Well Managed BI

The APOS Well Managed BI Blog Has Moved!

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Mon, 31 Aug 2020 18:30:00 +0000

The Well Managed BI bog is now on the APOS website:

https://www.apos.com/blog/

Customer Success – Santa Clara County SSA

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Tue, 28 Jul 2020 21:09:00 +0000

The County of Santa Clara's Social Services Agency (SSA) services 15 incorporated cities in the most populous county of the San Francisco Bay area, which is home to California's Silicon Valley. The SSA uses SAP BusinessObjects as its reporting engine, and relies on it to meet regulatory requirements for it documents of record.

Santa Clara County SSA’s Challenge

In preparation for an impending migration, the SSA needed an inventory and deep knowledge of their SAP BI system, how their reports were being used, and how those reports would be impacted. While taking steps to streamline their content migration, the SSA also had concerns about maintaining their documents of record and audit readiness.

Santa Clara County SSA implemented APOS Insight and APOS Storage Center

Impact AnalysisThe SSA implemented APOS Insight to achieve awareness of reports, object usage and security profiles, and to understand the downstream impact of data modelling changes on reports.
Migration ReadinessThe SSA used APOS Insight to inventory and analyze their SAP BI system content and usage. APOS Storage Center automation enabled system right-sizing and migration streamlining.
Content RegulationThe SSA used APOS Storage Center to implement a content storage strategy that met their stringent regulatory requirements, safeguarded their content, and maintained audit readiness.

Feedback

Thinh Hong, Information System Manager at SSA Santa Clara County:

APOS Insight's impact analysis capabilities allow us to see what effect changes to our data model will have downstream. It has allowed us to analyze SAP BusinessObjects metadata effectively. APOS Storage Center provides us with an efficient, rules-based means of cleaning up our BI environment, and the ease with which it allows us to back up and selectively restore objects has been very useful.

BI & Analytics Business Cases in the Time of COVID-19

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Mon, 27 Jul 2020 12:39:00 +0000

ASUG’S Undercover CIO notes in Making the Right IT Investments in Uncertain Times that the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a shift in how CIOs determine the course of IT investments, citing the ASUG Pulse Check:

47% of respondents said their organizations were not canceling any planned IT initiatives, while nearly half (45%) shared that they are postponing a few planned initiatives. The top reason respondents provided to explain these cancellations was that these initiatives were not considered “core” projects.

Uncertainty has this effect, and everyone wants to manage more efficiently and still be positioned to hit the ground running when that uncertainty is resolved, which is why streamlining is such a common theme:

...you need to look at automation, as well as doing less with physical assets and more with intelligent assets. Your business case for any project right now should be about streamlining.

In BI & Analytics, as elsewhere, streamlining means doing more with less, while ensuring your organization is ready to meet an uncertain future.

Streamlining through automation is a consistent theme throughout APOS Well Managed BI & Analytics solutions. They let you take control of your deployments, helping you to manage effectively in the present and prepare for what’s next.

APOS at TechEd 2018 Las Vegas

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Wed, 03 Oct 2018 18:57:00 +0000

APOS COO Allan Pym gave an interview at TechEd. He discussed the use of APOS solutions with SAP Analytics Cloud, including:

APOS Live Data Gateway - live data connectivity for SAP Analytics Cloud, Lumira, and Analysis Office
APOS Publisher for Cloud - bursting and distribution for SAP Analytics Cloud

Have a look:

Solution Spotlight - APOS Live Data Gateway

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Tue, 09 Jan 2018 15:29:00 +0000

Unlock live data with the APOS Live Data Gateway.

The APOS Live Data Gateway is a data connection and data transformation solution that enables live data connectivity for SAP BI solutions and expanded data source options

HANA is the model for SAP BI data connectivity. You know that SAP Lumira, SAP Analytics Cloud, and SAP Analysis for Office connect live to HANA data. If it's a good idea to connect live to HANA, it's probably a good idea for these SAP BI solutions to connect live to other enterprise data sources.

Using the APOS Live Data Gateway for extended, live data connectivity lets you:

Simplify user experience and data discovery
Select data with greater flexibility
Maintain current data in your SAP BI projects, without including the data in your project files, for stronger information governance and security

Find out how the APOS Live Data Gateway unlocks live data for:

Webinar - More SAP BI Distribution Options

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Mon, 13 Nov 2017 20:32:00 +0000

In SAP BI 4.2, SP4, you can experience a broad range of distribution options from within the BI Launchpad interface. There is no need to go outside of the BI Launchpad interface for new destination types, enhanced print controls, greater encryption options, and a wider variety of format types, because they are all available right there, at your fingertips, inside the BI Launchpad interface.

Why do you need enhanced distribution? Let's consider destination types as an example.

Firstly, you need enhanced destination types to be sure that you can push, pull, print or place information to the appropriate destinations in your workflows. Appropriate destinations are the ones that ensure the information is where it is needed, and where it will do the most good.

Secondly, enhanced destination types improve your ability to govern the flow of information, ensuring that your business intelligence does not go where it shouldn't. Using enhanced destination types improves information governance, and contributes to the development of a culture of compliance.

