topic Re: As a Novice where do I start? in Talend Data Catalog

As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Aug 2015 16:04:13 GMT

I do a lot of data cleansing in my current role. This involves processing tens of million of prospect and Customer data records on quarterly basis to be loaded onto a marketing database for direct mail and telemarketing campaigns.
I use a software call Cygnus which is a mail sorting software but also not a bad ETL tool. I recently came across Talend in a MDM migration programme at work - also this may be used in a new enterprise data warehouse function that my company is setting up.
I like to teach myself Talend and obtain the necessary certifications. However after reading a lot on the Talend webpage still unsure where to start.
My skills include writing microsoft sql server scripts for queries and I have basic knowledge of how database are built/implemented
My aim in the next 12 months is to be a competent Talend user and to get a job that require such skill set
Can you please help?

Re: As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Aug 2015 16:34:29 GMT

The best way to learn Talend (in my opinion) is to find a personal data integration use case and build a solution using Talend in your spare time. You rarely get time at work to explore a product like Talend, but if you have a personal problem you want to solve, spending the time learning Talend becomes worthwhile and it is a massive motivating factor.
I have been using Talend for years and I still find personal use cases for Talend. In the last year I have used it to hook up "internet of things" devices with each other at home, have retrieved personal social network data from the network, have linked Twitter to my Sonos speaker system,...I could go on.
I have a few tutorials on my website (click on my company logo) and several of them are more aligned to personal use than business use.
One thing I would recommend is to get to grips with Java. It is not essential for Talend, but it opens a lot of doors if you want to do some more complicated stuff with it.

Re: As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Aug 2015 17:15:02 GMT

The best way to learn Talend (in my opinion) is to find a personal data integration use case and build a solution using Talend in your spare time. You rarely get time at work to explore a product like Talend, but if you have a personal problem you want to solve, spending the time learning Talend becomes worthwhile and it is a massive motivating factor.
I have been using Talend for years and I still find personal use cases for Talend. In the last year I have used it to hook up "internet of things" devices with each other at home, have retrieved personal social network data from the network, have linked Twitter to my Sonos speaker system,...I could go on.
I have a few tutorials on my website (click on my company logo) and several of them are more aligned to personal use than business use.
One thing I would recommend is to get to grips with Java. It is not essential for Talend, but it opens a lot of doors if you want to do some more complicated stuff with it.

Rhall Thanks for your time to reply to my post.
I am really interested in Talend as a career progression from my current now in say a data warehouse or data migration role. Which is purely on Legacy billing systems or marketing database.
Although I have access to millions of data records to practice on this wouldn't be possible at work or on my work laptop since due to data protection laws I can't take data from work to practice on my personal laptop. Also due to admin rights restrictions I am not allowed to install an open source application on my work laptop.
I briefly looked at your website and it's very impressive - well done. As mentioned before I am can write decent SQL codes but Java will be too hard for me to try and learn again. I attempted JAVA about 12 years ago but just wasn't able to understand it.
So using SQL I think that I can give Talend a go. One of the Talend employees replied to my question suggesting the DI basic is a good starting point.
What do you think?

Re: As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Wed, 19 Aug 2015 21:43:39 GMT

You misunderstood me, I didn't mean that you should use your work data or your work laptop. Talend provides Open Source versions of all of their products. You can download it and use it on a personal laptop/desktop. There is also no need to use company data, you can use your own. As I said, I have used Talend for many purposes that are nothing to do with work. Doing this helped me to learn it very quickly.
I would recommend trying with Java again as it WILL be useful with Talend. Simple value expressions used in lots of components use basic Java code. But you can also learn what you need to learn while using Talend.
If you do not have a machine at home and you must use your work machine, then I can understand your problem with the above. In which case the Talend DI course may be quite useful....but it is quite expensive if you are paying for it for yourself. If you can get your company to pay for it for you, then that would be a good idea. However, you will need to use the product a lot after doing the course. It is a bit like taking driving instruction. Once you pass the test, you have to drive a lot more in order to really "learn".

Re: As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Thu, 20 Aug 2015 07:26:29 GMT

I would suggest you can start with basics of Talend or can refer DwETL.com
for various scenarios.

