Data is the lifeblood of modern business. As computerized systems have spread throughout all facets of business, the amount of data collected has exploded. Data is captured in almost every consumer activity, and most of this data ends up in some kind of transaction processing system, but it only has value if it can be used to make better decisions. Business intelligence allows you to pull all of this data together to help form a unified view of your enterprise that executives and analysts can use to generate insights and make better decisions. Making this data accessible, however, is a challenge facing all businesses. The commercial tools available do not always address all of the issues of particular data, so most companies create their own solutions. Building Business Intelligence Applications with .NET provides a practical guide to creating these tools, by teaching corporate software developers how to use .NET technologies to build applications for data mining, statistical analysis, or OLAP, and explains how to integrate them with existing transactional applications. By using the compelling technologies offered by .NET (such as Web Services, Smart Clients, and XML for Analysis) developers can construct BI applications that address their critical data, analytical, and flexiblity issues.