Typically, your distribution options will consist of BI Inbox, Email, FTP Server, File System, or SFTP Server, but with the APOS Distribution Server / BI Launchpad integration, you will see a much greater variety of destination types:

SAP takes great care to promote the SAP Partner Ecosphere, because they know they will be much more agile if they do not try to be all things to all organizations. Instead, they focus on vision (the SAP BI Convergence strategy, for example), and on the core capabilities that enable that vision. If you want to use SAP BusinessObjects in a novel or unique way, well, that's what the SAP Partner Ecosphere is for.

The APOS Distribution Server / BI Launchpad integration is an outstanding example of SAP's commitment to their customers through the SAP Partner Ecosphere, and an outstanding example of the SAP Partner Ecosphere in action.

If you want to see enhanced distribution in action, please tune in for our webinar:

Register for this webinar
When: Wednesday, November 15, 2 pm EST
Enhanced Distribution & Integration
of BI Content into Business Workflows…

In this webinar, Jason Young of Computer Services Inc. (CSI) joins us to describe how CSI used enhanced distribution techniques to integrate SAP BusinessObjects into their core bank processing solution.

Webinar - Making SAP BI Administration Exciting

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Thu, 02 Nov 2017 16:20:00 +0000

Well, okay, my title may be overselling BI administration a tiny bit.

In fact, as BI topics go, administration may seem one of the least exciting. But managing administration tasks well is the first step toward enabling the pursuit of all of those other, more exciting BI topics.

Many administrative tasks can be both labor-intensive and time-sensitive, meaning that you need to throw resources at the tasks to ensure timely fulfillment of service level agreements with your information consumers.

The result is a double dose of undesirable: your resource costs go up and you don't have the resources to tackle initiatives with much higher ROI. You're paying more and getting less. You're undermining your ability to deliver progressive BI capabilities to your stakeholders, and as an unintended consequence, you're robbing them of competitive advantage.

Without a progressive approach to your BI platform, your management of administration tasks may just be increasing the technical debt in that platform, and the vicious cycle continues.

Sorry, did I say I was trying to make BI administration exciting? I meant terrifying. The truth is that most BI administration teams would prefer to live in less interesting times.

On November 2, 2017, we hosted a webinar that explores ways to automate and simplify the many time- and labor-intensive SAP BI administrative tasks faced by administrators on an ongoing and recurring basis. We looked at tips and techniques for reducing, preventing and managing the many chaotic activities, events and factors that drain your administrative resources and interfere with your ability to deliver timely BI content to your information consumers.

View this webinar on demand

Administrative difficulties arise from many causes, including the volume and complexity of content, growing user expectations, the proliferation of data sources, greater security, governance and compliance requirements, and the rise of user-driven content. None of these trends will make BI administration easier, but you can use the APOS Administrator solution to automate and simplify the most resource-intensive administrative tasks, and to liberate resources for progressive BI initiatives.

Webinar - SAP Lumira Live Data Connectivity

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Thu, 26 Oct 2017 12:54:00 +0000

When: Thursday, October 26, 2017 - 10 am / 2 pm EDTWhy do you need live data connectivity for Lumira?

The convergence of SAP Design Studio and SAP Lumira is big news for SAP BusinessObjects users needing to create and use visualizations to communicate BI's single version of the truth. To achieve this single version, BI practitioners -- from business users to designers -- need to establish the best and most diverse data connectivity possible.

Lumira connects live to HANA. If it's a good idea to connect live to HANA, it's probably a good idea to connect live to other enterprise data sources.

The APOS Live Data Gateway simplifies and extends the data connectivity for SAP Lumira. The Live mode of data connectivity provides:

Connection to trusted and governed data sources
A simplified discovery experience, with no need to write SQL
Flexible data selection
Data that is always current
Stronger security -- no data stored on the user's computer
The ability to use the Lumira Discovery web client -- no install on the client machine

If you missed our recent webinar on the APOS Live Data Gateway solution and live data connectivity for Lumira, you can view it on demand:

View the Webinar on Demand …

SAP's David Stocker Gives Us the Lowdown on SAP Lumira 2.0 / 2.1

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Fri, 13 Oct 2017 16:17:00 +0000

In a recent APOS webinar, SAP's David Stocker updated us on the current state of Lumira Discovery and Lumira Designer (formerly Design Studio), including what's new in Lumira 2.0, and on the roadmap for 2.0 and 2.1.

The key to Lumira's success, now and for the future, is the integration of discovery and design within a single solution, and the interoperability of that solution with other components of the SAP BI landscape.

Here's the road map David laid out for us during the webinar:

Note that this road map is subject to the usual SAP disclaimer on forward-looking technology statements.

If you want to see and hear more about the present and future of SAP Lumira:

View the Lumira 2.0 / 2.1 Lumira Update webinar on demand

SAP Lumira is designed to deliver live connectivity to SAP BW, SAP HANA, and the SAP S4HANA Analytic Engine, and connects to universes (UNX) and other third-party relational data sources to allow you to acquire data for discovery and design.

