Wednesday, December 22, 2010
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Upcoming Webinars
Visit www.sapdiary.com
The following is a list to our upcoming webinars… Follow the link next to the webinar date to register.
InfoBurst Webinars
November 5 – 11A PST – http://goo.gl/EZpQ
November 8 – 11A PST – http://goo.gl/036g
November 10 – 11A PST – http://goo.gl/8ewE
November 12 – 11A PST – http://goo.gl/6yYs
November 15 – 11A PST – http://goo.gl/vhW2
360 View Webinars
November 4 – 11A PST – http://goo.gl/hCj7
November 9 – 11A PST – http://goo.gl/CdRc
On facebook, follow InfoBurst at www.facebook.com/infoburst
Yolande Grill is the Vice President of Business Development at InfoSol Inc. I would like to think of myself as the Chief Transformation Officer. My favorite quote to ponder is one from Trina Paulus. "How Exactly does one become a butterfly? You must want to fly so badly, that you are willing to give up being a catterpillar" T-SQL: Previous and Next Modified Date
Normally queries like this are not really solved in T-SQL; rather a front end UI like WebI is capable of navigating through the records.
However if you intend doing it in T-SQL, then here’s how we can retrieve the Next and Previous Records of a given record:
/* Create Sample Table */
DECLARE @TT table
(
ProductID int,
ModifiedDate datetime,
CategoryGroupName varchar(10)
)
/* Create Sample Data */
INSERT INTO @TT VALUES ( 101, ’2010-10-01', ‘AA’)
INSERT INTO @TT VALUES ( 203, ’2010-10-01', ‘AA’);
INSERT INTO @TT VALUES ( 305, ’2010-10-01', ‘AA’);
INSERT INTO @TT VALUES ( 101, ’2010-10-02', ‘BB’);
INSERT INTO @TT VALUES ( 203, ’2010-10-03', ‘BB’);
INSERT INTO @TT VALUES ( 634, ’2010-10-03', ‘BB’);
INSERT INTO @TT VALUES ( 101, ’2010-10-04', ‘CC’);
INSERT INTO @TT VALUES ( 203, ’2010-10-04', ‘CC’);
INSERT INTO @TT VALUES ( 305, ’2010-10-04', ‘CC’);
INSERT INTO @TT VALUES ( 634, ’2010-10-04', ‘CC’);
SELECT
Prod2.ProductID,
Prod2.ModifiedDate,
(SELECT MAX(ModifiedDate)
FROM @TT Prod1
WHERE Prod1.ModifiedDate < Prod2.ModifiedDate and Prod1.ProductID=Prod2.ProductID ) as PreviousModifiedDate,
(SELECT MIN(ModifiedDate)
FROM @TT Prod1
WHERE Prod1.ModifiedDate > Prod2.ModifiedDate and Prod1.ProductID=Prod2.ProductID) as NextModifiedDate
FROM @TT Prod2
GROUP BY Prod2.ProductID, Prod2.ModifiedDate
ORDER BY 1,2
Result looks like:
InfoBurst blog has a new home
The InfoBurst team at InfoSol is relocating their Infoburst2009 site to a new web address. Visit the new product blog at infosolblog.com/infoburst
Yolande Grill is the Vice President of Business Development at InfoSol Inc. I would like to think of myself as the Chief Transformation Officer. My favorite quote to ponder is one from Trina Paulus. "How Exactly does one become a butterfly? You must want to fly so badly, that you are willing to give up being a catterpillar" BO XI 3.1: To Upgrade or Not to Upgrade?
As SAP announces the “ramp up” or controlled release for SAP BusinessObjects XI 4.0, some companies who are planning to upgrade to BO XI 3.1 are wondering if they should now wait.
The simple answer is “no” and there are many good reasons to upgrade to XI 3.1 as soon as possible.
Firstly, BusinessObjects XI 3.1 has been the general release for a couple of years now and has proven to be a stable and solid platform. It brings a new version of Web Intelligence with the Rich Client (offline) capability with access to external data providers like Excel. It also has other features, previously only available in Desktop Intelligence, like the fold/unfold feature and stored procedure support through the universe. It adds new functionality also like the ability to track data changes between versions, contextual hyperlinking and use of drop-down selection boxes for prompts.
