Best Data Analysis Tools For Data Management

Data analysis is the process of working on data with the purpose of arranging it correctly, explaining it, making it presentable, and finding a conclusion from that data. It is done for finding useful information from data to make rational decisions. As it is done for decision making, it is important to understand the sole purpose of data analysis. The main purpose of data analysis is interpretation, evaluation & organization of data and to make the data presentable.

Data Analysis Methods

There are two methods of data analysis:

1. Qualitative Analysis
2. Quantitative Analysis

Qualitative Analysis: Qualitative Analysis is done through interviews and observations.
Quantitative Analysis: Quantitative Analysis is done through surveys and experiments.

Data Analytics Process

Data Analytics Process includes:

1. Data Collection
2. Working on data quality
3. Building the model
4. Training model
5. Running the model with full data.

Some tips to analyze the data are:

• Remove unnecessary data before the analysis.
• You should not perform the analysis on a master copy of data.

Difference Between Data Analysis, Data Mining & Data Modeling

Data analysis is done with the purpose of finding answers to specific questions. Data analytics techniques are similar to business analytics and business intelligence. Data Mining is about finding the different patterns in data. For this, various mathematical and computational algorithms are applied to data and new data will get generated. Data Modeling is about how companies organize or manage the data. Here, various methodologies and techniques are applied to data. Data analysis is required for data modeling. In this article, we will take a look at the top data analysis software in detail along with their features.

Top 10 Data Analysis Tools for Business

A list of the most popular Big Data Analytics Tools that are available in the market are explained below in detail.

#1) Tableau Public

Tableau Public will help you to create charts, graphs, applications, dashboards, and maps. It allows you to share and publish all your creations. It can be used on Windows and Mac operating systems.
It provides solutions for desktop & server and has an online solution too. Tableau Online will allow you to connect with any data, from anywhere. Tableau Public provides six products, which include Tableau Desktop, Tableau Server, Tableau Online, Tableau Prep, Tableau Public, and Tableau Reader.

Features:

• It provides automatic phone and tablet layouts.
• It enables you to customize these layouts.
• You can create transparent filters, parameters, and highlighters.
• You can see the preview of the dashboard zones.
• It allows you to join datasets, based on location.
• With the help of Tableau Online, you can connect with cloud databases, Amazon Redshift, and Google BigQuery.
• Tableau Prep provides features like immediate results, which will allow you to directly select and edit the values.

Tool Cost/Plan Details:
Tableau Public: Free
Tableau Creator: $70 per user per month.
There are few more plans as well, which you can select as per your requirement.
Verdict: Tableau Public provides many solutions with different features for each solution. The system is easy to use. This tool can be used by an organization of any size. Website: Tableau Public

#2) RapidMiner

RapidMiner is a software platform for data preparation, machine learning, deep learning, text mining, and predictive model deployment. It provides all data prep capabilities.
The tool will help data scientists and analysts in improving their productivity through automated machine learning. You will not have to write the code, to do the data analysis with the help of RapidMiner Radoop.

Features:

• Built-in security controls.
• Radoop eliminates the need to write the code.
• It has a visual workflow designer for Hadoop and Sparx
• Radoop enables you to use large datasets for training in Hadoop.
• Centralized workflow management.
• It provides support for Kerberos, Hadoop impersonation, and sentry/ranger.
• It groups the requests and reuses Spark containers for smart optimization of processes.
• Team Collaboration.

Tool Cost/Plan Details:
Free plan for 10,000 data rows.
Small: $2500 per user/year.
Medium: $5000 per user/year.
Large: $10000 per user/year.
Verdict: Tool is easy to use. It provides powerful GUI. Even beginners can use this tool.
No coding skills are required. Great tool for machine learning. RapidMiner provides five products for data analysis, RapidMiner Studio, RapidMiner Auto Model, RapidMiner Turbo Prep, RapidMiner Server, and RapidMiner Radoop. Website: RapidMiner

#3) KNIME

KNIME provides a open source data analysis tool. With the help of this tool, you can create data science applications and services.
It enables you to build machine learning models. For this, you can use advanced algorithms like deep learning, tree-based methods, and logistic regression. Software provided by KNIME includes KNIME Analytics platform, KNIME Server, KNIME Extensions, and KNIME Integrations.

Features:

• It provides a GUI in which using the drag-and-drop facility you can create visual workflows.
• No need for coding skills.
• It allows you to blend the tools from different domains like scripting in R and Python, connectors to Apache Spark, and machine learning.
• Guidance for building workflows.
• Multi-threaded data processing.
• In-memory processing.
• Data visualization through advanced charts.
• It allows you to customize charts as per your requirement.
• KNIME Server automates workflow execution and supports team-based collaboration.
• KNIME Integrations will allow you to integrate with Big Data, machine learning, AI, and Scripting.
• With the help of KNIME Integrations, you can import, export, and access the data from Big Data platform like Hive, Impala etc.
• With the help of KNIME Extensions, you can extend your platform.

