I have two sessions that I will be presenting in Iowa City, hope to see you there.

Increase your SSIS Productivity with Biml

Discover the power of Business Intelligence Markup Language (Biml) and increase your Integration Services development productivity. Biml can take your Integration Services package development to the next level. Creating template packages can add productivity to your Integration Services development effort. If the template design changes after development begins, refactoring to existing packages would be needed. See how Biml can help create template packages that can better adapt to changing business needs and allow for more comprehensive design or redesign.

This session will be a demo based session that will inspire you to make Biml your number one Integration Services development tool. Learn how to use Biml scripts to create both staging tables and Integration Services packages. Add metadata to your Biml scripts and really watch the possibilities expand.

Data Discovery with Microsoft Power Query for Excel

Understand how Power Query will fit into your enterprise information management strategy. Power Query, a free add-in for Excel 2010 and 2013, will enhance the self-service business intelligence offering from Microsoft. With Power Query the business analysis along with the BI developer can combine and shape data from a wide variety of data sources in a quick and easy manner. This task can enable more time to be spent in analysis and discover and less time build ETL plumbing.

This session will demo the ease of the data extraction process in Power Query. We will explore multiple data sources and even modify the language to create a foundation for further exploration into Power Query.

For more details go here: Event Site

Reeves

I will be speaking across the pond in Europe in March. I was fortunate enough to be picked for both PASS SQLRally-Nordic (Copenhagen, Denmark) and SQLBits (London, England). Both of the sessions will be on Biml and how it can be applied to your enterprise. These speaking engagements will take place immediately after I get back from traveling across the other pond to Australia, where I will be delivering another Biml talk with Peter Avenant and Paul Schmidt (Varigence Australia), and Warwick Rudd (SQL Masters Consulting).

At SQLRally: A New Approach to Unit and Integration Testing in SSIS

Testing is a critical part of the release process and vital to a high-quality data management lifecycle. Unfortunately, Integration Services (SSIS) does not have built-in support for testing and the tools for relational database testing are limited. As a result, most organizations forgo automated testing and focus entirely on manual user testing, which is both expensive and often occurs too late in the process to address all of the issues discovered.

In this session, a new approach to unit testing (focusing on verifying the correctness of individual packages, tasks, or dataflows) and integration testing (focusing on validating that the data produced by an entire sequence of transformations) will be discussed. This development pattern uses metadata authored by analysts to automatically generate testing logic within the corresponding packages or to automatically generate standalone test packages that contain all of the necessary validation logic.

Session details can be found here: https://sqlbits.com/Sessions/Event14/Increase_your_SSIS_productivity_with_Biml

At SQLBits: Increase your SSIS Productivity with Biml

Business Intelligence Markup Language (Biml) is an XML language for Microsoft Business Intelligence that can take your Integration Services package development to the next level. Creating template packages added productivity to your Integration Services development effort. If the template design changes after development begins, a fair amount of rework to packages could be needed. See how Biml can help create template packages that can better adapt to changing business needs and allow for more comprehensive design or redesign.

This session will be a demo based session that will inspire you to make Biml your number one integration services development tool. Learn how to use Biml scripts to create staging tables and integration services packages. Add metadata to your Biml scripts and really watch the possibilities expand.

Session details can be found here: http://www.sqlpass.org/sqlrally/2015/nordic/SessionDetails.aspx?sid=7570

Hope to see you there.

-Reeves

I will also be speaking at the SQL Saturday in Melbourne after the Biml Boot Camp.

Get Into Evaluation Context with DAX, the Language of PowerPivot

Data Analysis Expressions (DAX) is the language of PowerPivot and the Analysis Services Tabular engine. Review the basics of the DAX language and get introduced to evaluation context: including row and filter context. Learn why different cells return different results based on the same formula. Understanding evaluation context is the driving force behind releasing the potential to create truly dynamic DAX formulas. The demo will walk through various examples the DAX query language and demonstrate row and filter context.

Come by and see this session the 7th of February at 11:15am.

For full details see the event site: here

–Reeves

I will be speaking in Austin, TX just prior to my departure to Australia.

Increase your SSIS productivity with Biml

Discover the power of Business Intelligence Markup Language (Biml) and increase your Integration Services development productivity.

Business Intelligence Markup Language (Biml) is an XML language for Microsoft Business Intelligence that can take your Integration Services package development to the next level. Creating template packages added productivity to your Integration Services development effort. If the template design changes after development begins, a fair amount of rework to packages could be needed. See how Biml can help create template packages that can better adapt to changing business needs and allow for more comprehensive design or redesign. This session will be a demo based session that will inspire you to make Biml your number one integration services development tool. Learn how to use Biml scripts to create staging tables and integration services packages. Add metadata to your Biml scripts and really watch the possibilities expand. 

