From the Editor

Welcome to the inaugural issue of "The Data Profiler." We hope this quarterly newsletter will be an important resource for Information Technology professionals interested in the methodology and trends of the data profiling field. During the past five years, there have been significant advances in data profiling technology, resulting in new products, techniques, and applications. "The Data Profiler" will report on these new developments including new vendors, new releases of existing products, methodology development, and data profiling techniques. News about other developments involving other areas pertinent to data profiling, such as data quality, CRM, and data integration may also be featured.

I encourage our readers to submit articles on how data profiling has been used in their organizations. What were some useful techniques? What best practices were used? What were the pitfalls and challenges in incorporating data profiling into existing project methodologies? Writers can also discuss how they integrated data profiling solutions and other data management products or methodologies.

Though "The Data Profiler" is a vendor-neutral publication, solutions providers can also submit articles that discuss their products, use in the marketplace, and success stories of their customers. Readers submitting articles can also mention the product they are using. If you are interested in submitting an article, go here.

The Data Profiler will also feature articles on how to use the results of data profiling in other areas and with other products. What data profiling results are useful in the ETL process? How can an evaluation of packaged software, such as CRM software, be improved by data profiling? What about implementing XML portals? Can rule-based systems be profiled? These are only some of the areas we will address in future issues.

Feedback is also important and readers' letters will also be published. If there are topics you want covered, let us know. Is the layout of the newsletter easy to read and navigate? Are the techniques and reviews concise and useful? Your feedback will be used to continuously improve the newsletter.

I hope you enjoy this and all other issues of "The Data Profiler." Thank you for stopping by.

Joseph Novella, Editor