At the same time, XI 3.1 fully supports Desktop Intelligence reports unchanged which is quite significant when you consider that there will be no support for Desktop Intelligence in XI 4. This means that XI 3.1 will be the last BusinessObjects release to support Desktop Intelligence or the old Full Client reports.
BusinessObjects XI 4.0 will be a major new release with a lot of new functionality some of which will be available in the first 4.0 release and some which will be released later in service pack updates. It will be a 64-bit software application. It will have a new semantic layer that will combine the capabilities of the old BusinessObjects universe and Crystal Business Views and with a slew of new functionality including support of OLAP (MDX) data sources like SAP BW and MS OLAP cubes. The old BusinessObjects Universe Designer will remain supported in XI 4 for compatibility and easier transition.
There are new functionalities and capabilities in Web Intelligence, Xcelsius, Crystal and other content providers including taking advantage of the new semantic layer and universe design tool. There are two versions of Crystal – Crystal Enterprise which is new and uses the new semantic layer and Crystal Reports 2011 which is a continuation of Crystal Reports 2008. There is a new OLAP analysis tool called Advanced Analysis which replaces Voyager and there are significant improvements to Data Services and the BOE infrastructure functionality.
There will also be a new utility to move the contents of your old BusinessObjects content to XI 4. The Import Wizard is effectively replaced by this new tool called the Upgrade Manager Tool. This works for upgrades from XI 3.1 and the plan is to also be able to upgrade from XI R2 with security model changes. There is no upgrade available from earlier releases meaning you would need to move to XI R2 or XI 3.1 before moving to XI 4.
The ramp up will probably last 3 to 6 months so the general availability of XI 4.0 is expected sometime between February 2011 and May 2011. It is unlikely that the first service pack will be available until late in the year and most existing BO customers will probably not look at moving to XI 4 until 2012 or 2013 (based on previous trends).
For these BO customers still using Desktop Intelligence, there will be the added consideration and work of converting or replacing their old reports with Web Intelligence which for some may be a considerable effort and cost.
According to information disseminated at the ASUG BO annual conference in October, in addition to Desktop Intelligence, the following other existing BO XI products will be end of life : Voyager, Encyclopedia/Discussions and Performance Manager.
Historically, the current and immediately prior software releases tend to be actively supported for all software issues which would suggest that at some point in 2011 only XI 4.0 and XI 3.1 will be considered the actively supported releases.
Taking all of this information into consideration, it does make sense to upgrade to BusinessObjects XI 3.1 in the coming months if you have not done so already.
Paul Grill started his career in Information Technology in the U.K. in 1978, as an Executive Data Processing Trainee for Honeywell. More than thirty years later, he still has a voracious appetite for learning as Information Technology continues to advance at an ever accelerating pace. He was first introduced to the world of Business Intelligence in 1991, in France, when he saw a demonstration of an early version of BusinessObjects on Windows 2.1. He returned to the U.S. to rave about this phenomenal product, but it was many years before BusinessObjects made it into the mainstream. Paul founded InfoSol in 1997, and made Business Intelligence one of the key solutions offered by the company. Today, InfoSol is a leading SAP BusinessObjects solutions partner, known for its expert consulting, education and innovative add-on solutions. Paul is well known within the SAP BusinessObjects community for his extensive knowledge of Business Intelligence, and he has lectured and written many articles on the subject. Paul enjoys writing, running and coaching kids soccer, and is passionate about Ancient Egyptology. Drill in chart to different Tab
Posted on 5 October 2010 12:02 am.Femke
If you want to give your users the choice of clicking on a chart (e.g. clicking on the chart title) and then going to a specific tab where the KPI is displayed in more detail, you can use the property “Selected Item: Item (by position)” of the Tab-component and several toggle.
You can even return to the overview tab by using the same method (toggle button). However If you want your users to be able to navigate through BOTH the tab buttons and your toggle buttons, you need to set-up the “return” toggle buttons “with non existing tab positions” as source data. This as the Tab component does not have an insert selection option itself. And when clicking on a tab and then clicking in the chart (on toggle button), the position is not changed and thus it does not trigger the “Selected Item: Item (by position)” property.
