Big Data and Business Intelligence, MSc

University of Greenwich

The modern data growth is transforming performance and efficiency requirements for storage systems. The databases are getting more complex and more powerful which means that development and management of the database systems is only possible with a sound knowledge of architectures and techniques available.

To provide solid grounding in applying machine learning methods and develop a principled understanding of the key issues involved through application-driven exploration and development. Focus is on the practical application of machine learning in topical real-world problem contexts, including the data preparation requirements, model selection and evaluation. Considerations for the legal, ethical, social and professional issues that can arise when applying machine learning technologies will also be covered.

This course aims to provide analytical skills to study big data and to provide a solid foundation for developing solutions and applications that need to manipulate big data. Students will be introduced to a range of tools and techniques to manipulate and manage big data sets which will be used to develop a range of big data applications. Specific aims are: To provide an overview of statistical and machine learning techniques often used in big data processing. To develop a fundamental toolbox of techniques and skills from which to construct solutions to gain insight from large data sets. To develop the ability to manipulate abstracted data into meaningful information.

The list below provides the aims for this module: ? To encourage a critical assessment of the use of data warehousing and business intelligence tools in finding timely answers to critical business questions. ? To advance the student's knowledge of the business potential of organising and utilising data to support cross-functional systems. ? To develop the student's practical skills in defining an architecture of a Data Warehouse and in capturing, cleaning, transporting, and applying data in a Data Warehouse. ? To develop the student's skills in querying, reporting, and using tools to summarize and discover new patterns in the data and produce BI reports.

To provide essential professional and academic skills to prepare students for study at MSc level at the University of Greenwich.

With the growing volumes of unstructured and multi-structured data used by modern services and intelligent e-commerce, the relational databases are limiting and inflexible. New-generation NoSQL (Not Only SQL) databases are better suited to deal with vast volumes of diverse data.

This course is designed to provide the student with the opportunity to carry out an individual piece of supervised work which reflects their programme area and is at, or informed by, the forefront of their academic discipline.

This module provides a hands-on approach to the programming and applied mathematics expertise that is essential to the Data Science programme. Students will develop their understanding and gain practical experience with the data structures and processing algorithms most frequently used in developing Data Science solutions. The module is complementary to the other topics covered in the Masters programme and will prepare students in their learning experience as well as in their further pursuit for higher education or work in industry.