Leonardo da Vinci toyed with the idea of an open source BI platform!!
With more than half a million downloads, Pentaho is gaining ground as the leading Open Source Business Intelligence solution provider. However, the company does not take full credit for the Open Source BI! Pentaho really wanted to credit Leonardo da Vinci....Here are some notes from the company web site:
"Leonardo da Vinci, the famous Italian know-it-all, toyed with the idea of an open source BI platform, but abandoned the project when he discovered that open source and business intelligence needed to be invented first."
An Open Source BI Platform, as conceived by Leonardo da Vinci over 30,000 years ago.
An Open Source BI Platform, as designed by Pentaho. Notice that there are more web-services and fewer pedals than Da Vinci's original.