Kimono Starts to Open on BusinessObjects XI 4.0 at ASUG BO Conference
The 2010 ASUG BusinessObjects User Conference provided a lot of interest not just for the 1,100 registered attendees but also for the additional 600 attendees of the SAP Fall Focus who shared the same venue. Judging by the number of attendees in the various sessions, it appeared a large number of SAP Fall Focus attendees decided to attend the BusinessObjects tracks. The same was true in the exhibit area as many of the BusinessObjects sponsors were swamped with excited and interested customers.
This year Xcelsius dashboards shared the limelight with Mobile Business Intelligence in terms of the most popular topics being discussed amongst attendees.
There was also some buzz around the new BusinessObjects XI 4.0 release promising to be the first truly integrated business intelligence platform. While there were a few small demonstrations of some of the new XI 4.0 products in the general session, most of the other sessions stuck to slides and pre-recorded Camtasia demonstrations. With the release moving to “ramp up” stage in November, the kimono was only half opened on some of the new features and functions. These included the new Data Services that will now incorporate Text Analytics in addition to Data Integrator and Data Quality in a single engine solution. Also, there is the new Universal Metadata Layer that not only combines Business Views and Universes but also now provides direct access to Multidimensional OLAP data sources.
Part of the integration approach with XI 4.0 is to provide common services across all the main content provider tools like Crystal Reports, Web Intelligence, Xcelsius, Explorer. These include a common query panel for accessing data through a universe so in the new Xcelsius Enterprise 4.0 developers would have access to universe objects while building the dashboard.
An updated Web Intelligence brings new charting libraries from the Explorer product and an update Crystal Reports delivers a new grid view with drag and drop on graphics capability.
Common platform services like Auditing and Life Cycle Manager now extend across all the content provider tools including Xcelsius.
SAP’s new solution for in-memory analytics, known as HANA (High performance ANalytical Appliance), was also discussed.
Once the ramp up period gets underway, we will have a better chance to more thoroughly explore the new features and functions but based on this sneak preview, there appears to be some promising new functionality in XI 4.
Paul Grill started his career in Information Technology in the U.K. in 1978, as an Executive Data Processing Trainee for Honeywell. More than thirty years later, he still has a voracious appetite for learning as Information Technology continues to advance at an ever accelerating pace. He was first introduced to the world of Business Intelligence in 1991, in France, when he saw a demonstration of an early version of BusinessObjects on Windows 2.1. He returned to the U.S. to rave about this phenomenal product, but it was many years before BusinessObjects made it into the mainstream. Paul founded InfoSol in 1997, and made Business Intelligence one of the key solutions offered by the company. Today, InfoSol is a leading SAP BusinessObjects solutions partner, known for its expert consulting, education and innovative add-on solutions. Paul is well known within the SAP BusinessObjects community for his extensive knowledge of Business Intelligence, and he has lectured and written many articles on the subject. Paul enjoys writing, running and coaching kids soccer, and is passionate about Ancient Egyptology. Visit us at Booth 404 at ASUG SAP BO User Conference
By YolandePublished: September 8, 2010Posted in: 360 View, Events, InfoBurst, Roambi, SAP Business Objects, XcelsiusTags:
InfoSol will be a Diamond Sponsor at the 2010 ASUG SAP BusinessObjects User Conference to be held in Orlando. Florida October 5-7. The conference is expected to draw an estimated 1,500 to 2,000 BusinessObjects users.
InfoSol will be leading two session tracks during the conference : one highlighting Xcelsius Customer Case Studies and the other highlighting the next generation of BI report and dashboard publishing. We have also been invited to participate as one of the selected Xcelsius Guru companies in an Xcelsius Gurus event at the conference.
InfoSol will be highlighting many of its value add solutions including InfoBurst and 360View. Several InfoSol partners are also sponsoring and exhibiting including Mellmo the developers of Roambi and Antivia the developers of XWIS.
Be sure to stop by the InfoSol booth (#404) to say hello and enter for our raffle to win an iPad.
Selectors: 6 steps to Multiple Selection
Posted on 20 August 2010 10:50 am.Femke
As I get more and more request for the multiple select file I have written out below the steps to take (thus I will not send the file anymore, you can follow the steps yourself 
). Also I updated the source file to use the push button instead of a second source button as this is easier to understand. I created this initially for a Web Intelligence prompt, but of course you can use it for any prompt.
