BusinessObjects Topics

What is the Central Management Console?

2011-11-29T10:07:00.000-08:00

The Central Management Console (CMC) allows you to create and manage BusinessObjects Enterprise(BOE) users and groups. It also enables you to publish organize, and set security levels for all of your BusinessObjects Enterprise content, the CMC enables you to manage servers and create Server groups.

Note: The CMC is different from the Central Configuration Manager (CCM) in that the CMC is web based. Because the CMC is web-based application, you can perform all these administrative tasks remotely.

You can perform administrative tasks in the CMC such as:

Creating and managing users and groups, including their rights to folders, objects and applications.
Publishing, scheduling and managing Webi Reports, Crystal, Deski, OLAP files as well as third-party documents and hyperlinks.
Managing Universes and Universe connections.
Managing Performances Management applications.
Modifying BusinessObjects Enterprise applications.

Web Intelligence SP2: Input Controls

2011-03-13T06:33:00.000-07:00

With the release of XI 3.1 SP2 came quite a few new features for Web Intelligence. For the next few weeks, I will be presenting and discussing the features. In addition, I will try to provide my opinion on how the features can be used to improve the interactions with users (of the casual and power variety). For this post, I will be focusing on the new Input Controls available with Web Intelligence.

What are Input Controls?
The Web Intelligence input controls provide a quick and easy way for users to filter the content that is displayed within a Web Intelligence document. The use of filtering for a user allows them to not only cut through the information to get to what is important, but also aids the user in analyzing the information before them by determining insights that were not previously visible before a filter occurred. For example, if I am looking at a report that shows me all sales revenue by quarter and year for my many store locations then it is likely that I am not going to get to the information that I need quickly. I could use an input control available within the report to quickly filter the displayed content down to a specific year, quarter, region, or store. You could also use an input filter applied to a measure. This would allow you to use a slider control to easily see how the measure changes over time.

How do Input Controls work?
The screenshot below shows a report that displays all of the stores from the eFashion Universe with their 2005 sales revenue values in a table format. This report has been filtered using an Input Control.
more details.. Web Intelligence : Input Controls

Business Objects Administration SP2

2011-03-05T04:02:00.000-08:00

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Business Objects Administration SP2

View more presentations from Jay Riddle.

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - Degenerate dimension

2011-03-02T22:13:00.000-08:00

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - Degenerate dimension

Benefits of a Data Warehouse

2011-02-07T09:24:00.000-08:00

What is META DATA?

2011-02-07T09:21:00.000-08:00

What is OLAP?

2011-02-07T08:22:00.000-08:00

What are Dimensions and Measures?

2011-02-07T08:16:00.000-08:00

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - Storage Modes in (MOLAP, ROLAP and HOLAP)

2011-01-28T02:04:00.000-08:00

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - Storage Modes in (MOLAP, ROLAP and HOLAP)

SAP Network Blog: Bringing new innovations to the way we learn BI in 4.0

2011-01-08T22:50:00.000-08:00

SAP Network Blog: Bringing new innovations to the way we learn BI in 4.0

Sneak Preview Demo for SAP BusinessObjects 4

2011-01-02T03:07:00.000-08:00

The Future for SAP Business Intelligence

2011-01-02T02:58:00.000-08:00

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - Entity-Relationship Model

2011-01-01T10:29:00.000-08:00

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - Entity-Relationship Model

Database Normalization

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - Introduction to Data Modeling

2011-01-01T09:59:00.000-08:00

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - Introduction to Data Modeling

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - SAP Certified Application Associate BusinessObject

2010-12-14T09:41:00.000-08:00

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - SAP Certified Application Associate BusinessObject click on more details....

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - SAP BusinessObjects Name Changes

2010-12-14T08:09:00.000-08:00

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - SAP BusinessObjects Name Changes click on more details....

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - Interview Question

2010-12-11T04:30:00.000-08:00

BusinessObjects Topics • View topic - Interview Question

BusinessObjects Enterprise architecture basic terminology

2010-09-21T05:30:00.000-07:00

Host
A host can be a physical computer or virtual machine.