APOS Live Data Gateway - Extended Live Data Connectivity for SAP Lumira

If you would prefer to connect to live data in third-party data sources, such as:

Microsoft SQL Server
Oracle
DB2
Sybase IQ
Sybase SQL Anywhere
Teradata
IBM Netezza Data Warehouse Appliances

…then you should have a look at the APOS Live Data Gateway solution. If you want to familiarize yourself with this solution,

Solution Spotlight - APOS Publisher

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Tue, 22 Aug 2017 17:34:00 +0000

APOS Publisher is a complete publishing solution for SAP BusinessObjects. It provides:

An advanced bursting engine
Automated document production
Enhanced distribution, encryption & integration
Integration with BI Launchpad (BI 4.2, SP4)
Workflow monitoring, alerts and auditing\
Interactive process control
Assured delivery, auto recovery, & partial burst reruns

Learn More About APOS Publisher…

Download the whitepaper:
APOS Publisher: Progressive Enterprise Publishing Solutions for SAP BusinessObjects

Advanced Information Distribution Governance

With the frequency of high-profile data breaches over the past few years, risk is on everyone's mind. If there is value in information, there is necessarily also risk, which is why APOS Publisher is designed to deliver tightly controlled document production, publishing, and distribution.

Data governance requires you to establish control over the flow and exposure of information. Information distribution governance is how you establish and maintain that control.

The Distribution Server module of APOS Publisher Server is a post-processing engine that delivers a great variety of options that simplify and clarify user processes for greater empowerment and convenience, enhance information security through numerous encryption and password-protection methods, and fortify governance requirements by enforcing formats and destinations.

Push, pull, print, or place -- these are the essential information distribution options. Distribution Server delivers on all of these options, but it is with the "place" option that Distribution Server really shines.

When we place information, we are putting it where it is needed, when it is needed, with the right security, in order to inform workflows and decisions. Distribution Server's great variety of destination types, format types and security options make it possible to put information where it will be most timely and useful.

With the release of SAP BI 4.2 SP4, APOS Publisher's Distribution Server module is integrated with BI Launchpad, so SAP BI customers who also have a Distribution Server license can now access its advanced distribution, encryption and integration capabilities directly within the BI Launchpad interface.

Download the whitepaper:
Advanced Information Distribution Governance: APOS Publisher / BI Launchpad Integration

APOS Publisher Case Studies

Read case studies on how individual companies have used APOS Publisher for superior document production, delivery and distribution, and to achieve their information distribution governance needs:

Harvey Norman - Multinational Retail
Redevco B.V. - Real Estate
The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids, Toronto) - Healthcare
Outsourcing Solutions Inc. - Business Services
CrescentStonco, Genlyte Group - Energy

Solution Spotlight - APOS Insight

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Mon, 14 Aug 2017 12:29:00 +0000

For BI practitioners, deep system knowledge is the start of the incredibly rewarding journey to well managed BI. APOS Insight illuminates that path through enhanced metadata management, comprehensive audit, proactive system monitoring and alerts, and full impact analysis.

You need these capabilities to form an accurate understanding of your BI system's performance, and to plan for its future. APOS Insight will help you:

Improve system governanceOptimize BI system performance; meet and exceed service agreements.
Meet compliance and audit objectivesEnable your BI team to meet corporate governance, audit and regulatory requirements.
Prepare for migration & upgradesCatalog your content; extract pre-migration benchmark information; map IDs between systems; compare security structures between environments; plan your migration.
Audit and harden system securityAudit security and perform remedial fixes before the underlying problems hurt you.
Protect sensitive informationKnow who has accessed what information through off-line historical analysis of audit data. The APOS Insight Website Auditor also provides granular user session data for the web application server and SAP BusinessObjects.
Enhance change management processesSee what has changed, and who made the changes, so that your change management processes are audit-ready.

Use APOS Insight to optimize your SAP BI environment and infrastructure, establish complete confidence in your content, enable industry-specific regulatory compliance, and to deliver well managed BI to your organization.

Learn more about APOS Insight and Deep System Knowledge

BI + Analytics 2017, Nashville

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Thu, 03 Aug 2017 12:54:00 +0000

APOS will be in Booth #4 at this year's BI +Analytics show in Nashville, which takes place from August 7 to 9 at the Music City Center.

The show features two great presentations you won't want to miss by APOS customers:

CSI - Enhanced Distribution & Integration of BI Content into Business Workflows

Jason Young demonstrates how Computer Services Inc. integrated SAP BusinessObjects into their core bank processing solution with the help of APOS Distribution Server. APOS solution consultant Alan Golding will also be on hand to discuss the enhanced distribution options provided by the integration of APOS Distribution Server with BI Launchpad in BI 4.2 SP4. (When: Wednesday, Aug. 9, 1:30 PM)

Beaumont Health System - Healthcare BI Management & Related EHR Upgrades

While this presentation relates specifically to healthcare BI, its lessons are universal. Jeffery Morrison demonstrates how Beaumont Health reduces technical debt at every opportunity by thinking outside the SAP BusinessObjects box, taking full advantage of system metadata, and developing integrated resource, content, upgrade and migration strategies. (When: Wednesday, Aug. 9, 2:25 PM)

Both of these presentations are very strong on substance that you can apply to your own BI environment, and we would love to see you there.

