What does "NoSQL" refer to?  It is a general term for (predominantly) non-relational or schema-less datastores as opposed to "traditional" (relational) databases, popularised by recent developments in "cloud" storage and applications. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NoSQL Join this group if you're interested in scalable web apps and/or data stores, or if you just want to see what the fuss is all about.

SMAQ (Storage, MapReduce and Query) is an emerging architecture pattern pioneered by organisations such as Google, Powerset, Yahoo, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and others to handle massive quantities of globally distributed data effectively and scaleably. We're a group of systems engineers and data scientists who are solving the challenges of building the highly scalable software systems that enable "big data" and the next generation of business intelligence. We've had speakers from IBM, Google, …

I have set up this group with a focus on Banking & Finance because this is the area that I have worked in for the majority of my  25 years of working life.  I am interested in finding out what value my Bank can derive from solutions based around Big Data  so that I can build a business case to present to our executives to get funding.  I’ve found that keeping up with current news around Big Data  is like using twitter on speed so I have filtered my interest  for news and use cases specifically r …