Come by and see this session the 30th of January at 11:30am.

For full details see the event site: here

–Reeves

For more event details check it out on Everbrite: http://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/sql-saturday-precon-biml-bootcamp-tickets-14151819473

Note: Don’t miss out on Paul’s Biml Fundamentals Webinar starting this week.

For more event details check it out on Everbrite:https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/biml-webinar-training-session-biml-fundamentals-tickets-12575667159

Speakers

• Paul Schmidt
• Peter Avenant
• Warwick Rudd
• Reeves Smith

SQL SQL Saturday Melbourne Pre-con Tracks

• Introduction to Business Intelligence Markup Language (Biml)
• Getting Started with BimlScript Transformers 
• Mist and Biml for DBAs
• Real World ETL framework for Data Warehouse Automation (DWA)
• SQL Server BI Upgrades and Migrations using Mist
• Power BI with Mist and Biml

Introduction to Business Intelligence Markup Language (Biml)
Biml is a XML dialect for defining business intelligence (BI) assets. Biml authored BI assets can currently be used by the BIDS Helper add-on for Microsoft SQL Server Business Intelligence Development Studio (BIDS) and the Varigence Mist integrated development environment; both tools translate Biml metadata into SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) and SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS) assets for the Microsoft SQL Server platform. In this interactive, demo focused session you’ll learn about Biml and see how BimlScript can automatically create staging tables, SSIS Packages, and other necessary objects during the modelling process.

Getting Started with BimlScript Transformers
Mist and Biml is so powerful that you can even change the way BI assets are generated, giving you incredible power and flexibility. Transformer BimlScript allow you to automatically enforce design patterns and frameworks at compile time without developer interaction. In this session, we introduce the concept of Transformer BimlScript and demonstrate how this is applied in the real world.

Mist for DBAs
A traditional DBA is primarily responsible for the Administration and Day-to-Day running of the SQL Server environments.
Regular tasks include:

• Database Maintenance and Data Maintenance Plans
• Migrating data from a production to test / development environment

In this session we will be exploring how Mist and Biml can make your life as a DBA easier and “bust the myth” that Mist and Biml are only for BI.

Metadata driven ETL framework for Data Warehouse Automation (DWA)
Design patterns, standards, metadata, and reuse are the cornerstones of data warehouse automation. 

• Design patterns can be coupled with architecture, design, and implementation standards and best practices to build reusable data warehousing components. 
• Patterns, standards, and components are captured and described as metadata.

In this session, we walkthrough how a metadata driven ETL framework has been implemented using Mist.

SQL Server BI Upgrades and Migrations using Mist
With Mist’s ability to reverse engineer SQL Server SSIS packages, upgrades and migrations between SQL Server platforms is made easy. Why waste time with the SSIS Package Upgrade Wizard when you can save time using Mist and Biml to upgrade your SSIS packages to any SQL Server platform (SQL Server 2005 or later).
In this session we walkthrough a real world example of upgrading and migrating SSIS packages between SQL Server environments.

Power BI with Mist and Biml
Deliver powerful tabular models from metadata generated in Mist and Biml. In this session we walkthrough how metadata in Mist and Biml is used to generate tabular models.

Tim Mitchell and I will again be delivering a Getting Started with Biml all day session. This time we will head to the east coast to deliver a precon prior to the SQL Saturday event in Washington D.C. If you are new to Biml and want to see what all of the buzz is about come join us for a great day of training.

Getting Started with Biml (Business Intelligence Markup Language)

Have you ever needed to generate dozens (or even hundreds) of similar SSIS packages? Do you ever find yourself needing to regenerate a lot of packages when some piece of the upstream data format changes? These are not uncommon scenarios faced by ETL developers, but historically there haven’t been any good tools to help with this. However, we’re going to introduce you to one of the most useful tools you may ever use: Biml.

For ETL developers, Biml (Business Intelligence Markup Language) is a game changer. This is a great new tool for Microsoft business intelligence developers who want to make the most of their development efforts. In short, it’s an XML-based language that will allow you to programmatically create SSIS packages. Even better, it can be enhanced with VB.NET or C# scripting to create BimlScript, which allows you to dynamically build and modify a few, dozens, or even hundreds of packages with minimal effort. Best of all, you don’t need budget approval – if you already have Visual Studio, you can use Biml and BimlScript for free!