6 Steps to create a multiple select:
1. create spreadsheet
2. place a selector, eg.listbox with the following properties:
Labels: A5:A14Insertion type: rowSource data: B5:E14Destination: B2:E2Selected Item: Dynamicenable alertsalert values: H5:H14by valueselect “low values are good”deselect “enable auto colors”, remove 1 color and enter the value 0.5, the range minimum to 0.5 will be with a white background, range 0.5 to maximum will have a red background.3. place a label which shows the concatenated prompt value
4. place a source data button with the following properties:
insertion type: columnsource data: E5:E14destination: C5:C145. place a push button with the following properties:
label: G2source data: L5:L14destination: C5:C146. preview your dashboard.
That’s it. Easy is it not?
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So, you’ve been told you need to start using Crystal Reports. It’s installed on your machine and you’ve opened it. Now how do you get started?
The good news is that you don’t need to be a programmer or a database expert. However, you will need to be aware of the business requirements
for the report, how the report will be distributed, and be familiar with the data in the database. Assuming you have this knowledge, you can jump right in:
When you select Print Preview, Crystal Reports will generate the report by retrieving the records from the database and display the requested data on the report. It then is the time to be sure that the newly designed report meets all the business requirements per the request. Changes to the report, additions and deletions are simple to employ. If all is good, you can then export the report to several different Windows applications or to HTML. There is even a free Crystal Reports Viewer for those who don’t have a copy of Crystal Reports.
We provide plenty of practice creating basic reports in our Introduction to Crystal Reports 2008 class.
Add on manager is greyed out
Posted on 24 March 2010 1:33 pm.Femke
After installing Windows 7 the add on manager is greyed out in Xcelsius.
This is due to the default User Account Control settings. Change the setting to the lowest level (9) and then import the add ons. After restart of Xcelsius you can change the level back up again (or leave it).
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In Xcelsius, the Object Browser is your new best friend. It stores and displays all of the components that are on the canvas and allows you to hide them and/or lock them into position. Xcelsius allows you to design a dashboard by placing components on the canvas. It adds exciting visualization to Excel data– trends, what-if, projections and much more.
To add a component to a canvas of the visualization:
Open the spreadsheet that contains the data you want to use.Decide which type of component you need. ( Selectors, Containers, Charts, Gauges.)
Select the component and click on the canvas to insert the object.Use the Object Browser to control the component.Click on the eye to hide temporarily.Click on the padlock to lock the component position on the visualization.Once you have completed the components layout, you save it. The process of saving converts your visualization of the Excel data to an .xlf file. Click on preview and and a .swf file is created. This file then can be placed in a web page, PowerPoint, Word, Excel and Acrobat.
Xcelsius creates a dynamic, interactive and visual presentation of Excel data and a wow factor to your presentations!
Learn more about the Object Browser and other cool Xcelsius features in our 2-day Xcelsius class.
Webinar Alert: Fast-Tracking your BI Career One Dashboard at a Time!
With all the new BI trends and themes evolving today, how do you keep your career on track?
We are excited to announce a free webinar, hosted by Xcelsius Guru and SAP Mentor, Mico Yuk and a surprise guest, that will provide a firsthand look at key trends and themes within the BI industry and insight on how to take your career to the next level.
During the webinar the following important topics will discussed:
1. The future of the BI Industry and how dashboards will play an integral part
2. How to navigate your career in 2011 and take it to the next level
3. How to monopolize the emerging mobile technologies
Your Next Steps:
Click here to Register!Mark the date on your calenders: Wednesday, December 15, 2010, at 1pm EST, 10am PSTAttend the webinar with your questionsWe encourage anyone looking to get their BI career on track and to the next level to register today, as seats are limited. We look forward to this very exciting webinar!
Soo Tang Yuk fosters and evangelizes the ‘Xcelsius Gurus Network” and its communities. To find out more about her, please visit the About Us page.
Tags: BusinessObjects, Crystal Solutions, FleXcelsius, SAP Crystal Dashboard Design, Web Intelligence, Xcelsius 2008, Xcelsius Webinars
Missing Leo Apotheker
There was a lot of trepidation amongst the BusinessObjects community when SAP acquired Business Objects in January 2008. We had all seen how Oracle had consumed Hyperion (which had, in turn, consumed Brio) to the point of losing its identity as an independent BI solution. The question was would SAP do the same to BusinessObjects?
