Tag Archives: PowerShell

Implementing a Web Cross-Selling Application

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Data Mining with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Review Chapter 18

I have started a new refrain in my presentations: “SQL Server Data Mining is not an application, it is a service”. Possible application interfaces for this technology include:

The book (in its entirety) covers four of the five interfaces. In this chapter, the authors provide “code snippets” in C# (intended for an ASP.NET application) and also DMX code. For the purpose of this review, I will provide the PowerShell translation of the C# code (since PowerShell is not covered in the book). DMX could be sent from any of the five options above, but I will be discussing SSMS.

Both the “code snippets” and the DMX were provided to model the Movie Click dataset. The goal of this chapter is Continue reading “Implementing a Web Cross-Selling Application” »

Programming SQL Server Data Mining with PowerShell 2.0

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Data Mining with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Review Chapter 16

Programmers: Who are you?

I first had “programming” work in the 1980s. This chapter mentions programming in the title, and in looking for MSDN web references, I find the term developer more common. I decided to see what the difference is between programmer and developer. Wikipedia was no help, only to say that programming has been met with more comparative derision, while developer implies engineering (I deliberately provide no reference since Wikipedia is an ever-changing reference source). The Wikipedia definition does not include a strong statement on science, and that omission stands out to me.

I personally believe that programmer and developer are equivalent terms, but perhaps my perception reveals my age and experience with specific respected people who use these terms to refer to themselves. More important than either of these terms to me are the words engineering and science. In the MarkTab lexicon, engineers build things, and scientists apply the scientific method. I do not believe these terms are essentially independent — they might be, but not necessarily.

On this blog, I believe all data model builders are engineers, and may be scientists too. Someone applying a model (an analyst performing a prediction query) need not build a model, and applying models to data could be engineering but also could be science too. Analysts who apply models might be called a data mining scientist or data mining engineer. Some people might not feel like they are a scientist, but when we apply the scientific method, we are practicing science. In the history of science, you might be surprised at what simple tasks are considered science.

Some might believe data mining scentist should apply to someone who creates algorithms. I disagree with that application, and I have other terms for that person: Continue reading “Programming SQL Server Data Mining with PowerShell 2.0” »

Analysis Management Objects (AMO) and Powershell 2.0

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Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services Unleashed Review Chapter 34

This chapter discusses the AMO managed assembly, which describes a hierarchical model of major objects and minor (dependent) objects for administering Analysis Services. The diagram located at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms345083.aspx is more comprehensive than the one the book has on page 671. The Microsoft Developer Network (msdn.microsoft.com) website has full developer resources, and for this topic see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms124924.aspx.

The authors provided extensive C# code for this chapter. As with Chapter 33, I decided to translate the console applications into PowerShell 2.0. This blog post will go through the solutions provided by the author, and show the PowerShell code (I provided a PowerShell introduction in the Chapter 33 review, and therefore I skip that preliminary and necessary step for this blog post). Continue reading “Analysis Management Objects (AMO) and Powershell 2.0” »

ADOMD.NET with PowerShell 2.0 and C# 4.0

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Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services Unleashed Review Chapter 33

This chapter covers the ADOMD.NET provider. Some of the chapters in this book only have a few pages, essentially a short essay. This chapter has over 60 pages, and therefore I would consider it a small book. Though, developers might feel even this length is too short. Hopefully, the sample code provides some compensation. This blog post is long, and I spent more time because the book comes with a lot of sample code in C#.

Outline:

  • Gentle Introduction to ADOMD.NET — Basics about this topic with some web links. This provider is important for Analysis Services and therefore is also important for SQL Server Data Mining.
  • Gentle Introduction to PowerShell 2.0 — Command prompt has been around since I first used BASIC on the TRS-80 (in the 1980s). If you are a developer you should not be using the command window anymore. PowerShell does everything the command window can do and more.
  • Project by Project Commentary on Sample Code — Coverage of the many C# solutions provided with the book. When the authors wrote a C# console application, I rewrote a PowerShell 2.0 translation of the code. I will provide my PowerShell 2.0 code (which you can compare with the freely downloadable code from the book authors). Though none of the examples explicitly discuss data mining, the PowerShell scripts provide insight on how to use PowerShell with SQL Server Data Mining.

Gentle Introduction to ADOMD.NET

If you are developing with Visual Studio, then you will like this chapter. Continue reading “ADOMD.NET with PowerShell 2.0 and C# 4.0” »