Read more about these APOS customer presentations…

SAP App Center Q&A with SAP's Raghuraman Ramakrishnan

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Thu, 03 Aug 2017 12:45:00 +0000

APOS COO Allan Pym recently participated in a Q&A with SAP's Raghuraman Ramakrishnan. The focus of the Q&A was the SAP App Center, on which you can find numerous APOS solutions.

The SAP App Center is SAP's new online store bringing together the entire SAP partner ecosphere.

Allan described what he liked about the new SAP App Center:

I like two things in particular. First, that SAP is demonstrating its commitment to the SAP partner ecosphere. Second, that the new SAP App Center gives us more opportunity to describe our solutions and what they can do for organizations wanting to get the most out of SAP business intelligence (BI) solutions.

Read Raghuraman's blog post on the Q&A here.

Solution Spotlight - APOS Migrator for Web Intelligence

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Thu, 27 Jul 2017 13:48:00 +0000

SAP BusinessObjects BI 4 is very flexible in how it lets you adopt the new semantic layer and UNX universe, but it is in your organization's best interest to adopt the UNX universe sooner rather than later. Essentially, you have three options:

Stay fully on UNVThis option does not require any immediate action, but simply maintaining your UNV universes means you will slowly fall behind the technology curve as the SAP BI convergence strategy continues its inexorable course.
Move fully to UNXThis option allows you to take full advantage of new SAP BI capabilities, but it requires great efforts to update skill sets, convert universes, and repoint reports.
Retain some UNV, while performing all new development in UNXThis option allows you to transition at your own speed to UNX, taking advantage of new capabilities where they provide the most value, while preserving UNV universes that perform well. In the short term, you will have more maintenance, testing, and documentation as downsides to this approach, but it provides the most flexibility for a considered migration effort.

When you are ready to adopt the UNX universe, APOS has a solution to help you achieve your objectives as painlessly as possible.

APOS Migrator for Web Intelligence

The migration to UNX universes is a daunting project for many organizations. While the conversion of individual universes may be manageable, the repointing of all the associated Web Intelligence reports is a vastly bigger initiative. The APOS Migrator for Web Intelligence allows you to address the size and scope of such initiatives, providing strong process execution, effective and safe management of BI assets, and efficient methods for containing IT resource costs.

A fully supported solution, APOS Migrator for Web Intelligence delivers:

Bulk conversion of universes from UNV to UNX format
Bulk repointing of Web Intelligence reports to new UNX universe
Automated, high volume testing of reports to validate accuracy
Tightly controlled, project-based methodology

Learn more about the APOS WebI Migrator

Solution Spotlight - APOS Validation Manager

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Thu, 15 Jun 2017 13:01:00 +0000

The increasing pace of technological change, the growing volume of data, and its complexity, make automated report testing an ongoing subject of interest for BI platform managers and administrators.

From full-version migration to in-place upgrade to day-to-day report development and management, report testing can be a labor- and resource-intensive activity. The APOS Validation Manager solution presents a project-based, highly controlled environment for testing reports. It works with:

SAP Web Intelligence
Analysis for Office
Crystal Reports
Crystal Reports for Enterprise

Use Validation Manager log in to your source BI system, search for report objects, add the report objects to a project, set the target BI system connection information, and import the files into your project for testing.

Simplify the import operation by using other APOS solutions such as APOS Insight or the InfoScheduler or Instance Manager modules of the APOS Administrator solution, or you can import by specifying schedules or from existing instances.

Validation Manager tells you when report validation is failed, successful, or successful with warnings, simplifying your testing process and allowing you to increase the speed of report implementation.

Validation Manager provides numerous benefits:

Rapid technology adoption ensuring timely and accurate information for decision-making workflows
Increase the scope of your migration testing sample, and the depth of testing
Improved internal control governance for SOX compliance and other regulatory requirements
Implement database / schema changes and upgrades, semantic layer changes, and vendor-based data source changes more quickly and dependably
Efficient resource management

Learn more about APOS Validation Manager…

SAP Convergence Strategy - Data Connectivity

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Wed, 31 May 2017 13:37:00 +0000

The April 20, 2017, SAPinsider Q&A on the SAP BI Convergence Strategy has provided a nearly endless supply of blogging material, but this will be my last post on the subject. If you want to read the full transcript, go to the APOS On-Demand Webinars page:

View the complete SAPinsider Q&A Transcript

So far, I've focused on the place of individual SAP products within the SAP convergence strategy (the merger of Lumira and Design Studio, what's new in SAP Web Intelligence, BOC), on the newest platform developments (what's new in SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.2 SP4), and on the convergence strategy itself.

Now let's look at a topic that was a little less defined, but ever-present nonetheless: data connectivity.

As convergence reduces the SAP BI toolset, the need for greater connectivity grows, and the pressure is on to supply that connectivity. One of the registrants for the Q&A commented:

Will there be more emphasis on adding new features in the BI reporting/analysis toolset to support non-SAP databases? We see lots of new features and capabilities to better report off of SAP HANA and BW data, but not much related to Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle, etc.

