Predictive analytics - one dimension to tap max potential of your Big Data

Predictive analytics is the process of using data analytics to make predictions based on data. This process uses data along with analysis, statistics, and machine learning techniques to create a predictive model for forecasting future events. When we say “predictive analytics” we mean   application of a statistical or machine learning technique to create a quantitative prediction about the future.
For example False Alarms from electrocardiographs and other patient monitoring devices are a serious problem in intensive care units (ICUs). Noise from false alarms disturbs patients’ sleep, and frequent false alarms desensitize clinical staff to genuine warnings. Metlab has developed an algorithms that can detect QRS complexes, distinguish between normal and ventricular heartbeats, and filter out false QRS complexes caused by cardiac pacemaker stimuli. The algorithms produced a true positive rate (TPR) and true negative rate (TNR) of 92% and 88%, respectively. What it means is data of ECG, ABP & PPG devices are now being processed to identify a false alarm and it is improving life of patients as well as hospital staff.


Predictive analytic's has become the key to helping businesses create differentiated, personalized customer experiences and help customer make better decisions. As we know predictive analytics strategy and architecture are very custom to the client landscape & requirements.

Key considerations while architecting for Predictive Analytics-

1. Predictive analytics must cover the full customer life cycle                                                       . Organizations require predictable insights into customer behaviors and business operations. Design idea should be to deliver value to customers throughout their life cycle to differentiate their customer experience and sustain business growth. The business stakeholders input is key and it will help identify effective mechanisms for translating the business knowledge to predictive algorithm inputs thereby optimizing predictive models faster and realizing deeper customer insights.
2. Build your Big Data architecture around predictive analytic's                                                    There is no dependency of predictive analytic's on big data, Only thing that has changed is with Big Data processing e have access to larger data sets that can be used for predictive analytic's.  By putting predictive analytics solutions at the core of your platform we create synergies between the analytic's layer and big data processing.
3. Learn from leading companies embracing digital transformation.                                         A large Australian telco improved customer discovery for precise targeting of ads; Another US telco optimized its marketing mix for effective channel interaction; A UK telco major deepened its insights into the voice of the customer to improve customer satisfaction; and many companies are providing personalized digital experiences to maximize customer loyalty.

Career choice - What has better future Android Development or Big Data Development?

I was at a Big Data seminar and one of the participants asked me this questions about choosing career between Android & Big Data. Incidentally I have experience of working on both technologies as an architect/developer/designer and I found the dilemma interesting for someone who has to choose a career track and I decided to post my thoughts.

Choosing a career track is a difficult decision when you are a fresher and don't have any development experience. My suggestion is to first spend some time& effort in learning about both these technologies. If possible you should attend a basic training and do some hands on development on both technologies to get an idea of what is it all about.

Both technologies 'Android' and 'Big Data' (Big Data is actually a set of technologies) have tremendous potential and while Android is already accepted and adapted by industries, Big Data is still in the stage where more than 80% of the industry is still planning their move. Architecturally Big Data is more complex as it is about restructuring the approach to process and consume your data and requires experienced data architects to plan the Big data journey where as android /mobile architecture is kind of 'add-on' that can sit on your existing architecture and does not involve huge invests. So investment is also a decision factor for companies to adopt Big Data thought you can always start small with Big Data. Big Data is actually a set of technologies from Haddop, HBase, Hive, MAP-R  to Data Analytics and more. In the long run there is an opportunity to become a data scientist and we are already short of data scientist and the demand for data scientist is expected to grow exponentially. So is Big Data a good career track ? Definitely it is a interesting and challenging career track and this is a good time to get started on Big Data set of technologies. Do

The reason Android (or mobile architecture in particular) is a hot technology (and has been so for last few years) is because the exponential rise is use of mobile devices and improved & cheaper mobile internet connectivity across the world. Today the companies do not have an option but to make their services available over mobiles for their consumers as well as their work force. Android market share is increasingly growing as compared to iOS so it is a definitely good career track to aspire for. The other reason why one can choose mobile technology as a career track because there is big potential innovate in this area and you can see many startups leveraging mobile technology and it does not require huge investment. One good idea & an innovative mobile application can change the game for you. I am fascinated by the potential of these technologies and have alternated between the two (fortunately). So get trained on both the technologies and then make your move. Best wishes!
   