Server

A server is an Operating System (OS) level process hosting one or more services.
For example,
CMS and Adaptive Processing Server are servers.
A server runs under a specific OS account and has its own PID.

Service

A service is a server subsystem that provides a specific function. The service runs within the
memory space of its server under the Process ID (PID) of the parent container (server).
For example,
the Web Intelligence Scheduling and Publishing Service is a subsystem running within the Adaptive Job Server.

Node

A node is a collection of BusinessObjects Enterprise servers, all running on the same host.
One or more nodes can be on a single host. Each node is managed by a Server Intelligence Agent (SIA).

Server Intelligence Agent

The SIA is a locally run service managed by the operating system. The task of the Server
Intelligence Agent (SIA) is to start, stop, and monitor locally run BusinessObjects servers.

When one of the managed servers goes down unexpectedly, the SIA restarts the server immediately.
When you issue a command in the CMC to stop a server, the SIA stops the server.

When you create a SIA, you create a new node. A node is a collection of BusinessObjects
Enterprise servers which run on the same host and are managed by a single SIA.

You can add servers to the node and you can have more than one node on the same machine.

The SIA continuously monitors server status information, which is stored in the CMS databases.

When you change a server's settings or add a new server in the CMC, the CMS notifies the SIA
and the SIA performs the jobs accordingly.

................ continue..next we will discuss about Workflows for each servers and how the communicate each server

Introduction to Semantic Layers

2010-09-14T00:10:00.000-07:00

Introduction to Semantic Layers
The semantic layer is a metadata layer that abstracts the complexities of the data source. The end user sees only a logical grouping of available, well-named fields for use and does not have to concern them with the details of database design or need any SQL knowledge.
In Business Objects XI, two semantic layers are supported business views and universes. With the merging of Crystal Decisions and Business Objects, a decision was made to keep business views from Crystal Decisions and universes from Business Objects.
Why Use a Semantic Layer
Semantic layers offer wonderful advantages over traditional report design processes by removing the most difficult data-intensive tasks, as described in the following sections, from report design. Furthermore, it allows for reuse of components and promotes the concept of changing a component once and having the change applied to multiple reports.
Abstract the Complexities of the Database
With large complex data warehousing projects using many tables and complex joins, the report author might not have the requisite knowledge. If the report author is required to join the tables for the reports, he might not use the most efficient join, resulting in poor performance. Semantic layers allow for a division in labor, whereby the more technical database administrators and developers can create the joins between tables and data sources and the business users can concentrate on designing reports to satisfy their requirements.
Putting Report Design in the Hands of Business People
As a result of this division of labor and the reuse of the Business Objects repository, business people do not have to be as technically savvy, effectively resulting in less technical skill being required to develop reports.
Support for a Wide Range of Data Sources
Both metadata layers provide a wide range of database support, including the majority of relational database vendors. Business views also include the ability to connect to some no relational data sources; for example, a user could abstract the complexity of an XML file by encapsulating the XML with a business view.
Reuse of Metadata Components
One major drawback to specifying the data joins in each report is that this creates a large amount of redundant work. Secondly, should the database change, there is no way to effect this change other than changing each of the individual reports. A semantic layer allows the administrator to create this join once and should this join change, the administrator only needs to change it once.
Security
The semantic layer allows the administrator to set up security so that data is filtered based on who the user is. This can be based off of security within an entitlements database, or the Business Objects user model can be used to create the security model. This way rows and columns can be secured by users or groups.
The Business Objects repository also secures the semantic layers and only those users with the required permissions can access them. For example, it is generally accepted auditing practice that accounts receivable personnel should not be able to see accounts payable information and vice versa. By using the user group functionality in Business Objects Enterprise, the accounts receivable group would be given access to only the accounts receivable semantic layer.
Transportability
The semantic layers provide the ability to export a business view to an XML file or a universe to an .unv file. These files can then be easily imported into another Business Objects Enterprise repository. This simple form of transportability makes semantic layer swapping a simple exercise. It also simplifies the storage of source code, should the organization have a source code storage requirement.