Another guest asked about row and cell limitations in Design Studio:

Design Studio has a row and cell limitation. We were hoping this limitation was removed with the convergence of DS and Lumira.

SAP's David Stocker replied:

In BEx and SAP HANA datasources, you can define what the limits are in the backend. For universes, we still have the same hard limit as in 1.6. We've not changed anything in that corner for 2.0. We do plan to revisit this in the future, now that we have the new velocity infrastructure.

Another guest asked about OLAP connectivity:

Hi Team, When would SSAS OLAP based universes or direct non-SAP OLAP connections be supported?

Merlijn Ekkel replied:

We already support various non-SAP OLAP datasources. Please check our Product Availability Matrix

Another guest asked about BOC connectivity:

Our company is planning to move more to cloud rather than using on-premise, so my detail question is, how is SAP BusinessObjects BI Cloud able to access data on our company (within firewall)? Example, I have Crystal Report access Oracle database in my company, if I want to move that Crystal Report to SAP BusinessObjects BI Cloud, is it possible?

Henry Kam noted:

SAP BusinessObjects Cloud is able to access data within the firewall by utilizing the BOC Cloud Agent to import data into BOC… It is not currently possible to move Crystal Reports to SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.

Another guest:

When will Lumira support SSAS?

Merlijn:

Today we have no direct road map plans to support SSAS (or other OLAP datasources). Today the best option would be the APOS Data Gateway that solves the gap.

We thank Merlijn for his acknowledgement of how the APOS Data Gateway is leading the way with enhanced data connectivity for SAP BusinessObjects. Check out the available connectivity options:

What's on your data connectivity wish list?

SAP Convergence Strategy - BOC

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Fri, 26 May 2017 16:48:00 +0000

The April 20, 2017, SAPinsider Q&A focused on the SAP BI Convergence Strategy.

So far, I've published posts on the convergence strategy itself, and on what's new in SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.2 SP4, and the merger of Lumira and Design Studio.and SAP Web Intelligence. The SAP BusinessObjects Cloud was also a subject of discussion.

SAP's Henry Kam took the lead in the discussion:

Organizations recognize that SAP BusinessObjects Cloud offers a unique value proposition in the market today by combining analytics, planning, and predictive capabilities. These 3 capabilities are not just available under a shared application user interface, but the key is that these functionalities are actually integrated seamlessly together in user workflows. Also resonating with customers is the SAP Digital Boardroom, which is a capability of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud. It provides users with a 360-degree view of their company’s performance in real time, using BOC which is a Cloud SaaS product, with the ability to securely access on-premise data, and displaying analytics on multiple large TV screens that are touch enabled.

Henry went on to discuss how organizations with on-premise deployments should be viewing the move to the Cloud:

We believe in taking a hybrid BI approach. Hybrid BI provides a seamless experience across both on-premise and cloud. When you access content or blend data from on-premise or cloud systems, you are doing hybrid BI. A seamless experience means that business users do not have to think about where data or content is residing; on-premise and cloud clients and assets work together. Sharing resources between on-premise and cloud deployments such as tools, data connectivity, visualizations, security, distribution, budget, organization, program management, training, licensing, and internal evangelization, does not require understanding whether the resources are on-premise or cloud. The journey many times starts with on-premise deployments, which must be extended and expanded into complementary cloud strategies with minimal disruption. One way we are realizing this vision is our planned innovation of providing a new experience which will consolidate access to analytics content from multiple hybrid (on-premise or cloud) systems into a unified experience. Keep an eye out for the analytics announcements at SAPPHIRE as we’ll be unveiling this new solution.

APOS realizes that data connectivity will be one of the most pressing matters for organizations wishing to take advantage of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, which is why we develop the APOS Data Gateway for SAP BusinessObjects. Allan Pym described this APOS offering during the Q&A:

The APOS Data Gateway for BOC will allow for live data access to on premise UNV and UNX universes, as well as SAP BW (v 7.3 and higher), MSAS, Essbase (Q3) and relational datasources (mid Q2). APOS also has a connector that will enable acquiring data from UNV universes.

Note: The APOS Data Gateway connector for relational data sources has now been released.

You can find more about the SAP BusinessObjects Cloud roadmap in the Q&A transcript, which you can access from the APOS On-Demand Webinars page:

View the complete SAPinsider Q&A Transcript

A future post will look at what's new in Analysis for Office.

SAP Convergence Strategy - Web Intelligence

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Thu, 11 May 2017 18:08:00 +0000

The April 20, 2017, SAPinsider Q&A focused on the SAP BI Convergence Strategy.

So far, I've published posts on the convergence strategy itself, and on what's new in SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.2 SP4, and the merger of Lumira and Design Studio. Let's turn our attention to SAP Web Intelligence.