On the day of the acquisition, I was attending a joint sales and partner meeting for BusinessObjects in Las Vegas listening to a mix of top Business Objects and SAP Executives delivering presentations to motivate sales for the coming year. There was really very little of substance until this man named Leo Apotheker took to the stage. He was engaging and passionate as he explained that Business Objects would remain an autonomous division of SAP so that it could effectively continue to sell Business Intelligence to all. He then went on to explain who SAP was and the core values of the company and how those would benefit the BusinessObjects employees, partners and product suite. He painted an exciting vision of both the direction for SAP and BusinessObjects. I believe he impressed and inspired a lot of people in the room that day.
The global financial crisis followed later that year and into 2009 and Apotheker had his work cut out for him to steer SAP through a difficult time but he continued to push Business Intelligence to the forefront of SAP as well as actively support the Sustainability solution initiative within SAP.
So at the beginning of 2010 as we emerged from that difficult period, I was both shocked and sad to see Leo Apotheker leave SAP. Of course, what he put in place has borne remarkable results with now more than 50% of SAP’s license revenues coming from Business Intelligence (not bad when you consider SAP was eight times larger than Business Objects at the time of acquisition) and SAP a clear leader in the Sustainability solution arena.
Leo Apotheker is now the CEO of Hewlett-Packard ( a company eight times larger than SAP – HP Press release ) and I think they are very fortunate to have such a visionary leading them. Unfortunately, we will not see how much further he could have taken SAP but, from where I sit, he certainly set them on the right track.
In searching for a picture to post on this blog, I found the following blog post from Feb 7, 2010 http://www.enterpriseirregulars.com/12079/news-analysis-saps-ceo-leo-apotheker-resigns/ which has many links including one to the official SAP press release.
Paul Grill started his career in Information Technology in the U.K. in 1978, as an Executive Data Processing Trainee for Honeywell. More than thirty years later, he still has a voracious appetite for learning as Information Technology continues to advance at an ever accelerating pace. He was first introduced to the world of Business Intelligence in 1991, in France, when he saw a demonstration of an early version of BusinessObjects on Windows 2.1. He returned to the U.S. to rave about this phenomenal product, but it was many years before BusinessObjects made it into the mainstream. Paul founded InfoSol in 1997, and made Business Intelligence one of the key solutions offered by the company. Today, InfoSol is a leading SAP BusinessObjects solutions partner, known for its expert consulting, education and innovative add-on solutions. Paul is well known within the SAP BusinessObjects community for his extensive knowledge of Business Intelligence, and he has lectured and written many articles on the subject. Paul enjoys writing, running and coaching kids soccer, and is passionate about Ancient Egyptology. Request post
Posted on 1 October 2010 4:53 pm.Femke
This post is meant as a request post. If you have a problem which need solving or a question which needs to be answered, just leave a reply and I’ll try to answer it.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.Difference OpenDocument Crystal Reports and WebI
Posted on 14 April 2010 9:53 am.Femke
I experienced some frustations when trying to open 2 different reports (Crystal Reports and WebI), however both were built on same universe and used same objects, from the same URL button in Xcelsius.
The OpenDocument statement for the WebI report was quickly set up, however the Crystal Reports took some time. Even after consulting chapter 3 Crystal Reports in the PDF Viewing Reports and Documents using URLs (for BOXI 3.1) I could not get it to work.
Finally I figured it out by reading several forum topics, in the end the URL was built as follows:
../../../OpenDocument/opendoc/openDocument.jsp?
Identifies Crystal Reports reportH stands for HTML, unfortunately in 3.1 pdf is not supported anymoreforces reports to open in new windowKeeps Xcelsius dashboard “alive”CustomerCode is name of prompt, 0019 is customer code value, note “” to identify stringfoldername in Infoview, don’t forget []identification type, preferred in OTAP streetsforces reports to open in new windowKeeps Xcelsius dashboard “alive”CustomerCode is name of prompt, 0019 is customer code valueYou can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.Tips for Emailing from Xcelsius
I often get questions about sending emails from Xcelsius. In fact, I get them so often, I thought I’d take a moment to document what I know. Here, I’ll show you how to :
Send a basic emailSend an email to multiple recipientsAdd a Body to you emailPrevent that awful Browser window from popping up when sending an email from Xcelsius.First, you’ll want to add a simple URL button onto your canvas and go to properties:
.