Inmon vs. Kimball - An Analysis

2010-09-08T20:25:00.000-07:00

Mr. William (Bill) Inmon is known as the “Father of Data Warehousing”, entitled for coining the term “Data Warehouse” in 1991. He defined a model to support “single version of the truth” and championed the concept for more than a decade. He also created “Corporate Information Factory” in collaboration with Ms. Claudia Imhoff. Mr. Inmon is known to have published 40+ books and 600+ articles.

Mr. Ralph Kimball is known as the “Father of Business Intelligence” for defining the concept behind “Data Marts”, for developing the science behind the analytical tools that utilize dimensional hierarchies, and for conceptualizing star-schemas and snowflake data structures. He defined a model to support analytical analysis and championed data marts for more than a decade. Though Kimball’s writings do not exceed Inmon’s by quantity, Kimball’s books are all-time best sellers on data warehousing.

Inmon and Kimball are two pioneers that started different philosophies for enterprise-wide information gathering, information management, and analytics for decision support. Inmon believes in creating a single enterprise-wide data warehouse for achieving an overall business intelligence system. Kimball believes in creating several smaller data marts for achieving department-level analysis and reporting.

APPROACHES
Inmon’s philosophy recommends to start with building a large centralized enterprise-wide data warehouse, followed by several satellite databases to serve the analytical needs of departments (later known as “data marts”). Hence, his approach has received the “Top Down” title.

Kimball’s philosophy recommends to start with building several data marts that serve the analytical needs of departments, followed by “virtually” integrating these data marts for consistency through an Information Bus. Hence, his approach received the “Bottom Up” title. Mr. Kimball believes in various data marts that store information in dimensional models to quickly address the needs of various departments and various areas of the enterprise data.

STRUCTURES
Besides the differences in approaches, Inmon and Kimball also differ in the structure of the data. Inmon believes in creating a relational-model (third normal form: 3NF) where as Kimball believes in creating a multi-dimension model (star-schema and snowflakes).

Inmon argues that once the data is in a relational model, it will attain the enterprise-wide consistency which makes it easier to spawn-off the data-marts in dimensional-models. Kimball argues that the actual users can understand, analyze, aggregate, and explore data-inconsistencies in an easier manner if the data is structured in a dimensional-model. Additionally, to enable the Information Bus, data marts are categorized [Imhoff, Mastering Data warehouse design] as atomic data marts, and aggregated data marts that both use dimensional-models.

Irrespective of the structural differences in the model, both Inmon and Kimball agrees that there is a need to separate the detailed-level data from aggregated-level data.

CONTENT
Another difference is in the granularity of the content. Inmon believes that the content in the data warehouse has to be at the most granular level possible and must include all the possible historical data within an enterprise. His argument is that the end-users will mandate the needs on the level of data-detail that are not known at the time of building the data warehouse.

COMMON GOALS
Though Mr. Inmon and Mr. Kimball have different philosophies to their approach, they do tend to agree with each other in an indirect manner. Though Inmon’s basis is on a single data warehouse, he stressed on iterative approach and discouraged the “big bang” approach. On the other hand, though Kimball’s philosophy is to quickly create few successful data marts at a time, he stresses on integration for consistency via an Information Bus.

DATA WAREHOUSE vs. BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE
Business Intelligence = Inmon’s Corporate Data Warehouse + Kimball’s Data Marts + Data Mining + Unstructured Data.

SAP BusinessObjects Useful Links

2010-07-27T01:13:00.000-07:00

SAP BusinessObjects Links
SAP® BusinessObjects Community: http://sdn.sap.com/irj/boc
SAP® BusinessObjects Notes: https://sdn.sap.com/irj/boc/notes
SAP® BusinessObjects Articles: https://sdn.sap.com/irj/boc/articles
SAP® BusinessObjects Forums: https://sdn.sap.com/irj/scn/forums

DASHBOARDS USING QUERY AS A WEB SERVICE AND XCELSIUS

2010-07-25T08:37:00.000-07:00

DASHBOARDS USING QUERY AS A WEB SERVICE AND XCELSIUS
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BusinessObjects XI R2 installation Step by Step

2010-06-10T12:38:00.000-07:00

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How to browse CMS repository

2010-04-18T19:55:00.000-07:00

Overview

The CMS(Central Management Server) repository stores metatdata in the form of InfoObjects. As you know, all the contents of BOE(BusinessObjects Enterprise) system can be classified into two types: metadata and the actual file. For example, if there is a Crystal Report document in the BOE system, the metadata (including Report name, type, ID, CUID, path, etc.) is stored as an InfoObject in the CMS Repository. The Crystal Report document itself (i.e. the .rpt file) is stored as a file on the File Repositoy Server(FRS). In this article, I will describe the structure of CMS repository and how the metadata is organized.

