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Best OLAP Tools For Your Organization
Here we go!
#1)IBM Cognos
IBM Cognos Logo
Availability: Proprietary License
IBM Cognos is an integrated, web-based analytical processing system owned by IBM. It contains toolkit to perform analysis, reporting and score carding along with the provision to monitor metrics.
It also contains numerous inbuilt components to meet various information requirements in an organization.
These components are mainly windows based namely IBM Cognos Framework Manager, cube designer, IBM Cognos Transformer, map manager and IBM Cognos connection.
IBM Cognos Report Studio is used to create reports that are shared with knowledge processing departments. It gives the flexibility to create any type of report including charts, lists, maps, and repeat function.
IBM Cognos Analysis Studio is used to search for background information about an action/ event and prepare the analysis of large data sources. Key OLAP features like roll up and drills down are used to get a better understanding of information.
Click IBM Cognos to visit the official company website.
#2) Micro Strategy
MicroStrategy Logo
Availability: Licensed
MicroStrategy is a Washington-based company that provides services on BI and mobile software worldwide. MicroStrategy Analytics enables companies/organizations to analyze large volumes of data and distribute the business specific insight throughout the organization securely.
It delivers reports and dashboards to the users and allows to conduct and share analysis via mobile devices as well.It is a secure and scalable software with very good governance features of enterprise level BI.
MicroStrategy is available in both the forms: on-premises software as well as host-based service in MicroStrategy Cloud. It helps to make better decisions and build a smarter enterprise.
Click Microstrategy to visit the official company website.
#3) Palo OLAP Server
Palo OLAP Server Logo
Availability: Open source
Palo is an MOLAP- multidimensional online analytical processing server typically used as a BI tool for various purposes like controlling and budgeting etc. Palo is a product of Jedox AG.
It has spreadsheet software as its user interface. Palo allows different users to share a centralized database that acts as a single source of truth.This type of flexibility to handle complex data models enables users to have a deeper insight into statistics.
It works with real time data and data can be consolidated or written back with the help of multidimensional queries.
In order to give faster data access to all the users, Palo stores run-time data in memory.
Palo is available as open source and comes with a proprietary license.
Click Palo to visit the official company website.
#4) Apache Kylin
Apache Kylin Logo
Availability: Open source
Apache Kylin is a multidimensional open source analytics engine. It is designed to provide SQL interface and MOLAP in synchronous with Hadoop to support large data sets.
It supports rapid query processing in three steps
Identify the star schema
Build cube from data tables
Run query and get results via APIs
Kylin is developed to reduce query processing time for faster processing of billions of data rows.
Click Kylin to visit the official company website.
#5) icCube
icCube Logo
Availability: Licensed
Switzerland-based company icCube owns a business intelligence software of the same name.
It sells an online analytical processing server which is implemented in Java as per J2EE standards. It is an in-memory OLAP server and it is compatible to work with any data source that holds its data in tabular form.
IcCube comes with inbuilt plugins that facilitate file access and HTTP stream etc. It has a unique web interface to carry out activities like cube modeling, MDX (Multidimensional expression) queries, server monitoring and dashboards. It is an excellent as well as quality focused data analysis and visualization tool.
It is an excellent as well as quality focused data analysis and visualization tool.
Click icCube to visit the official company website.
#6) Pentaho BI
Pentaho BI Logo
Availability: Open source
Pentaho is a powerful open source tool that provides key BI features like OLAP services, data integration, data mining, extraction-transfer-load (ETL), reporting and dashboard capabilities.
Pentaho is built on Java platform that can work with Windows, Linux and Mac operating systems.
Pentaho comes in two editions one is Enterprise Edition & another one is Community Edition. Enterprise edition has extra support features and services. It is a very flexible BI tool with good comprehensive capabilities.
Click Pentaho to visit the official company website.
#7) Mondrian
Mondrian Logo
Availability: Open source
Mondrian is a very interactive tool with outstanding features and strengths like its ability to work with categorical data, large data as well as geographical data. It is a general purpose data visualization tool. It consists of interlinked plots and queries.
