Many CIO's and IT decision markers remain fascinated with the Open source Philosophy. Once viewed by some within the enterprise as a low-budget option to other proprietary software’s, open-source software has evolved into a strategic asset for many CIOs and IT administrators, earning equal footing in their businesses with proprietary software. But is it the right option for your business? This article tells us that the result to this question is neither art nor science, and offers a brief introduction for decision makers looking to go down the Open Source route for their Business Intelligence Solution.

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Open Source Business Intelligence (OSBI)
Friend or Foe
Published: June 6, 2013 - Fru Louis
WHAT IS FREE OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE (FOSS)
For a solution or product to be considered as open source software
by the software development industry, certain criteria must be met:
1. The program must be freely
distributed (It can be part of a package
that is sold though, such as Red Hat has
done with Linux in the example below).
2. Source code must be included.
3. Anyone must be allowed to modify the source code.
4. Modified versions can be redistributed.
5. The license must not require the exclusion of other software
or interfere with the operation of other software.
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WHAT IS OPEN SOURCE BI (OSBI)
It is hard not to be impressed with the growth of
open source platforms. Obviously the open
source philosophy has come a long way from
the early days of computing delivering stable
indispensable solutions like (Hadoop, Apache, Linux, Redhat,
MySQL, Mongo dB, etc.). The fields of Business intelligence (BI)
has also matured tremendously, now reaching the point where it’s
finally delivering huge return on investments (ROI) to companies
who invest in BI solutions. With FOSS and BI both growing, it
makes perfect sense to ask if a merging of the two to result in Open
Source Business Intelligence (OSBI) would be beneficial to
companies.
HOW DOES OSBI WORK?
OSBI is, technically, free business intelligence (BI)
software. Instead of selling traditional software
licenses, OSBI vendors charge for support,
documentation and code that have been fine-tuned
for specific audience or implementations.
A handful of open-source business intelligence
platform vendors have gained visibility and developed technology
platforms to be heard over the general market noise. Examples of
some popular OSBI vendors include (in no specific order):
Pentaho CloverET
L
ApatarForge Eclipse BIRT RapidMiner
JasperSoft Actuate SpagoBI OpenL Jedox

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IS OSBI RIGHT FOR YOU?
OSBI software has a lot going for it,
between access to source code, freedom
from licensing issues and the right to
modify the software to fit your needs—
not to mention the price tag of FREE.
Free can be hard to pass up, particularly
for IT leaders under pressure to do more
with less and this explain why OSBI
stays as a very appealing alternative to
traditional commercial software’s.
Unfortunately, while righteous in its premise, OSBI has long been
dogged by financial unsustainability issues and a ton of additional
cost that could pose great problems for adopters.
This challenges result from the fact that people usually gravitate
towards OSBI with the notion that there is ZERO cost associated
with the choice.
Sometimes this expectation is indeed true, with OSBI solutions
offering better quality and lower in long-term costs than
commercial BI alternatives. However, it is a fallacy to think that
Open Source BI means – WITHOUT COST.
Just like you receiving a FREE dog from a shelter doesn’t mean the
dog won’t cost you anything in its life time, downloading and using
OSBI software for free doesn’t mean that the cost of
implementation and maintenance of the software has been waived.
You would have to evaluate your options and make sure any
solution you pick, be it OSBI or not is right for you.
Fundamental questions like these must be asked and answered.
1. What BI Solution currently exists for your company?
2. What is needed?
3. Do you want to Host or not to host any solution?
4. What are you ready to spend to get it working?
5. Is there enough technical knowhow to implement and
support the OSBI solution?
6. Do the OSBI solutions available meet all your business
needs? Etc.
These are tough but very important questions that must be
asked/answered in order to maximize the chances of making a
successful decision on which solution use.
The summary matrix below provides of some the key attributes that
stake holders can consider when making their decisions.

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KEY CONSIDERATIONS FOR OSBI
Stake
Holder
Key
Attribute
Considerations
Business
Requirements
Cost From a business perspective the purchase cost of software is only one factor; total cost of ownership (TCO)
is what really matters. OSBI software are generally free to download, for example, but the actual costs of
successfully implementing the software once staff time and consulting costs are taken into account can
vary dramatically.
Additional
Resources
Required
Some open source software packages are easy to get started with, but others expect you to have someone
technically savvy
to get them up and running. And though a constellation of consultants and vendors tend to support most
open source packages, support costs can be as high as or higher than those for traditional software.
Available
capabilities for
Business Needs
Do all the available OSBI solutions meet all your business needs? For organizations looking to build a
customized solution on an existing platform of functionality and features, the lack of restrictions on
modification also makes open source software attractive because it reduces TIME TO VALUE as few
customizations would have to be built.
Legal Constraints Traditional software requires that organizations not only track licenses, but also the type of license
agreement that applies to each piece of software.
For instance, one package might require each user to have a license, while another requires only enough
licenses to cover simultaneous or “concurrent” users. Some require licenses per machine, or per processor
within a machine.
It’s easy even for conscientious organizations to end up in violation of license agreements, leaving them
vulnerable to legal action and fines. OSBI gives companies more flexibility, since it can be installed on as
many systems as needed without tracking licenses.
Technical
Requirements
Reliability and
Availability
Consideration of factors such as uptime requirements, downtime costs, failover and disaster recovery
capabilities

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Manageability and
Serviceability
How easy is the environment to manage? What sorts of skills, training, additional tools, custom
development is needed to provide monitoring for problems, deployment of applications, configuration
management, problem diagnosis
Maintainability
and Supportability
Patch management, application deployment, product support costs and capabilities, ability to substitute
alternatives
Security Not just for the application, but infrastructure and connectivity to databases, other application, proxies,
cluster peers.
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Performance and
Scalability
How do supported applications behave when the transaction volume and dynamic load change needs? Will
the addition of capacity be predictable and cost effective?
Extensibility How easy is it to add new features / functions without disruptive and expensive efforts?
TAKE AWAY POINTS FOR DECISION MAKERS
At the end of the day, OSBI could be useful, but it isn’t necessarily
the best solution
just because it’s
open source.
Whether or not
open source
software is a good idea for you can also depend on the culture of
your organization. Some organizations tend to stick with established
technology brands, and prefer Microsoft’s software and all the
support and brand recognition that comes with it over a smaller
provider’s competing releases. If that’s the case at your organization,
then you may find it convenient to stay the course. For decision
makers who have an open mind and are ready to try new solutions,
then it’s important to weigh the needs of your organization against
the core characteristics (good or bad) provided by OSBI such as
compatibility, interoperability, ease of use, availability of support,
legal and all associated costs. When all this is done, then you can
safely make your decision based on how well a given solution fits
your needs—not whether that solution is open source.
RECOMMENDED READ
 A book by Lindsay Wise is definitely worth reading for
those considering or just curious about OSBI.
http://www.wiseanalytics.com/book/book.php

6. About NextGen
NextGen Global Solutions, LLC. (NGG: IT) is an information technology consulting, research and advisory company. We deliver the technology-related
insight necessary for our clients to make the right decisions, every day. From CIOs and senior IT leaders, to business leaders, Engineering and Service
professionals. Information is power in this digital age, and we try to research and provide the resources and solutions that would help decision makers
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