Blogmint If your blog is influencing people, why not let it influence your bank account?

I recently went through the Blogmint.com. Blogmint.com has a unique model that serves brands and bloggers.Bloggers have reach in the social media and their own nice followers based on the content of their blogs. The brands want to reach-out to the consumers using trusted channels and Blogmint offers the platform. Various brands register and launch campaign programs and registered bloggers can show interest in a brand campaign they are familiar with and if the brand accepts their blogger credentials the blogger can blog/write about their experience with the brand and get paid for their writing. Interesting idea because the blogger can 'Choose a  brand he is familiar with'to blog and he is not forced to write for 'any brand'
Here is the link to Blogmint.com in case you are interested in knowing more.
Link : http://blogmint.ref-r.com/c/i/7230/3008573

Downgrading from Windows 10 to Windows 8 when your laptop manufacturer does not support Windows 10

Downgrading from Windows 10 to Windows 8  ( when your laptop manufacturer does not support Windows 10 or if your system becomes sluggish)

Recently I started facing issue with my Dell 14Z Inspiron Ultrabook. I had upgraded OS from Windows 8 to Windows 10 around 2 months back. After upgrading to Windows 10 I felt the system became slow and started giving various random errors. When I checked with Dell Support they advised me to revert to the OS factory version which was Windows 8 in my case. Thankfully as soon as I bought the laptop I had created DVD backup media to restore the system to factory image in case of failure ( I had created a 4 DVD set using Dell Backup & Recovery software).

I took backup of all my data and software and then I tried to use the DVD media to restore to factory image but there was some issue and the backup would not run, it started giving me Boot error (Error Code- 0xc00000d ).

 After lots of troubleshooting I could not fix this error and then reached out to Dell Support and they told me they can send me a USB with Factory Restore media for my laptop ( Fantastic Support! If nothing else one should buy dell laptops for their after sales support. IN my case I did not even have a extended warranty yet they provided dedicated support and even send the USB media without charging me anything) .
Once I received the USB with Dell Backup and Restore media I changed the setting in laptop bios to boot from USB instead of the default boot from disk. The restore failed for the first time because the default setting on my laptop was 'Secured Boot' as pointed by very helpful Dell support. Once I disabled the Secured Boot in my bios I was able to complete the factory restore to Windows 8

After the install I checked the driver and I found couple of drivers needed update (See image below)

Once the drivers were updated the next step was to check for Windows updates. There were around 190+ Windows updates that needed to be installed and once the task was completed the system was completely restored. It has been 2 weeks since I have rolled back my Dell 14Z Ultrabook from Windows 10 to Windows 8 and the laptop is faster and stable. Yesterday I started getting messages to update my OS to Windows 8.1. I did not want to upgrade to 8.1 as Dell has not tested Windows 8.1 on my laptop model ( Frankly there is no harm in upgrading from Windows 8 to Windows 8.1 as there are few changes and all these changes are to resolve some cosmetic issues present in Windows 8 but my recommendation is check with laptop manufacturer before upgrading Windows OS).

How to stop Windows from forcing you to upgrade to Windows 8.1

Check this useful link to disable automatic upgrade to Windows 8.1
: http://www.askvg.com/how-to-stop-automatic-forced-upgrade-from-windows-8-to-windows-8-1/

I hope this post helps those wop want to rollback from Windows 10 to Windows 8 after the 1 month rollback period is over. I struggled a lot initially but with help of Dell support it was easy to roll back to Windows 8. If you are a Windows user, one thing to note is that if laptop manufacturer does not support Windows 10 then you may think of changing your laptop in near future because Windows will soon stop support for Windows 8 and then you will be stuck with your old laptop. You can of course put the old laptop to some good use. I have a Samsung X05 Pentium Windows XP laptop with 30GB HDD. There is not much you can do with a laptop that has 30 GB HDD but if the screen resolution is good then you can use it for surfing and watching videos. I have put the XP laptop in my kitchen to view cookery videos while I am experimenting with cooking. Good luck!