Intelligent Enterprise Magazine: BI on a Budget

BI on a Budget talks o companies wondering why most BI solutions cost an arm and a leg for software licenses, and some alternatives. Of course, Analysis services is at the top of the list, even though it doesn't mention that chances are, most mid-size and larger companies probably own several copies of it already. Some other comments:

• Syncsort is mentioned as a low-budget tool... but the old, dated, but still relevant alternative of Perl is not. As well as PL/SQL for Oracle.
  
• No front ends are mentioned, curiously. Microsoft has several free or cheap ones (all that work with Analysis Services), including Data Analyzer, the thin web client, and pivot tables.
  
• Web services (external) are mentioned as a solution to some external sources, including demographic data. The author doesn't realize an incredible amount of this data is available for free from the US Census. A talented developer can deliver every proximity calculation, market peneteration, or any other demographic measure you can dream up with this data. (tell them to look up "great circle."
  
• Also, Mappoint has a free OLAP plugin (for Analysis Services, of course) that makes magical eye candy.
  
• There are many other very reasonably priced fron ends, my favorite being Databeacon.
  

Intelligent Enterprise is one of my favorite magazines lately, always has some relevant articles. And even better, they also have an rss feed.