Tool Cost/Plan Details: KNIME Analytics platform is free. KNIME Server price starts at $8500.
Verdict: Software is easy to learn. It is an open source and provides a good number of features and functionalities for free. With Partner extensions, KNIME provides a set of commercial capabilities. You can run the KNIME analytics platform and KNIME Server on Microsoft Azure and AWS. Website: KNIME

#4) Orange

Orange is a data visualization and machine learning toolkit.
It is an open source system which can be used by experts as well as beginners. It supports three operating systems i.e. Windows, Mac, and Linux. It allows you to use visual programming for the data analysis process. It provides many classification and regression algorithms.

Features:

• It provides interactive data visualization.
• Clever reporting include the workflow history of every widget and visualization.
• Intelligent visualization with great scatter plot.
• You can do exploratory data analysis.
• Many standard visualizations are included.
• As an interactive visualization platform, you can select data points from a scatter plot, node in a tree, and a branch in the dendrogram.
• For data analysis, choices made by you are remembered by Orange and it gives suggestions based on that.

Tool Cost/Plan Details: Free.
Verdict: Widgets provided by Orange, cover a large area, and allow you to create models for supervised and unsupervised learning, validation of the model, and filtering of data. Many widgets are available as add-ons. Graphical interface provided by Orange is user-friendly. Website: Orange

#5) OpenRefine

OpenRefine is a free and open source data analysis software.
Even if your data is messy, OpenRefine will help you to clean, transform, and extend it. This tool will help you to transform data from one form to another. It will also help you to extend the data using web services and external data. It is available in fourteen languages.

Features:

• You will be able to work with large data sets easily.
• It allows you to link and extend the data using web services.
• For some services, you can upload the data to a central database through OpenRefine.
• You can clean and transform the data.
• It allows you to import CSV, TSV, XML, RDF, JSON, Google Spreadsheets, and Google Fusion Tables.
• You can export the data in TSV, CSV, HTML table, and Microsoft Excel.

Tool Cost/Plan Details: Free.
Verdict: This desktop application can be used by small, medium, and large companies. It allows you to select multiple rows using filters and apply command. It supports many file formats for import and export. Website: OpenRefine

#6) Looker

Looker will help you in business intelligence, analytics, visualization, and data management. It is a cloud-based platform.
For ease of use, Looker provides drag-and-drop for elements, roles assigning, and mapping features. It provides accurate charts and tables so that you can view the data easily in a much detailed way. It helps in creating mini-applications. For this, you can use the language Look ML. This language is easy to learn.

Features:

• It provides robust security for data.
• For data security, it queries the data, finds the answer, and stores it in a cache. The cache will automatically get cleared after 30 days or you can shorten this time.
• Data security is also provided by setting permissions and controlling access to the data.
• For visualizations, fresh data will be taken directly from the source.
• For more details, you can see row-level details.
• It provides an expansive visualization library.
• Looker will allow you to build any visualization with the help of JavaScript. You can save it in your Looker instance.
• It allows you to customize the reports for Google Ads and Facebook Ads.

Tool Cost/Plan Details: Contact them for pricing details.
Verdict: Looker servers small, medium, as well as large companies. It provides a web-based interface and real-time analytics. It is easy to use. Even if you don’t know SQL, good learning material like videos and documentation are provided. Website: Looker

#7) Talend

Talend is a cloud-based platform for data integration. An on-premises solution is also available. It works with AWS, Google Cloud, Azure, and Snowflake. It supports multiple cloud environments, public, private, and hybrid.
It provides free as well as commercial products. Free products can be used on Windows and Mac. Talend offers different features for data integration, data quality, and data management.

Features:

• With the help of the data integration platform, you can build for relational databases, flat files, and cloud apps ten times faster.
• Real-time and IoT analytics.
• No need for manual coding. Cloud API services will allow you to build, test, and deploy.
• Talend Open Studio for data integration will allow you to map, aggregate, sort, enrich, and merge the data.
• No need for scripting for file management.
• Talend can be integrated with many databases, SaaS, Packaged Apps, and technologies.
• The open studio has multiple designs and developing tools.

Tool Cost/Plan Details: Talend provides free software. Cloud integration platform price starts at $1170 per user per month.
Verdict: Talend is a popular tool as it offers several features and functionalities for free.
It allows you to connect data with iPaas. It provides many free products. Even Open Studio for Big Data is free and open source. You can customize it for your project. It is a powerful integration ETL tool and the system is easy to use. Website: Talend

#8) Weka

Weka provides machine learning algorithms for data mining. It can be used for Data preparation, classification, regression, clustering, association rules mining, and visualization. It can be used on Microsoft Windows, Mac, and Linux operating systems.

Features:

• It provides a graphical user interface.
• It can work with large datasets.
• It provides many regression and classification tools.

