What is Big Data?

What is Big Data?

Big data refers to a massive size of data both structured, unstructured and semi-structured, which is so large and complex, hence it is almost impossible to store or process it within the traditional methods. 

Structured Data:  It is the traditional form of data storage since these type of data contains rows and columns which makes it easy to search, organise and analyse. SQL databases and Excel files can be given as examples of structured data.

Unstructured Data: Opposed to structured data, unstructured data do not have predefined fields or data model. With the rising trend of social media; images, audio, video, text file types of data started to dominate the data world.  There is no doubt that the lack of structure makes it difficult to manage, however (Marr, 2019) “ The recent proliferation of artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms made it easier to process.”.

Semi-Structured Data: It is another type of data between structured and unstructured since it has nonrigid unstructured characteristics which give to data analysts the ability to read it.

Even the concept of big data was coined in the 90s, a great number of the businesses now appreciate the value of data which might be captured and analyzed with the purpose of revealing the relationships between the variables and the trends.

Big data might be used for strategic business decision makings after the analysis processes with an emphasis on cost reductions, time reductions, optimisation, and deep learning. As Wayne Thompson, SAS Product Manager, said “Deep learning craves big data because big data is necessary to isolate hidden patterns and to find answers without over-fitting the data. With deep learning, the more good quality data you have, the better the results.”

Big data enable businesses to use advanced analyses methods like text & predictive analytics, data mining, machine learning and natural language processing in the manner of getting deep insights to make the optimal and time-efficient decisions.

             

References

Sas.com. (2020). Big Data: What it is and why it matters. [online] Available at: https://www.sas.com/en_us/insights/big-data/what-is-big-data.html [Accessed 23 Jan. 2020].

Marr, B. (2019). What’s The Difference Between Structured, Semi-Structured And Unstructured Data?. [online] Forbes.com. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2019/10/18/whats-the-difference-between-structured-semi-structured-and-unstructured-data/#c2b7bbd2b4d3 [Accessed 30 Jan. 2020].