To start a basic email, enter this into the URL input box:
mailto:mike@someaddress.com?subject=Email To DataPig
This will start a basic email when URL button is pressed. The email will have the To line filled in and the Subject line filled in.
If you want to send the email to multiple recipients, you can include other addresses separating each with a comma. Like this:
mailto:mike@someaddress.com, mico@someaddress.com?subject=Email To DataPig
Want to use the CC and BCC lines? That’s easy. Simply add the cc and bcc parameters:
mailto:mike@someaddress.com?cc=mico@someaddress.com&bcc=ryan@someaddress.com&subject=Email To DataPig
Notice that you will need to use the ampersand (&) to separate the parameters
OK, let’s get fancier and add a body.
mailto:mike@someaddress.com?cc=mico@someaddress.com&bcc=ryan@someaddress.com&;subject=Email To DataPig&body=I ate too much salmon.
If you need to add a multi-lined body (meaning the text of your body is on multiple lines), you can use your own carriage return encoding %0D.
To be able to use this, you will need to uncheck the “Encode URL” option. This will tell Xcelsius that you will handle the encoding.
.
Once you’ve disabled Xclesius’s encoding, you can enter something like this:
mailto:mike@someaddress.com?cc=mico@someaddress.com&bcc=ryan@someaddress.com&subject=Email To DataPig&body= I ate too much salmon.%0DNow I have salmonella.
And as always, you can dynamically build your mailto url address in Excel with formulas and simply reference it in the URL button.
So what about that nasty browser window that pops up when you send an email from Xclesius?
You can get rid of it by changing the “Open In” option to ‘This Window’.
After doing this, the extra browser window doesn’t open when you export your final SWF and HTML. You’ll still see it when you are in Preview mode, but rest assured, it will be gone when you go to run-time.
There you have it! Happy emailing!
Mike Alexander is the author of several books on advanced business analysis, including Crystal Xcelsius For Dummies. You can find Mike at Datapig Technologies, where he serves as principle contributor and shares free video tutorials with the Microsoft Office and Xcelsius communities.
Tags: Crystal Solutions, SAP Crystal Dashboard Design, Xcelsius 2008, Xcelsius 2008 Tips, Xcelsius Gurus
Conditional Formatting in Crystal Reports
What exactly is Conditional Formatting in Crystal Reports?
Conditional formatting, put simply, is formatting (e.g, font color, font style, etc.) applied to data that meets certain rules or conditions. For example, the person requesting the report would like the Total Sales field to have a green background if the amount is greater than $5000.
But how is this conditional formatting magic done?
Select the field to be formatted.Right-click and choose the border tab – background color is in the center of that tab.Do not click in the color checkbox, rather click on the X+2 box directly to the right of the background color. The Formula Editor will open.In the Operators column choose Control Structures for the If Then Else.Double-click to bring that down to the work area. At the top of the functions column, you’ll see two new categories associated with formatting text/numbers: Formatting FunctionsColor ConstantsNow the tricky part: you have to construct a formula. I’ve included a couple of examples below.if Sum ({Orders.Order Amount}, {@GroupSort})>5000 then crGreen else crNoColorNote that the colors are preceded by cr in lower case – Crystal Reports needs this, so do not enter a color name without it. Also note that the else argument is followed by crNoColor. The else could also be followed by DefaultAttribute, like so:
if Sum ({Orders.Order Amount}, {@GroupSort})>5000 then crGreen else DefaultAttributeThe results would be the same but the second formula would revert back to whatever the formatting color was that did not meet the condition. Of course, the formulas could be much more complex but the logic remains the same. If the formula returns true do this othewise do something else.
Happy formatting!
We cover conditional formatting in our Introduction to Crystal Reports class.
Xcelsius Will Always Be Xcelsius
So what’s in a name? Some people will tell you “everything” while others will tell you it depends on what you are naming.
