Hello, SQL Server 2016 Yesterday, Microsoft announced the release of SQL Server 2016 on June 1st of this year: https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/dataplatforminsider/2016/05/02/get-ready-sql-server-2016-coming-on-june-1st/ . Along with performance benchmarks and a description of the new functionality, came the announcement of editions and features for the next release. Good-bye, Business Intelligence Edition The biggest surprise to me was the removal of the Business Intelligence edition that was initially introduced in SQL Server 2012. Truthfully, it never seemed to fit in the environments where I worked, so I guess it makes sense. Hopefully, fewer licensing options will make it easier for people to understand their licensing and pick the edition that works best for them. Feature Comparison Overall, the business intelligence services features included with each edition for SQL Server 2016 are fairly similar to SQL Server 2014. Nothing has been "downgraded&quo
Data science and data scientists are all the rage right now in the information technology space. Every company wants one; every job candidate touts they are one. But what actually does that mean to companies and potential employees? I decided to take a course on data science to see if I could find out! My co-worker, Gabriella Melki, recommended the Coursera Data Science specialization by John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The entire specialization contains a set of 9 courses, but you can take each one individually. I started with the first course, called "The Data Scientist's Toolbox". Over the four week timeframe, I was able to view lectures and perform the assignments at my own pace. I've listed below my thoughts on the course and what I learned about data science. Week 1: Introduction to Data Science Data science is about data , specifically about answering questions, and science , following a method to discover an answer. A data scientist is the