Tool Cost/Plan Details: Free.
Verdict: Online courses are available to learn Weka for data mining and machine learning. All techniques are based on the consideration that data will be in a flat file format. Website: Weka

#9) R-Programming

R is a programming language. It provides a software environment for free. It is used for statistical computing and graphics. It can be used on Windows, Mac, and UNIX.
It will allow you to link C, C++, and FORTRAN code. It supports object-oriented programming features. R is called as an interpreted language as instructions are executed directly by many of its implementations.

Features:

• Provides linear and non-linear modeling techniques.
• Classification
• Clustering
• It can be extended through functions and extensions.
• It can perform time-series analysis.
• Most of the standard functions are written in R language.

Tool Cost/Plan Details: Free.
Verdict: R is the language that is mostly used for data science as it provides features useful for data science.  Some of the features which are very helpful for data science are multiple calculations with vectors, running code without a compiler, data science application functions, and statistical language. Website: R-Programming

#10) Google Fusion Tables

It is a web application which will help you to gather, visualize, and share the information in data tables. It can work with large data sets. You can filter the data from thousands of rows. You can visualize the data through charts, maps, and network graphs.

Features:

• Automatically saves the data to Google Drive.
• You can search and view public fusion tables.
• Data tables can be uploaded from spreadsheets, CSV, and KML.
• Using Fusion Tables API, you can insert, update, and delete the data programmatically as well.
• Data can be exported in CSV or KML file formats.
• It allows you to publish your data and the published data will always show the real-time data values.
• You can merge two tables. This feature will allow you to merge other people’s data.
• Even after merging, if the data of one table is updated then you will see this updated data in the merged table. Location tables can be converted into maps.

Tool Cost/Plan Details: Free.
Verdict: As it is a web-based application, it can be accessed through a browser on any system. With fusion tables, you can work with large data sets. It allows to merge table of the other people with yours, but at the same time, it also provides privacy options. You can easily share the data through links. Website: Google Fusion Tables

Additional Data Analysis Software

#11) Qlik Sense:

Qlik Sense is an analytics platform for any device. It provides a cloud-based platform. This tool is for any sized businesses. Qlik works with several databases like IBM DB2, Impala, Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle, Sybase, and Teradata.

Qlik can be extended and combined with other technologies using APIs. It provides features like drag-and-drop functionality, smart search, provides real-time analytics anytime and anywhere. It provides a basic plan as well as a business plan. The basic plan is free and the cost of the business plan is $15 per user per month. Website: Qlik Sense

#12) NodeXL:

It is the tool for social network and content analysis. With this tool, data analysis is done in Microsoft Excel. This tool provides data importers and reports. The tool is useful for data-driven marketers.
NodeXL has included social media analysis features. The tool provides good features for research work as well. Its other features include importing data from social media, PowerPoint export, and network visualization.

For academic and personal use, cost of the tool is $199. For corporate use, the price is $75 per month. Website: NodeXL

#13) GoodData:

GoodData provides a cloud-based platform for data analytics. It will help you while working with complex data. This tool will allow you to deliver fully managed insights to your customers.
The tool can work with any data source and visualization. The tool enables you for agile development and flexible product design. It is a business intelligence platform and will serve as a service. Website: GoodData

#14) Pentaho:

This tool is for data integration, data mining, and information dashboards. It also provides OLAP services. This business intelligence software supports Windows, Mac, and Linux operating system.
With Pentaho, you can work in hybrid and multi-cloud environment. It has functionalities like IoT analytics, big data integration, real-time data analysis, and predictive modeling. No coding skills are required. The tool is simple and easy to use. Website: Pentaho

#15) Domo:

It is a data management and machine learning tool. It provides more than 500 connectors. These connectors will allow you to connect with the other sources from the cloud, on-premises, and proprietary systems. Domo will provide real-time data.

With the help of a mobile app, you can work on mobile as well. Mobile app supports Android and iOS. The tool works for all sized businesses. Cloud architecture of this tool saves your data securely. The tool will allow you to share your visualization with customers.

Domo has three pricing plans. You can try the tool for 30 days for 5 users. To know more about the pricing details, you will have to contact them. Website: Domo

Conclusion

To conclude, we can say that Tableau Public is easy to use and provides many data analysis solutions with different features. RapidMiner is a great data analysis software for machine learning, is easy to use and provides a powerful GUI. KNIME is a free and open source analytics platform which is easy to learn.

Orange provides Widgets to create supervised and unsupervised learning models. OpenRefine makes working with messy data easier and it also supports many file formats for import and export. With Looker, you will get accurate charts & tables and it will also allow you to build mini-applications using Look ML.

Talend is a popular and powerful ETL integration tool, which is easy to use. R-Programming is used by many people for data science as it provides many features which are useful for data science.
Google Fusion Tables is a free platform to visualize the data through charts, graphs, and maps.