Friday, March 20, 2009

Where have you been??

When I say "you", of course I mean me! I silently fell off the radar about 7-8 months ago, and am now finally re-emerging. Well, let me tell you what I've been doing in my "off" time:

  • First, let me introduce you to Jack David, my new baby boy. Doug and I were blessed with this little guy August 15th, 2008. He is the primary cause for my hiatus. I have been loving every minute of being home with my peanuts (Anthony, 13, Bella, 3 and baby Jack)! Alas, the lure of olap cubes, ETL and bug squashing safaris was just too compelling to resist, and it's time to return to the business world.
  • I also joined the board of directors as secretary of the Brevard Rescue Mission, a faith based ministry that provides whole-life transition resources for near-homeless moms and their kids. My dear friend Stacia Glavas is the founder, and I have been privileged to be able to handle her communications, marketing and administrative needs in between diaper changes.
  • I have been dabbling in a bit of graphic design and found that while I have no natural talent, the Adobe suite allows me to appear semi-talented in creating fun and compelling designs. I have since designed the web site for rescue mission mentioned above, as well as the logo for my daughter's new preschool, several business cards and stationery for friends, and my latest, most daring adventure: skinning a mySpace page for my photographer and friend, Yvette Gioia! Where WILL my curiosities take me?????
  • I also have managed to talk a friend of mine into letting me "borrow" his home renovation crew to renovate the entire exterior of our 25 year old home. That's right, I've decided that I also have some sort of qualifications as a contractor. Or possibly just a penchant for frustration and pain, we'll soon see!
As you can see, when Doug and I decided that it would be a good idea for me "take some time off" to adjust and organize our growing family, well, I may have misread the "time off" instructions :) I have thoroughly enjoyed my very full, engaged foray into being a stay-at-home mom. I actually just this month officially earned my soccer mom title, as Bella joined the local soccer team. I never knew there was a position for grass-pickers in soccer, but sure enough, my daughter has the exalted title!

While I will miss much of the freedom that comes from being my own manager, I miss my career more. So expect to hear from me soon, as I mull over my next career adventure! And of course, immerse myself back into the Pentaho Nation!

Kindest regards!
Gretchie

8 comments :

rpbouman said...

Hi Gretchen!

great to see you back in the "arena" ;-) he he ;)

Jack David looks like a wonderful baby - amazing how time flies - Mainz doesn't seem that long ago.

Anyway, We'll keep in touch - I'm sure we'll meet again soon some time.

Regards and greetings to Doug too!

bb, Roland

Anonymous said...

With such a photo there, not much comments to be made except... Welcome Back and Contratulations!

Gretchen Moran said...

Thanks guys, looking forward to catching up with each of you at the various upcoming Pentaho events!

G

Luc Boudreau said...

Nice to have news from you, Gretchen. Welcome back, and congratulations.

Anonymous said...

Hi Gretchen,
i am new to Pentaho.i want to build web based reports. i have installed pentaho design studio and executed hello world program. But i am getting error while modifying the text in XML.
My question is did i chosed the correct tool for web based reports?? or any other tool is there for this?
i am in a starting stage...after going through the community forums and demos, i saw ur blog is very nice the way u explains and all...
i decided to write to u....can u please explain me how to make web based reports in pentaho?????

Gretchen Moran said...

There are two ways to get started with web based reporting:

1. Download the Pentaho Report Designer. This tool allows you to build pixel perfect reports with a wizard to help you through the steps of connecting to your data, and setting the template and initial look and feel for your report. Of course, you'll want to deploy your report to the BI server to make it available via the web, so you'll need to have the BI server installed as well.

2. The second means of reporting is the adhoc query and reporting tool, which is accessible through the user console of the BI Server.

You can find great how-to articles on getting started with reports at http://wiki.pentaho.com/display/COM/Technical+Tips.

Hope this helps,
G

Anonymous said...

hey thanks for the reply. i already worked on report designer and BI server. i want to know about designer studio to generate reports. Is it possible to deploy reports in tomcat server or do we need to use only bi server?
i downloaded many versions of designer studio but none of it is working properly, in one version jfree reports is not working, and in another version sample database is not getting connected. and in another version everything is working fine but when i modified the XML file (helo world Example) its not showing the modifications.
So could u please tell me the version for designer studio to work.
i worked on BIRT, and i want to integrate those reports in pentaho. i copied the plugins and all but still not able to generate. can u just help me in fixing this issue also???
So i have totally 3 issues
1)is it able to run reports in tomcat?
2)version number of designer studio
3)integrating with BIRT

Gretchen Moran said...

You've got alot going on, and you need far more info than we should be posting in a blog. Have you taken these questions to the Pentaho forums? There are FAQ's over there as well that answer some common start up questions, which sound a lot like yours.

-G