Re: As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Thu, 20 Aug 2015 07:47:57 GMT

Hi samunj ,
So far, talend provides community users with Talend Integration Software Training(Instructor-led Courses
On-Demand Training).
For more information, please go to https://www.talend.com/services/training.
Best regards
Sabrina

Re: As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Thu, 20 Aug 2015 10:35:16 GMT

You misunderstood me, I didn't mean that you should use your work data or your work laptop. Talend provides Open Source versions of all of their products. You can download it and use it on a personal laptop/desktop. There is also no need to use company data, you can use your own. As I said, I have used Talend for many purposes that are nothing to do with work. Doing this helped me to learn it very quickly.
I would recommend trying with Java again as it WILL be useful with Talend. Simple value expressions used in lots of components use basic Java code. But you can also learn what you need to learn while using Talend.
If you do not have a machine at home and you must use your work machine, then I can understand your problem with the above. In which case the Talend DI course may be quite useful....but it is quite expensive if you are paying for it for yourself. If you can get your company to pay for it for you, then that would be a good idea. However, you will need to use the product a lot after doing the course. It is a bit like taking driving instruction. Once you pass the test, you have to drive a lot more in order to really "learn".

Thanks Rhall
what is the best talend open source application to start with? is data intergration the best one to start with? Also where I can start learning java again online? I am prepared to put in the time and effort to learn as much as I can in the next 12 months both on talend and basic java. My company has 50 talend enterprise licenses used by colleagues in another department. So I plan on learning as much as possibly can privately in the next 12months while taking exams and apply for a full time or secondment in that department

Re: As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Thu, 20 Aug 2015 10:41:33 GMT

I would suggest you can start with basics of Talend or can refer DwETL.com
for various scenario
Thanks for your time

The website will be useful when I am up and running with Talend. Can you please let me know which Talend open source application to download and start learning?

Re: As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Thu, 20 Aug 2015 10:43:10 GMT

Hi samunj,
So far, talend provides community users with Talend Integration Software Training(Instructor-led Courses
On-Demand Training).
For more information, please go to .
Best regards
Sabrina

Hi is it not best to download and practice the open source applications before taking the exams

Re: As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Thu, 20 Aug 2015 10:58:42 GMT

You misunderstood me, I didn't mean that you should use your work data or your work laptop. Talend provides Open Source versions of all of their products. You can download it and use it on a personal laptop/desktop. There is also no need to use company data, you can use your own. As I said, I have used Talend for many purposes that are nothing to do with work. Doing this helped me to learn it very quickly.
I would recommend trying with Java again as it WILL be useful with Talend. Simple value expressions used in lots of components use basic Java code. But you can also learn what you need to learn while using Talend.
If you do not have a machine at home and you must use your work machine, then I can understand your problem with the above. In which case the Talend DI course may be quite useful....but it is quite expensive if you are paying for it for yourself. If you can get your company to pay for it for you, then that would be a good idea. However, you will need to use the product a lot after doing the course. It is a bit like taking driving instruction. Once you pass the test, you have to drive a lot more in order to really "learn".

Thanks Rhall
what is the best talend open source application to start with? is data intergration the best one to start with? Also where I can start learning java again online? I am prepared to put in the time and effort to learn as much as I can in the next 12 months both on talend and basic java. My company has 50 talend enterprise licenses used by colleagues in another department. So I plan on learning as much as possibly can privately in the next 12months while taking exams and apply for a full time or secondment in that department

I would start with Data Integration. The DI product is where most people start and will help when moving across to other areas.
To learn Java, if you are an absolute beginner, I would recommend this book ( http://www.amazon.co.uk/Objects-First-Java-Practical-Introduction/dp/0132835541/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1320999550&sr=1-1). It is quite expensive (but I am certain you can find it cheaper if you look). This book is used by a lot of UK Universities to teach Java fundamentals. It comes with an IDE which makes it easy to see what is happening when you run your code. If you can't get the book, you can get the IDE here ( http://www.bluej.org/). It is a very good one to help you learn, but not very functional when you want to create your own programs. Maybe take a look at this as well ( https://kar.kent.ac.uk/22061/1/The_BlueJ_Tutorial.pdf).

Re: As a Novice where do I start?

Anonymous — Fri, 21 Aug 2015 04:51:18 GMT

Hi samunj,
It is highly recommended to do the DI Basics course before attempting the exam(Talend Certification) so that you increase your chance of succeeding in the exam.
Best regards
Sabrina