CMS Repository Structure
The CMS metadata is physically stored on a database, but we browse the InfoObjects from virtual tables. To give a clear picture, let's begin with physical structure at the database level.

Physical Database Tables
There are 6 tables on the database level to store the metadata.
 CMS_VersionInfo
The table contains the current version of BOE.

 CMS_InfoObjects6
This is the main table in the repository. Each row in this table stores a single InfoObject. The table contains the following columns: ObjectID, ParentID, TypeID, OwnerID, Version, LastModifyTime, ScheduleStatus, NextRunTime, CRC, Properties, SI_GUID, SI_CUID, SIRUID, SI_INSTANCE_OBJECT, SI_PLUGIN_OBJECT, SI_TABLE, SI_HIDDEN_OBJECT, SI_NAMEDUSER, SI_RECURRING, SI_RUNNABLE_OBJECT, SI_PSS_SERVICE_ID, ObjName_TR, SI_KEYWORD, SI_KEYWORD_TR, LOV_KEY.

 CMS_Aliases6
This table maps the user alias(es) to the corresponding user ID. A user has an alias for each security domain in which they are members. For example, a user may have both a Win NT alias and an LDAP alias. Regardless of the number of aliases a user may have, in the BI Platform each user has only one user ID. The map is stored in a separate table to enable fast logins.

 CMS_IdNumbers6
The CMS uses this table to generate unique Object IDs and Type IDs. It has only two rows: an Object ID row and a Type ID row. The CMSs in a cluster use this table when generating unique ID numbers.
GUIDs, RUIDs and CUID are generated with an algorithm that does not use the database.

 CMS_Relationships6
Relationship tables are used to store the relations between InfoObjects. Each row in the table stores one edge in the relation. For example, the relation between a Web Intelligence document and a Universe would be stored in a row in the WebI - Universe Relation table. Each relationship table has these columns:
Parent Object ID,Child Object ID,Relationship InfoObject ID ( this Default InfoObject "DFO" describes the properties of the link between the two objects.), member, version, ordinal, data. Relationship tables are defined by default objects.

 CMS_LOCKS6
This is a auxiliary table of CMS_RELATIONS6

With above knowledge, we can answer some questions regarding the physical tables on database level:
• When doing a CMS database backup, which tables should be chosen on the database?
The answer is all the tables which we mentioned above. Besides the database, user should also make sure to backup the FRS.

• How to substitute the CMS database with another database?
As we know there are 6 tables storing the BOE metadata, we may create the same tables on the target database, and import data from the source CMS database. Besides, users should make sure that the CMS server point to the new target database when starting CMS server, to automate the process, use the CCM database copy function, below are the screenshots of the workflow:

Firtly, click the data source button;

Then choose to copy data.

................ next post,

SABE501V3.0 Business Objects Certified Professional – BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.0 – Update

2010-04-14T04:55:00.000-07:00

Examination Competencies:
This exam will measure your knowledge of the new features and functionalities of BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.0. Before taking the SABE501V3.0 exam, candidates should install and become familiar with the BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.0 product, become familiar with the Administrator’s Guide found on the Documentation CD shipped with the BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.0 product and be proficient in the competencies found in the following offerings:
• SA100eV3.0 BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.0: What’s New – Installation and Lifecycle Management
• SA101eV3.0 BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.0: What’s New – User Rights
• SA102eV3.0 BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.0: What’s New – Federation, Server Intelligence, Auditing and the Repository Diagnostic Tool
• SA103eV3.0 BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.0: What’s New – Publishing Documents
• SA104eV3.0 BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.0: What’s New – Using the CMC and InfoView
• SA106eV3.0 BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 3.0: What’s New – Migrating Reports and BCA Publications