Reviews And Related Data Mining Resources

Data Mining Solutions By Chris Westphal and Teresa Blaxton "This valuable overview explores all aspects of commercial data mining tools that database analysts and technically savvy business managers can use to identify sales trends, evaluate and improve performance, monitor financial fraud, forecast investment returns, and much more. After a quick tutorial on various techniques for storing and analyzing business information, the authors provide an overview of data mining tools, including those that present information in traditional spreadsheet format as well as more modern visual tools for identifying complex patterns and trends. In-depth case studies explore the effectiveness and reliability of the industry's leading tools."  The publisher, John Wiley & Sons   Contact the authors

In the Chapter on Quantitative Data Mining Tools, the following review is given of Graf-FX

"Graf-FX is a shareware application that has been written in Microsoft Access.  It therefore has many features you would expect  to see in this type of environment.   It is an easy system to use, so for those who want to explore the use of visualization without the hassle of training and setup, Graf-FX might be a good option.   Graf-FX was designed as an open front-end application that can be layered on top of any Access system or data import.  To get data into Graf-FX, you only need to attach your tables to an Access/ODBC database.  Once the data are made available,you can start to take advantage of the Graf-FX features.  Graf-FX supports up to 15 graph templates and also supports layout customization.  Graf-FX lets you view up to eight data elements (e,g.,variables) and there can be up to nine graphs (called grafs) active at any one time.

There are several features supported by Graf-FX that are useful during a data mining analysis.  You can drill-down on any table or query and display it either through group or pivot/crosstabs tables.  Graf-FX is a good after market add -on to the   Access environment because it makes the data come alive and allows the analyst to interact with the data set.  You can view the SQL statements or save the query from any one of the drill-down exercises.  The grafs can be saved, reused, replayed, and batched according to your data analysis needs.  There is also a fully callable procedures library available within Graf-FX."

Supporting CD Rom That Comes With The Book 

"There is a shareware version of the Graf-FX data mining system.  In order to run this application, you will need to couple it up to your current version of Microsoft Access.  There are three different versions on the CD-ROM, one for each Access version 2.0, 7.0, and 97.  If you run into a problem launching the MDB file, double check your version of Access and make sure that you have launched the correct Graf-FX.   This application has been built entirely in Access, and those familiar with  Access/Office should have no problem using Graf-FX.  Do not hesitate to check out the help functions or the Graf Utilities.  Graf-FX is a simple and easy- to- use system. "

  Notes From Garry Robinson - The Manager Of GR-FX

"The essence of data mining is the discovery of something in your valuable databases that you didn't already know.  This book describes a variety of different ways that you might go about exploring your data and gives an upto date review of current software tools that might be used for this process.  Whilst our exposure in the overall scheme of data mining software is modest, we are proud of the fact that we can deliver a powerful system that is easy to use, allows you to talk directly to data from text files, spreadsheets, PC databases right through to backend databases with ODBC drivers. We also offer something that you will not find in other Quantitative Analysis tools reviewed in this book, Low Cost. 

The CD Rom accompanying Data Mining Solutions is the last place that you still obtain the shareware versions of Graf-FX for Access Version 2 and Access 95 without pre-purchasing.

So why not improve your knowledge by reading a practical book on this topic to supplement the highly featured shareware tool Graf-FX