If you’ve come here to read a blog post about BigQuery or data analysis, you may also be interested in this book, which helps data analysts and engineers pilot and run a data program. While it focuses on Google BigQuery as the technology medium, many chapters focus on less technical subjects. This includes areas such as establishing a project charter, data governance, and adapting to long-term change.
More generally, this book will take you from the basic concepts of data warehousing through the design, build, load, and maintenance phases. You will build capabilities to capture data from the operational environment, and then mine and analyze that data for insight into making your business more successful. You will gain practical knowledge about how to use BigQuery to solve data challenges in your organization.
I had originally expected this book would be about 400 pages long, in which I would primarily discuss BigQuery as a technology and its specific application. When I got down to it, I realized I had a lot more to say about how to structure and launch data programs, and the people and process components of having them succeed. It came in at 550 — and the extra 150 pages are all about data warehouses in a BigQuery-agnostic sort of way, discussing the implementation of project charters, data governance, and an enduring culture of data.
So even if you have no interest in BigQuery, but you have been tasked with building or running a data warehouse, there are a lot of useful insights compiled from my experience in running software engineering organizations. There are also a series of related forays into reporting, dashboarding, and machine learning techniques.
BigQuery for Data Warehousing is available now. Go order it!