Initially, Mondrian had focused on visualization techniques for categorical data mainly. However, over the time, a complete suite of visualizations was added for univariate and multivariate data. Its linkage to R offers great statistical procedures.
Today, Mondrian even supports geographical data with the help of highly interactive maps.Mondrian works with standard ASCII files (comma separated & tab delimited). It can load data from R workspaces.
In collaboration with R, Mondrian offers brilliant statistical functions like multi-dimensional scaling (MDS), density estimation, principal component analysis (PCA) etc.
Click Mondrian to visit the official company website.
#8) OBIEE
OBIEE Logo
Availability: Open source
A unique platform OBIEE (Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition) enables its customers to have deeper insights into the data and helps make faster informative decisions. It offers visual analytics via highly interactive dashboards. It is capable of providing metadata search, in time alerts and powerful operational reporting.
Oracle BI 12c is a comprehensive solution with brilliant in-memory computing and well-streamlined system management. It reduces ownership cost and increases revenues for the organization.
Click OBIEE to visit the official company website.
#9) JsHypercube
JsHypercube Logo
Availability: Open source
JsHypercube is an OLAP database server written in Java programming language. It is a light-weight database. It is best suited for any application that involves the integration and aggregation of metrics for serving the primary purpose of dynamic charting.
It gives the capability to slice and dice datasets in real time rapidly. The OLAP functions can be performed on data with low-latency. It is an n-dimensional database with powerful aggregation capability.
Click Hypercube to visit the official company website.
#10) Jedox
Jedox Logo
Availability: Licensed
Jedox is a systematic data analysis tool that creates business intelligence solutions. It has a specially designed cell oriented core and a multidimensional analytical processing server.
Jedox is specially designed for reporting, planning and data consolidation. It uses Microsoft Excel and spreadsheet as its UI.Jedox streamlines organizational budgeting and forecasting. It connects to user system’s general ledger, operational systems, and ERP systems.
Jedox supports multi-dimensional query processing and keeps data in its cache for faster processing. It has inbuilt APIs that help it integrate its database in different environments.
Click Jedox to visit the official company website.
I would also like to list some equally good tools here that can be considered for OLAP slicing and dicing
#11) SAP AG
SAP AG is a large software supplier globally as well as well-known producer of enterprise-wide business applications built on a client-server model in the software market. SAP has two major rivals in the market namely Oracle and Baan.
Oracle database uses R/3 component of SAP which made SAP as leading seller of value added Oracle products.
Click SAP to visit the official company website.
#12) DBxtra
DBxtra is an excellent report designing software that users can use to create and distribute interactive reports and dashboards in very less time. DBxtra Users need not have knowledge of SQL queries or web technologies. It has made designing and distribution of ad-hoc reports and easy task.
Click DBxtra to visit the official company website.
#13)HOLOS
Holos was developed by a holistic system is an influential OLAP tool. It is the first tool to provide hybrid OLAP. It has a quite versatile mechanism to handle large data cubes, dimensions, and metadata.
Click Holos to visit the official company website.
#14) Clear Analytics
Clear Analytics is a revolution in self-service analytics. It has impressive features like data access to all, secure data analysis, Power BI etc. that give it an edge. Clear Analytics has a powerful self-service BI that enables everyone in the organization to do power analysis with no manual intervention required.
All the spreadsheets are centralized in clear analytics and the data is fully auditable.
Click Clear Analytics to visit the official company website.
#15) Bizzscore
Bizzscore is a Dutch performance management tool. It is a BI solution that falls in the category of niche and innovative products. Bizzscore aims at developing specific elements of business intelligence. It focusses on performance management primarily.
Bizzscore supports many performance and quality management models like INK-models, the Balanced Scorecard, EFQM etc.
#16) NECTO
NECTO is the main BI product of Panorama software company. It offers data mining, reporting and spontaneous data views without the need of running the report first. Users can create visual presentations and dashboards with the help of Necto. It has unique features like collaborative decision-making and generating one-click reports.
