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22 Preface

WhAt’s neW in the tenth edition?
With the goal of improving the text, this edition marks a major reorganization of the text
to reflect the focus on analytics. The last two editions transformed the book from the
traditional DSS to BI and fostered a tight linkage with the Teradata University Network
(TUN). This edition is now organized around three major types of analytics. The new
edition has many timely additions, and the dated content has been deleted. The following
major specific changes have been made:
• New organization. The book is now organized around three types of analytics:
descriptive, predictive, and prescriptive, a classification promoted by INFORMS. After
introducing the topics of DSS/BI and analytics in Chapter 1 and covering the founda-
tions of decision making and decision support in Chapter 2, the book begins with an
overview of data warehousing and data foundations in Chapter 3. This part then cov-
ers descriptive or reporting analytics, specifically, visualization and business perfor-
mance measurement. Chapters 5–8 cover predictive analytics. Chapters 9–12 cover
prescriptive and decision analytics as well as other decision support systems topics.
Some of the coverage from Chapter 3–4 in previous editions will now be found in
the new Chapters 9 and 10. Chapter 11 covers expert systems as well as the new
rule-based systems that are commonly built for implementing analytics. Chapter 12
combines two topics that were key chapters in earlier editions—knowledge manage-
ment and collaborative systems. Chapter 13 is a new chapter that introduces big data
and analytics. Chapter 14 concludes the book with discussion of emerging trends
and topics in business analytics, including location intelligence, mobile computing,
cloud-based analytics, and privacy/ethical considerations in analytics. This chapter
also includes an overview of the analytics ecosystem to help the user explore all of
the different ways one can participate and grow in the analytics environment. Thus,
the book marks a significant departure from the earlier editions in organization. Of
course, it is still possible to teach a course with a traditional DSS focus with this book
by covering Chapters 1–4, Chapters 9–12, and possibly Chapter 14.
• New chapters. The following chapters have been added:
Chapter 8, “Web Analytics, Web Mining, and Social Analytics.” This chapter
covers the popular topics of Web analytics and social media analytics. It is an
almost entirely new chapter (95% new material).
Chapter 13, “Big Data and Analytics.” This chapter introduces the hot topics of
Big Data and analytics. It covers the basics of major components of Big Data tech-
niques and charcteristics. It is also a new chapter (99% new material).
Chapter 14, “Business Analytics: Emerging Trends and Future Impacts.”
This chapter examines several new phenomena that are already changing or are
likely to change analytics. It includes coverage of geospatial in analytics, location-
based analytics applications, consumer-oriented analytical applications, mobile plat-
forms, and cloud-based analytics. It also updates some coverage from the previous
edition on ethical and privacy considerations. It concludes with a major discussion
of the analytics ecosystem (90% new material).

• Streamlined coverage. We have made the book shorter by keeping the most
commonly used content. We also mostly eliminated the preformatted online con-
tent. Instead, we will use a Web site to provide updated content and links on a
regular basis. We also reduced the number of references in each chapter.
• Revamped author team. Building upon the excellent content that has been
prepared by the authors of the previous editions (Turban, Aronson, Liang, King,
Sharda, and Delen), this edition was revised by Ramesh Sharda and Dursun Delen.

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