Using Pentaho: Open Source Business Intelligence Tool

Pentaho is an open source application software that contains different functionalities that can serve various users especially those in businesses. The system has the following functionalities:

1. KPI Dashboard

The dashboard contains gauges that measure specific accounts of the company like average sales, order cancellation, items per sale and inventory status. It has Territory Value and Product Line options that you can change to view different results of the accounts specified depending on the location and type of product. This is a very nice tool to show the status of the company’s accounts.

2. Product Sales Breakdown

This functionality shows graphs and a table that describe the product sales (graph), sales trend (graph) and total sales by supplier (table). Like the KPI Dashboard, this also has Territory Value and Product Line options that you can change to view different results of the accounts specified depending on the location and type of product. This uses graphs and tables instead of gauges to visualize the company’s performance.

3. Google Maps

This functionality shows a map where you can see different locations or territories. When you choose a specific sales threshold you will see balloons on specific areas. The color of the balloons describes the sales for that area. I believe that this part of the software is an enhancement of existing software; it just added the balloons and threshold ranges to describe accounts like sales.

4. Buyer Product Analysis Report

This part contains drop-down fields - “choose a line” (products) and “output type” (file type of the report to be shown) that presents reports of a specific product and the report on that product depending on your choice.

5. Product Line Sales Trend Analyzer Report

The ‘Analyzer Reports’ looks simpler compared to the ‘Report’. The ‘Report’ contains detailed information about a specific product; the ‘Analyzer Report’ on the other hand, presents summarized information in a graphical form. It is better to use the ‘Analyzer Report’ when presenting it to report viewers particularly the top management of the company since it is very straightforward.

Pentaho is a sophisticated software that targets businesses. Its is best for database management, reports and presentations. It has different functionalities that can be used depending on the needs of the business.

MS Access and Pentaho are similar in some ways like serving as a data management system. Nevertheless, these still have differences. They have different capabilities and features. As mentioned before, Pentaho is an open source application software, while MS Access is not. MS Access is a relational database management system, while Pentaho is a business intelligence system. I think Pentaho is better used in reports and presentations because of its attractive applications and interface. Lastly, I believe Pentaho is simpler and more enjoyable to use compared to MS Access.