called a meta-database constructed for quick searching, retrieval, ad hoc queries, and ease of use. The data are normally extracted periodically from an operational database or from a public information service. Data Warehouse is a relational or multidimensional database that may consume hundreds of gigabytes or even terbytes of disk storage. Once the data is loaded into the warehouse, data are accessible via various query and analysis tools that are used for data mining.
The primary reason for using a data warehouse is to optimize business performance. By providing customers and suppliers with the information they need when they need it, the company can improve its relationships and provide better service, e.g. a responsive and efficient supply chain. Hope we will find a good example to explain the importance of Data Warehouse in our presentation.
Implementing a successful data warehouse involves installing a process for gathering data on an ongoing basis organizing it into a meaningful information, and delivering it for evaluation.
Dr.Zheng's links are also added here for sharing:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extract,_transform,_load
http://www.information-management.com/infodirect/2009_109/10014988-1.html