During this year's Q&A, Gregory Botticchio told us that the Web Intelligence team had delivered approximately "50 innovations and cumulative enhancements." The top 6 most popular, according to Gregory:

Parallel refresh of WebI data providers, for all datasources
Commentary: add a comment in a report and in a table cell
Shared Element: share and reuse blocks (table, carts) between users
New SAP HANA access mode (direct access and OnLine)
dHTML catchup vs the Java applet
Dynamic, or Cascading, Input Controls

Coming in SP4 are improvements to the Web Intelligence dHTML client, new chart types and cumulative enhancements, but the biggest news in SP4 is a new Web Intelligence interface:

…we will mainly deliver a new, modern and elegant, SAP BusinessObjects Web Intelligence experience. It will be an interface build in HTML5, using some SAP Fiori UI5 elements. And it will be mostly an interactive viewer that you will have the choice to use in parallel of the existing one.

Gregory also gave us some details on the road ahead for Web Intelligence:

In the mid/long-term: We are planning a new simplified and modernized WebI Designer, to complete the story. Also we are thinking of changing the way to create reports by proposing Suggestions and Recommendations. Interactive Analysis for the end-users will also be key in this future release.

You can find more about the Web Intelligence roadmap in the Q&A transcript, which you can access from the APOS On-Demand Webinars page:

View the complete SAPinsider Q&A Transcript

Future posts will look at what's new in Analysis for Office and SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.

SAP Convergence Strategy - Merging Lumira & Design Studio

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Fri, 05 May 2017 13:12:00 +0000

The April 20, 2017, SAPinsider Q&A focused on the SAP BI Convergence Strategy, and nowhere is that convergence more apparent than in the merger of SAP Lumira and SAP Design Studio.

So far, I've published posts on the convergence strategy itself, and on what's new in SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.2 SP4.

The coming release of Lumira 2.0 will unite the Lumira and Design Studio code base in recognition of the fact, as David Stocker put it during the Q&A, that " the use cases of an agile viz tool and a custom app actually overlap in the wild." The merger of these two solutions is meant to simplify the workflow from business users to designers.

The backend convergence will facilitate such workflows, while the maintenance of separate client applications will preserve and improve usability for the business user and the designer. Blair Wheadon described the SAP vision:

Lumira 2.0 has major improvements in usability, data access, and is converged with SAP BusinessObjects Design Studio to enable the creation of sophisticated analytic applications… Data access: Key new features include online access to BW from Lumira Discovery 2.0 (the successor to Lumira Desktop) and improved access to Universe data in Lumira Designer 2.0 (the successor to Design Studio desktop 1.x) which removes the row limit for Universe access. This will ensure direct access to governed data and remove the need to create data extracts and ungoverned data silos. In addition to data access, the usability of Lumira Discovery is much improved with a single canvas UX, improved filtering and input controls, new chart features like smoothed lines and improved formatting control. Finally the ability to open a Lumira Discovery visualization with Lumira Designer and turn it into a full blown analytic application is very powerful. This means that any dashboard from the simplest visualization up to full-blown planning applications can be handled by the same tool. As requirements change, you don't need to switch tools.

The combination of Lumira Discovery 2.0 (formerly Lumira Desktop) and Lumira Designer (formerly Design Studio Desktop) will enable seamless collaboration between business users and designers to create custom dashboards and analytic applications from business user visualizations.

You can make this collaboration even more effective by expanding your data connectivity options. The APOS Data Gateway solution is designed to help you do just that. The APOS Data Gateway is a data connection and data transformation solution which provides extended data source and data volume options for SAP Lumira and SAP Design Studio. It also enables enhanced interoperability with BI components across the SAP landscape.

You can find more about the Lumira / Design Studio convergence in the Q&A transcript, which you can access from the APOS On-Demand Webinars page:

View the complete SAPinsider Q&A Transcript

Future posts will look at what's new in Web Intelligence, Analysis for Office, and SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.

SAP Convergence Strategy - Highlights from the April 20, 2017, SAPinsider Q&A

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Wed, 03 May 2017 12:16:00 +0000

As usual, this year's SAP Convergence Update event, brought to you by SAPinsider and APOS, covered a wide range of topics. While nominally about convergence, the conversation naturally turned to many of the individual SAP BI solutions, and how they are affected by the SAP Convergence Strategy.

The discussion concerning the SAP Convergence Strategy itself can be found here:

SAPinsider Q&A Highlights - SAP BI Convergence Update

For your convenience, I'll break down some of the more salient topics discussed at the event here on the Well Managed BI blog. Today, I'll focus on the discussion on Service Pack 4 for SAP BusinessObjects.

During the Q&A event, SAP's Merlijn Ekkel told us:

Within SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.2 SP04, we release the initial version of our fully revamped BI Launchpad and Web Intelligence Viewer, where end users will gain the ability to leverage the new and fresh UI for BI with great experience. Besides these, many smaller enhancements have been added.

He also announced that the SAP BusinessObjects BI Platform 4.2 SP04 What's New presentation deck had been published only a couple of hours earlier.

You can view the presentation deck here.

More good news: According to Merlijn, SP4 marks the beginning of a major overhaul of the BI Launchpad, including "a revamp of the scheduling and publications process."

You can access the complete transcript from the APOS On-Demand Webinars page.

