Unit Description

This unit discusses databases. Although it was brief, consisting of only one SIMPath exercise, it was insightful. I come from a data analysis/data science background and if there's a recurring theme in this course, it's a return to fundamentals. It's interesting because when you're immersed in data analytics for a while, you tend to forget the names of certain terms. Examples of this can include, calling "records" by the term "unit of observations", calling "fields" by the term "variables". Fields was an interesting one because I would think to say "columns" if the term "variables" wasn't landing while talking to an audience, but if you're not doing regression analysis, CART, K-nearest neighbor, etc. the term "variables" would make no intuitive sense. I had to remember my days from using ArcDesktop and remember, "Oh yea, attributes, like an attributes table." The unit also talked about AI, and how it would be employed in management and transaction systems, which is not something I'm as well versed in, but interesting nonetheless.

Lessons Learned

A lot of this lesson was revisiting the basics of databases and rediscovering terms and applications. However, I wasn't aware of how AI is being used to automate transaction systems or management software, which was pretty interesting. I would be interested to see what implications that might have on business intelligence applications in the future.