Click Necto to visit the official company website.
#17) Phpmyolap
Phpmyolap is an OLAP application in PHP for performing analytics in MySQL databases. It does not require any Java-based web services to perform operations. It does not depend on MDX language as well. It is quite an independent and self-sufficient software.
#18) Jmagallanes
Jmagallanes is an open source tool. It is an OLAP application for dynamic reporting by the end user. It is written in Java/J2EE programming language. It has the capability to read data from multiple sources like SQL, XML, and Excel and combines data to generate reports, pivot tables and charts.
It generates reports in various output formats such as PDF, XML format or any other application specific files.
Click Jmagallanes to visit the official company website.
#19) HUBSPOT
HUBSPOT is a unique BI tool of its own kind. It does not monitor financials or client information like other tools, it analyzes organization’s inbound marketing efforts. This is the best-suited tool to determine investment returns for complex marketing aspects like blogging, email marketing, and blogging etc. It is an excellent marketing platform.
Click HUBSPOT to visit the official company website.
Conclusion
To sum up, one should always identify and design predictive analytics strategy first based on the existing systems being used in the organization, be it any of the sectors supply chain management system, marketing organization, CRM, human resources or ERP etc.
Several of the products mentioned above in the list will work perfectly for all lines-of-business users.
Execution speed, ownership cost, user-friendly interface, energy efficiency and interactive reports etc. are some additional key features to help users make a selection of the best-suited tool. We hope this article was helpful!
Sources:
Top 10 Best Analytical Processing (OLAP) Tools: Business Intelligence — Software Testing Help
Top 4 open source ERP systems
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Businesses with more than a handful of employees have a lot to balance including pricing, product planning, accounting and finance, managing payroll, dealing with inventory, and more. Stitching together a set of disparate tools to handle those jobs is a quick, cheap, and dirty way to get things done.
That approach isn’t scalable. It’s difficult to efficiently move data between the various pieces of such an ad-hoc system. As well, it can be difficult to maintain.
Instead, turn to an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system.
The big guns in that space are Oracle, SAP, and Microsoft Dynamics. Their offerings are comprehensive, but also expensive. What happens if your business can’t afford one of those big implementations or if your needs are simple? You turn to the open source alternatives.
There are a number of flexible, feature-rich, and cost effective open source ERP systems out there. Here is a look at four of them.
What to look for in an ERP system
Obviously, you will want a system that suits your needs. Depending on those needs,more features doesn’t always mean better. However, you needs might change as your business grows so you’ll want to find an ERP system that can expand to meet your new needs. That could mean the system has additional modules, or just supports plugins and add-ons.
Most open source ERP systems are web applications. You can dowload and install them on your server. But if you don’t want to, or don’t have the skills or staff to, maintain a system yourself then make sure there’s a hosted version of the application available.
Finally, you’ll want to make sure that the application has good documentation and good support—either in the form of paid support or an active user community.
Odoo
Odoo is an integrated suite of applications that includes modules for project management, billing, accounting, inventory management, manufacturing, and purchasing. Those modules can communicate with each other to efficiently and seamlessly exchange information.
While ERP can be complex, Odoo makes it friendlier with a simple, almost spartan interface. The interface is reminiscent of Google Drive, with just the functions you need visible.
Odoo is a web-based tool. Subscriptions to individual modules will set you back $20 (USD) a month for each one. You can also download it or grab the source code from GitHub.
You can give Odoo a try before you decide to sign up.
ERPNext
ERPNext was featured on Opensource.com last November, and it’s one of those classic open source projects. It was designed to scratch a particular itch, in this case replacing a creaky and expensive proprietary ERP implementation.
ERPNext was built for small and medium-sized businesses. It includes modules for accounting, managing inventory, sales, purchase, and project management. The applications that make up ERPNext are form-driven—you fill information in a set of fields and let the application do the rest. The whole suite is easy to use.
If you’re interested, you can test drive ERPNext before taking the plunge and downloading it or buying a subscription to the hosted service.
