Cogito and 7 Degrees

Analysis of graph-oriented database/analytics vendor 7 Degrees and its predecessor Cogito. Related subjects include:

Graph-based data models

August 21, 2009

Social network analysis, aka relationship analytics

A number of applications lend themselves to graph-oriented analytics, including:

Finding bad guys (national intelligence)
Finding bad guys (anti-fraud)
Data mining the social graph (e.g., for advertising optimization on social networks, or to identify influencers)

There are plenty more graph-oriented applications, of course, such as the identification of biochemical pathways. But I want to focus for now on ones like those on my list. My key points are:

There are Big Data problems that lend themselves to graphical data models.
So far as I can tell, the database management community isn’t doing enough to address them. (If I’m wrong about that, please tell me. I plan to arrive in Lyon for VLDB/XLDB Wednesday of next week, and of course I can always be reached by email.)

Here’s what I mean. Read more

Categories: Analytic technologies, Cogito and 7 Degrees, Data models and architecture, Data types, RDF and graphs, Theory and architecture

18 Comments

December 27, 2006

Bulletin on Cogito

My Bulletin on Cogito — i.e., a short-short white paper — is now available for download. Thankfully, it turned out to be pretty consistent with what I previously wrote on the company and its technology. The conclusion to the paper bears quoting here:

In deciding between conventional DBMS and specialty graph-oriented tools such as Cogito’s, there’s one key criterion: Path length. If path lengths are short and predictable, there’s a good chance that relational DBMS and their forthcoming extensions can do the job. In complex graphs with longer paths, however, relational approaches may not scale well. In such cases, specialty technologies warrant serious consideration.

Categories: Cogito and 7 Degrees, RDF and graphs