SAPinsider SAP BI Convergence Q&A Transcript

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Thu, 27 Apr 2017 13:21:00 +0000

The APOS-sponsored SAPinsider Q&A - SAP BI Product Convergence Update transcript is now available for you to view at:

APOS On-Demand Webinars

This SAPinsider Q&A featured many SAP BI luminaries, including Jayne Landry, Merlijn Ekkel, Blair Wheadon and Ty Miller offering insights on the future path of the SAP BI ecosphere.

SAPinsider Q&A Highlights - SAP BI Convergence Update

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Fri, 21 Apr 2017 10:23:00 +0000

APOS was proud once again, for the third consecutive year, to provide an opportunity to interact with some of SAP’s leading BI lights on the subject of SAP BI convergence. We don’t yet have an official transcript of yesterday’s SAPinsider Q&A - SAP BI Product Convergence Update: What’s Happening Today, What Is Coming Next, and What Does It Mean for You?, but here are some highlights.

By the way, when the transcript for the Q&A becomes available, we will post a link on our APOS On-Demand Webinars page, where you can also view a large number of past webinars on topics you may be interested in, such as:

Automated Report Testing
UNX Universe Adoption Testing
Semantic Layer Update with SAP’s Pierpaolo Vezzosi
SAP BusinessObjects Advanced Monitoring

...and much more.

This Q&A session was billed as a chance to:

…interact directly with Jayne Landry, Merlijn Ekkel, Blair Wheadon, Ty Miller, and several other key product leaders from BI product groups at SAP, including SAP BusinessObjects Web Intelligence, SAP BusinessObjects Lumira, SAP BusinessObjects Design Studio, and SAP BusinessObjects Analysis for Office. Here's your chance to take a look at the road ahead for SAP’s BI products, assess your opportunities, and seek clarifications to questions

It lived up to this billing quite nicely.

APOS COO Allan Pym started the session off asking Jayne Landry (Global Vice President & General Manager, Business Intelligence, SAP) about the progress of the SAP BI convergence initiative. Jayne responded:

We have made tremendous progress on the convergence front. When we started this journey 3 years ago we had 14 different client tools running on the BI platform! We’ve now got that down to 5, with Crystal, Webi, Analysis Office, Design Studio and Lumira... And we’ve adhered to the convergence principles we laid out from the start – all existing content is safe and all existing BI 4.x clients continue to be supported so that customers can move to the “go to” tools at their own pace.

Jayne continued with a description of upcoming convergence advancements:

The next big advancement is the convergence of Lumira and Design Studio into a single code line with the release of Lumira 2.0, currently in beta and planned for GA late Q2/early Q3. This will enable end-to-end workflows from rapid prototyping by business users through to deployment of production dashboards at scale by developers.

You’ll have to wait for the official transcript for more, but I can tell you that it will contain substantial content on a number of subjects of interest, including:

The Design Studio / Lumira convergence
SAP BusinessObjects Cloud
New Analytics announcements to be made at SAPPHIRE
Web Intelligence improvements
New features in SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.2 SP 4

Bookmark the APOS On-Demand Webinars page and check back over the coming days for a link to the official transcript.

Update: SAP BusinessObjects Semantic Layer Webinar

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Wed, 22 Feb 2017 14:35:00 +0000

SAP's Pierpaolo Vezzosi joined us on February 16, 2017, to talk about what's new in the SAP BusinessObjects semantic layer. Back on February 2, it was SAP's Gregory Botticchio who joined us to talk about what's new in Web Intelligence. Taken together, these webinars give us a great view of the current and future states of the SAP BusinessObjects platform.

Pierpaolo's presentation featured a wealth of information, especially for people working with HANA and BW. He spoke specifically about:

Linked Universes
Universes on BEx query
HANA

Below, I provide a fairly detailed look at the topics discussed, but it would definitely be worth your while to view the webinar on demand, as Pierpaolo provides live demonstrations on all of these topics, as well as a lively Q & A at the end.

Direct & Online Access to HANA

SP3 saw the addition of Direct access and Online access as methods to access HANA, allowing Web Intelligence reports to access HANA data without the need to build a universe between them, with best practices enabled.

Pierpaolo provided live demonstrations of Direct and Online access to HANA from Web Intelligence using the newer DHTML interface, because, as he reiterated, this is where most new development will occur, due to the impending deprecation of Java applets.

He discussed a number of access methods in detail, and when to use them:

HANA online - best for exploration. It is fast and best practices are enabled by default. By default, you can return only 5,000 rows, but the user can override this default. However, "good" reports in Web Intelligence don't return this many rows. The big constraint with online is that all calculations and filtering are pushed back to the HANA system, which means that some complex Web Intelligence calculation are not available in this mode.
HANA direct on relational sources - has all the functionality of Web Intelligence, including the complex calculations not available in online mode, and the best performance / cost ratio for reporting. The recommendation is that you start the design process in online mode to discover the data and the shape of the data, then move to HANA direct mode to make all Web Intelligence functionality available.
HANA direct on OLAP sources - if you need hierarchies. OLAP on HANA direct may be marginally slower, so if you don't need hierarchies, stick with HANA direct relational mode.
HANA via a universe - if you need to customize your access to HANA. For example, if you want to rename objects and do not have write access to HANA views, you can use a universe to make access more friendly, or if you want to add a layer of security on top of HANA, but in general, SAP does not recommend using universes for HANA access. The default should be to use HANA views.