Dolibarr
Like ERPNext, Dolibarr is aimed at small and medium-sized businesses. It offers end-to-end management of your business from keeping track of invoices, contracts, inventory, orders, and payments to managing documents and supporting electronic point-of-sale system. It’s all wrapped in fairly clean interface.
If you’re wondering what Dolibarr can’t do, here’s some documentation about that.
In addition to an online demo, Dolibarr also has an add-ons store from which you can buy software that extends Dolibarr’s features.
Opentaps
Unlike the other ERP systems that this article discusses, Opentaps is designed for larger businesses. To that end, it packs a lot of power and flexibility.
You get the expected set of modules that help you manage inventory, manufacturing, financials, and purchasing. You also get an analytics feature that helps you analyze all aspects of your business. You can use that information to better plan into the future. Opentaps also packs a powerful reporting function.
On top of that, you can buy add-ons and additional modules to enhance Opentaps’ capabilities. There are only a handful available right now, but they include integration with Amazon Marketplace Services and FedEx.
Before you download Opentaps, give the online demo a try.
Thanks to Opensource.com moderator Scott Nesbitt for this article.
The Top 8 Free, Open Source ERP Software
Published July 26th, 2017 by Andrew Marder in ERP
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Update 7/20/2017: We’ve added some new ERP options and removed those that were out of date.
Solving complicated problems for your business doesn’t mean you have to splash out on a million dollar enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. Oracle and SAP may dominate the field, but there are plenty of free, open source ERP options that can help get your business in shape.
top free and open source erp software
Before we dive in, a word to the wise: putting an ERP in place is a headache. Most implementations go over budget, take too long, don’t deliver on the plan, and just generally make businesses miserable.
Don’t fall into those camps. Having a clear plan, a clear problem, and clear goals is the recipe for ERP success. Even a “free” ERP costs your business time and money.
The following options are presented in alphabetical order.
Dolibarr ERP is super popular, and I feel genuinely remiss for not having added it to this lineup earlier. So far this year, it’s already been downloaded 129,000 times from SourceForge, putting it light-years ahead of my Linux-based keno simulator, “Keno Speaker.”
Dolibarr in action (Source: Dolibarr.org)
Dolibarr comes with everything an ERP needs, including accounting, CRM, HR, and inventory modules. If you want to expand functionality into the weird or incredibly specialized, Dolibarr offers apps through its Dolistore—you can also just build your own, if you’re so inclined.
Due to its popularity, Dolibarr is updated pretty constantly and has a very active user forum for troubleshooting and general discussion. On that note, it’s also a very popular program internationally, meaning Dolibarr is likely to be available in your language—assuming you speak a European language, that is.
Dolibarr is a great option for businesses with in-house tech teams and those that want to be a part of a bigger ERP community.
Cloud installations are possible, though you might be better off outsourcing to one of Dolibarr’s hosting partners. You can read reviews of Dolibarr on the project’s Capterra listing.
ERPNext is an open source solution with the modern user in mind. ERPNext is designed for small and medium businesses (SMBs) and is presented as a series of apps. The whole system is designed for the less technical among us, which is both a blessing and a curse.
Source: ERPNext
ERPNext’s simplicity means that it’s easy to set up, using simple forms to enter information about your business and walking you through the whole process in typical setup wizard style. It’s a feeling that quickly becomes familiar, as the ERP is clean and user friendly.
Of course the downside is in expanding the ERP to fit specific needs for larger or more complex businesses. While there are built in tools for designing specific forms and reports, adding more complex elements requires diving head-first into the code.
ERPNext is free for five users when hosted online, or free for any size business when installed on your own servers.
iDempiere is a full-fledged ERP, with everything from invoicing to POS integration to warehouse management to forecasting. While iDempiere is open source, installing an ERP is never truly free. Chuck Boecking, an ERP specialist, suggests budgeting between $20 ,000and $100,000 for businesses earning $10 million to $100 million.
iDempiere
Source: iDempiere
iDempiere, like most open source programs, relies on community support for troubleshooting. Businesses may also call in specialists with experience in iDempiere.
