Building reports in Drupal is both easy and terrible. Views is an incredibly powerful tool, but is limited by user sophistication and the structure of Drupal’s data itself. 

If you’re overrun by requests for custom reports, views overrides, and worried about a crushing MySQL load when big reports run, there is another solution. You can build a data warehouse and run reports faster and more flexibly than you ever thought possible. A data warehouse will unlock untapped user value and generate revenue in your existing platform. Plus, data visualization is fun and easy!

We’ll review the process of denormalizing Drupal data and where to go from there. Learn about the tools necessary for extracting, transforming and loading (ETL) and cheap (or pricey) data warehouse options.

We’ll also talk about how your customers can access the data once the data warehouse is built, and review how to select business intelligence software to integrate into Drupal. You’ll also hear from a customer and learn firsthand how powerful a data warehouse can be for your product users.

Learning objectives:

Understand data denormalization and how to achieve it in Drupal.
Consider the necessity of ETL and commercial options vs home-grown solutions.
Evaluate and select a BI product and integrate it into Drupal
Understand how a data warehouse and BI product can improve customer satisfaction and unlock value in your product.