Encyclopedia of Data Warehousing and Mining, 2nd ed.

Citation

Mason, D.D.M. (2009), "Encyclopedia of Data Warehousing and Mining, 2nd ed.", Online Information Review, Vol. 33 No. 2, pp. 389-390. https://doi.org/10.1108/14684520910951302

This work is an updated version of the previous edition of 2005. This four‐volume set is primarily aimed at institutional libraries. Buying the hard cover version gives rights to online access institution‐wide for as long as the edition is current.

It is a collection of 332 invited contributions in the area of data warehousing and data mining. The scope of the entries is very broad, encompassing the whole field – every topic is probably included somewhere. The contributions are typically three to five pages: longer than a factual entry but not quite an academic article. Each entry is credited to specific authors. All contributions follow the same format: introduction, background, main thrust, future trends, conclusion, references, key terms. All are fully, even lavishly, referenced. In some instances the reference list constitutes about a third of the total entry. The referencing is perhaps the main strength of the encyclopaedia. Students will be able to inspect topics of interest and then immediately identify relevant references. The key terms part will also be useful to students; however, since each entry is entirely self‐contained, the same key terms are sometimes repeated in different entries, and there is no consistency in the definitions.

The publication does not really merit the title “encyclopaedia”. The entries vary in their treatment of the topic and in the level of knowledge expected from the reader. There is no overall house style, with each author presenting his or her own style of writing. Entries are not generally in encyclopaedia format, an anonymous review of the facts. Some entries are like extended lecture notes, others report on original work by the authors, and there are even case studies. Many entries are titled more like journal articles than reference resources.

The individual entries are well written and cover their topics adequately. However, for the work as a whole there is no internal cross‐referencing, and, oddly for a book on data retrieval, there is no attempt to organise the contributions other than alphabetically. A more useful and more logical format might have had the contributions arranged into topics, and then structured in increasing complexity with an introduction or primer to the general area followed by increased specialisation. Although this is a single‐subject work, there is no attempt to review the literature or to put the entries in context, or to comment on developments in the subject since the last edition.

Overall, the breadth of the collection makes it useful, but collectively the individual entries do not build to a coherent sense of completeness. It remains a collection of minor articles by a wide diversity of authors and viewpoints, and as such offers little that could not be found just as easily by an online search of publicly available resources.