To begin at the beginning

“The data warehouse is dead. Long live the data warehouse.”

Afilonius Rex

“Ignore the hyper-nonsense about the data lakehouse, the digital doghouse, the information outhouse and the big bricking-it massive. Even if some really smartish dude tells you otherwise.”

Seneca

Heads up data, information, and knowledge people. Listen to me! If you are so of a mind.

But first, be forewarned and forearmed. This is not a love story. This is not an easy read. This is not a walk in the park. A breeze, cream puff, kids’ stuff, or a ’piece of cake.’ Moreover, this is not your granny’s world of data.

But, for all the content I include in this book, you might like it. And, with a fraction of effort on your part, you even get some tangible benefit from it. It’s like caviar, champagne and French fries. It’s an acquired taste, for sure.

Now, what is all of this about?

That’s a question worth much thought, discussion, and a whole shedload of answers.

In short, this book is about data, information, and knowledge. Most importantly, it provides snippets of my lifelong relationship with them and the people and organisations closely associated with them.

You may ask for even more about what I want to communicate, which is all fine and dandy. I may have some genuinely relevant, tangible, and concrete answers.

You know much about what goes on in the big world of IT. Or maybe not. On the other end of the scale, you may be new to the subjects.

It might be right or need to be corrected, but we’ll assess that as we go along.

So, let me try to explain. Better said! Let me engage, align and explain.

This work is a much-expanded, serious, yet tongue-in-cheek version of something I had previously cobbled together earlier in my publishing life. And happily received it was, too—a reception with, I must add, some significant degrees of tempered infamy, agitated surprise, and aggressively cute irritation.

For this exercise, which you can view as a revisionist’s revision, I have tried to channel the exquisite wit and wisdom of Pete and Dud and all the other childhood friends who entertained the laughs and tears out of me so many moons ago.

Moreover, and with the benefit of hindsight, this has mainly been to great successes of what I can only call inspirations of Mel Brooksian proportions.

Nevertheless, some good came of it.

I occasionally laughed, giggled, and smiled. Perhaps you will, too. I hope so. Because I would hate to be the only one to find it funny. However, being the only one, plus one, is probably far worse, like being a performing stand-up-philosopher that only one person in the audience claps.

So, without further ado and in the timeless tradition of the Ramones, “Hey ho, let’s go!”