Authoring UNX Universes on BEx Queries

You can author a UNX universe on a BEx query as a means of improving user adoption. Users have welcomed the ability to access BW directly with Web Intelligence, but many have found BEx queries to be not business-user-friendly. Building a UNX universe on a BEx query simplifies the view of the BEx query for business users. Pierpaolo provides a detailed demonstration on how to author such universes.

Linked Universes

When linked universes were introduced in SAP BusinessObjects XI, their purpose was to make complex universe projects easier to manage. This idea returns in BI 4.2 SP3: You can construct UNX universes and allow objects in those universes to be inherited by a newer universe. Further, when you make changes to the original (or master) universes, the changes are propagated down to the derived universe.

Linked universes allow you to:

Deliver a modular approach to universe building in the Information Design Tool (IDT)
Insert the objects of a master UNX into a derived UNX universe, with automatic updates propagation to the derived universe

Use cases for this linked universes include:

Component Use Case- using a team approach in which each team supplies one or more components for the derived universe (e.g., customers, products, measures)
Kernel Use Case - building a large data foundation (e.g., the whole data warehouse) in the original universe, then showing subsets of that universe in derived universes (e.g., for Marketing, HR)
OEM Use Case - building a common universe, which is then extended in derived universes for various customers

Again, Pierpaolo provided a detailed demonstration on linking universes, and it is definitely worth your while to view the webinar on demand for these demonstations.

APOS Migrator for Web Intelligence

Allan Pym, APOS COO, also gave a brief description of the APOS Migrator for Web Intelligence, which enables:

Bulk conversion of universes from UNV format to UNX format
High-volume re-pointing of Web Intelligence reports from the old UNV to the new UNX

View this webinar on demand...

Update: SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.2 Semantic Layer

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Wed, 15 Feb 2017 13:58:00 +0000

APOS is hosting another SAP update webinar on Thursday, February 16, at 11 am EST. This time, it will be SAP's Pierpaolo Vezzosi updating us on developments in the BI 4.2 semantic layer.

The semantic layer has always been one of the features that sets SAP BusinessObjects apart within the increasingly crowded BI space. Universes greatly simplify access to data by providing consistent, business-logic-friendly naming conventions across the enterprise data landscape.

The centrality of the semantic layer meant that it needed to be tweaked regularly to keep up with new BI requirements and technological developments, but there is only so much tweaking that a technology can take before it begins to become unwieldy. By the time SAP began to design BI 4, the semantic layer was perceived by some to be approaching those limits, and SAP undertook the task of redesigning the semantic layer from the ground up.

The new semantic layer was designed to support a clear vision of the future of SAP BusinessObjects, and new developments continue to build toward that vision. In our upcoming webinar, Pierpaolo will discuss progress toward that vision, and the road ahead.

Join us to catch a glimpse of the future.

Register for this webinar...

SAP Web Intelligence Update Webinar Summary

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Woodhead) — Tue, 07 Feb 2017 15:42:00 +0000

Groundhog Day 2017 was not particularly informative concerning the length of our Winter here in Canada. A recent study determined that the rodents have been right only 37% of the time over the past several decades, which isn't even randomly inaccurate.

However, Groundhog Day did bring us a wealth of information from Gregory Botticchio in the form of a webinar that highlighted advances in SAP Web Intelligence and the road ahead.

Gregory told us about WebI themes if BI 4.2:

Building a Trusted Foundation - removing upgrade barriers with Linked Universes, and client improvements with Parallel Queries
Enabling the Business - collaboration through Commentary and Shared Elements, client improvements through GeoMaps and Big Numbers, and unleashing the ecosystem through Visualization Extensions
Leveraging the SAP Backend - SAP BW improvements with BEx-Authored Universes, and SAP HANA Enhancements with HANA Direct Access and HANA Online

These features were delivered in SP2, and enhanced in SP3 with:

dHTML Catchup - striving to achieve parity with the Web Intelligence Java Applet (an ongoing project)
Dynamic Input Controls - more than just cascading controls
Sets - authoring sets in the Infromation Design Tool, using them to query data, and consuming them through universes
Referenced Cells - using variables that return the value of a specified cell, maintaining the context of that cell, and listing referenced cells as Available Objects
Commentary - improved usability and lifecycle; performance optimization
Parallel Data Provider - parallel query support on BEx queries

When SP4 arrives later this year, it will launch a whole new set of Web Intelligence features that will improve Web Intelligence functionality and render the user experience more consistent with other SAP BusinessObjects solutions.

SP 4 is scheduled to include:

A New Viewer
More dHTML Catchup
New Chart Technology
An SDK & Extensions

Click the link below to view the webinar on demand and listen to Gregory Botticchio, BI Product Manager, SAP, give us the lowdown on what's up next for SAP Web Intelligence

View this Webinar On Demand...