The software provides just about everything an ERP could, including product planning, warehouse management, and payroll, among many others.
While it requires more setup than some of the other options on this list, iDempiere is one of the most robust open source options available.
MixERP is free and open source, built on the ASP.net framework. In its free iteration, you manage hosting and upgrading, but you’ll have access to support for $49 per issue. It’s a nice mix between do-it-yourself and complete outsourcing.
Source: MixERP
The free version comes with all the bells and whistles, including inventory management, sales management, accounting, and HR tools to keep your business running smoothly. It does lack manufacturing and payroll management options, though, so larger companies will need to use one of the cloud or on-premises, paid versions.
Odoo offers one application for free for under 50 users, when hosted online, but it jumps up after that. However, if you install and maintain the software in house, Odoo is totally free.
The software covers all the standard warehousing, manufacturing, and sales channels. Odoo’s distinction is that the whole system revolves around a series of apps.
Source: Odoo
You can bolt on access to apps for a monthly fee that help you build a website, install eCommerce portals, run a CRM, and on and on. The benefit of this system is you don’t end up running a bloated system when you could be running a slim setup.
Odoo’s obvious downside is the limitation on users or the need to have a skilled technical team in house. Luckily, adding online users isn’t prohibitively expensive. With its scaled approach to users and features, Odoo provides a solution that can grow with your business.
Openbravo is a retail-focused ERP based on a modular system. The software comes in three “flavors” depending on the needs of your organization. Openbravo Community edition is the free release, offering a stripped down version of the paid Enterprise and Professional editions. These editions include some premium, commercial modules — like financial management and inventory management — that many businesses find necessary.
Openbravo Community edition is the free release, offering a stripped down version of the paid Enterprise and Professional editions. These editions include some premium, commercial modules such as financial management and inventory management that many businesses find necessary.
Source: Openbravo
Moving up to the Professional or Enterprise editions will set you back, so talk to Openbravo for a quote before you make a final decision.
Like Odoo, Openbravo’s open source meets commercialized product approach gives users a place to go for support besides just community forums. Of course, support comes at a cost, which can put a damper on the lower cost option that open source often offers.
VIENNA Advantage is an open source ERP out of Germany. The core product includes an ERP and CRM that the rest of the solutions revolve around. The platform is web-based, so you can access it across devices and without having to worry about some of the nitpicky compatibility issues that plague small businesses.
The Community eEdition is a free option for “developers, technical companies and microenterprises looking to deploy a basic set of features.”
There is no built-in support for this edition and you’ll have to have someone with strong technical skills on-hand to get things running smoothly.
That said, once installed, you’ll have access to a ton of free modules. These include document management, accounting, and reporting tools.
If you end up loving the product and want to move management over to someone else, Vienna offers two cloud-based, hosted solutions. One for SMBs and one for enterprise clients.
xTuple makes a range of ERP and manufacturing-focused products, but the core of all these options is PostBooks. PostBooks manages the central functionality of an ERP, which is extended by xTuple’s other offerings.
Source: xTuple
With PostBooks, four users get access to almost everything you need to run a single-location operation. That means inventory for one location, accounting, billing, reporting, and other sales tools. You won’t get multiple locations, advanced MRP tools, or other advanced planning tools, but you could extend into those features later with one of the paid offerings.
PostBooks is a great fit for service companies, as they don’t have the advanced manufacturing and inventory requirements that would require an upgrade. Even for a smaller, single location warehouse, PostBooks could be a good fit. Just know that you’re limited in your scale if you’re planning to stick with the free option.
Conclusion
The range of open source ERP options should offer a solution for almost any business. While implementations can go awry, making clear plans and having an understanding of the problems that you’re trying to solve with an ERP can take a lot of the sting out of putting one into place.
If you’re looking for a more extensive list of ERP options, check out Capterra’s full listing of ERPs, complete with reviews and feature breakdowns.