In this full-day presentation, we’ll introduce you to dynamic package generation through Biml. Business intelligence consultants Tim Mitchell and Reeves Smith will walk you through the essentials of Biml – getting started, syntax, and common uses – followed by dozens of design patterns to improve your efficiency as an ETL developer.

Among the topics that we’ll cover:

• Overview of Biml – What is it? Where do I use it?
  
• Introduction to Biml syntax
  
• Biml in the Visual Studio environment
  
• Introduction to BimlScript syntax
  
• Dynamic package generation with BimlScript
  
• Metadata management with Biml
  
• Create a simple staging package project with dozens of packages in less than an hour
  
• Package (re)generation
  
• Source control
  
• Common design patterns for Biml in the enterprise
  
• Taking Biml to the next level with Mist
  

By the end of this full-day presentation, you should be equipped to get started immediately using Biml. It’s a revolutionary technology, and we hope that you’ll be as excited about Biml as we are.

Audience

This course is intended for business intelligence developers and other database professionals with experience creating and supporting SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) packages. Attendees should have a working knowledge of the SSIS essentials. In addition, some experience with either C# or VB.NET, and a basic understanding of XML (or other markup language) would be helpful.

For more details go here: Event Site

Hope to see you there.

Reeves

I will be speaking at the upcoming SQL Saturday in Washington D.C. I have two sessions, one on DAX and one on Power Query.

Get Into Evaluation Context with DAX, the Language of PowerPivot

Data Analysis Expressions (DAX) is the language of PowerPivot and the Analysis Services Tabular engine. Review the basics of the DAX language and get introduced to evaluation context: including row and filter context. Learn why different cells return different results based on the same formula. Understanding evaluation context is the driving force behind releasing the potential to create truly dynamic DAX formulas. The demo will walk through various examples the DAX query language and demonstrate row and filter context.

This session will be at 9:40 AM on Saturday December 6^th.

Data Discovery with Power Query for Excel

Power Query, a free add-in for Excel 2010 and 2013, will enhance the self-service business intelligence offering from Microsoft. With Power Query the business analysis along with the BI developer can combine and shape data from a wide variety of data sources in a quick and easy manner. This task can enable more time to be spent in analysis and discover and less time build ETL plumbing.

This session will demo the ease of the data extraction process in Power Query. We will explore multiple data sources and even modify the language to create a foundation for further exploration into Power Query.

This session will be at 2:55 PM on Saturday December 6^th

Hope to see you there.

Reeves

Another article was posted to the Notes From the Field series that is hosted out on SQLAuthority.com. This blog post continues the introduction of Biml with a good use case for why you might want to give Biml a look on your next Integration Services project.

What is Biml and How Can it Help Me with SQL Server BI?

The Why of Biml?

-Reeves

Increase your SSIS productivity with Biml

Discover the power of Business Intelligence Markup Language (Biml) and increase your Integration Services development productivity.

Business Intelligence Markup Language (Biml) is an XML language for Microsoft Business Intelligence that can take your Integration Services package development to the next level. Creating template packages added productivity to your Integration Services development effort. If the template design changes after development begins, a fair amount of rework to packages could be needed. See how Biml can help create template packages that can better adapt to changing business needs and allow for more comprehensive design or redesign. This session will be a demo based session that will inspire you to make Biml your number one integration services development tool. Learn how to use Biml scripts to create staging tables and integration services packages. Add metadata to your Biml scripts and really watch the possibilities expand. 

Come by and see this session the 25th of October at 1:20pm, at Spencer Fox Eccles Business Building 1655 Campus Center Dr, Salt Lake City, UT 84112

–Reeves

The Speaker Idol participants were released yesterday and I was lucky enough to make the cut. With that being said, I guess I will be speaking at the PASS Summit 2014, well kind-of.

This will be the first ever Speaker Idol competition and the group of people speaking are very talented. I think this will be the start of a great program to give less known speakers (speaking for myself only) an opportunity on the big stage and receive some great speaking feedback. We all like that, ummm… yea…

Does this schedule mean I’m going first?

Wednesday

• Reeves Smith
• Pieter Vanhove
• Mike Byrd
• Wagdy Ishac

Thursday

• Sergey Olontsev
• Ed Leighton-Dick
• Rob Volk
• Tim Costello

Friday

• John Flannery
• Luan Moreno Medeiros Maciel
• Mitchell Bottel
• Jason Carter

Best of luck everyone.

-Reeves