Some products have not only become defined by their name but have been so successful they end up defining all products of the same type like “Kleenex” and “Band-Aid” . Others have found out that their product name can end up portraying the wrong image like Chevrolet’s Nova car – “No va” meaning “it doesn’t go” in Spanish! The French company Bull Computers also had a hard time with its “Bull” named products in North America. However, Bull also launched a clever marketing campaign around the ambiguity of its name entitled “Know Bull” which did get some attention.
At this year’s Sapphire, Sir Richard Branson told this great story of how when he went to register the name “Virgin” for his company in the UK, the company registration official turned it down because they deemed the name as rude. So Branson returned the next day with a dictionary showing the definition of “virgin” as being pure and they accepted it.
So I have been somewhat intrigued about recent forum discussions surrounding SAP’s decision to rename Xcelsius – their amazing and very popular dashboard product.
Xcelsius already had some name recognition when Business Objects acquired Infommersion (the original developers) in November 2005 but then proceeded to rename it Crystal Xcelsius. This resulted in a lot of confusion as people started to relate the product to Crystal Reports and thought it was an add-on to this report writer product. So when the next major release was developed, the decision was made to drop the Crystal name and so Xcelsius 2008 came to market.
For the last two years Xcelsius has become one of the most popular and prolifically used BI dashboard products in the marketplace and its name has become synonymous with data visualization and dynamic dashboards.
So why would you take this very well known product with such a cool and catchy name as Xcelsius and rename it SAP Crystal Dashboard Design or SAP Enterprise Dashboard Design?
Well apparently this is because SAP uses a “master brand strategy” where SAP is the master brand and the product brand name takes a back seat.
So why not SAP Xcelsius?
Well this is because SAP also uses “descriptive naming” for all its products so in the case of Xcelsius, the back seat has been completely removed!
Since “SAP Crystal Dashboard Design” is so long, it is bound to become abbreviated. However, I doubt this will be shortened to “SCDD” since a Google search points you to the “California State Council on Development Disabilities” . It is more likely to become “Dashboard Design” since that is the new descriptive product name. A Google search on “Dashboard Design” comes up with about 2.5 million results starting off with Qlikview, followed by Tableau Software then Corda and SAP Crystal Dashboard Design comes in at about number 14. Interestingly, there is little ambiguity when you search on “Xcelsius”.
Translating Dashboard Design into other languages may also prove interesting. Xcelsius will always translate into Xcelsius in all languages and I have a feeling the name will persist. At the end of the day, it is not just the name that counts, it’s the product itself. Xcelsius is as unique as a product as it is as a name. I will never forget that day in 2005 when I first saw it and was totally blown away. Infommersion created something truly amazing and ahead of its time. It remains top of its class and, for me, Xcelsius will always be Xcelsius.
Paul Grill started his career in Information Technology in the U.K. in 1978, as an Executive Data Processing Trainee for Honeywell. More than thirty years later, he still has a voracious appetite for learning as Information Technology continues to advance at an ever accelerating pace. He was first introduced to the world of Business Intelligence in 1991, in France, when he saw a demonstration of an early version of BusinessObjects on Windows 2.1. He returned to the U.S. to rave about this phenomenal product, but it was many years before BusinessObjects made it into the mainstream. Paul founded InfoSol in 1997, and made Business Intelligence one of the key solutions offered by the company. Today, InfoSol is a leading SAP BusinessObjects solutions partner, known for its expert consulting, education and innovative add-on solutions. Paul is well known within the SAP BusinessObjects community for his extensive knowledge of Business Intelligence, and he has lectured and written many articles on the subject. Paul enjoys writing, running and coaching kids soccer, and is passionate about Ancient Egyptology. Open document link in new window while dashboard does not re-initialise
Posted on 9 April 2010 4:31 pm.Femke
When you connect an OpenDocument statement to a URL button in Xcelsius and you apply the option New Window in the button properties, a new window is opened to show your WebI report (or Crystal report for that matter). However the report is not actually opened in that window, it is opened in your dashboard window, thus after closing or going back it forces the dashboard to reload again.
Solution:
add the following commands to the opendocument url:
sWindow=New&isApplication=true
the first command forces the link to open in a new window, the second command keeps your dashboard in the state it is in.
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Paul Grill from INFOSOL will be presenting Xcellent Xcelsius at the upcoming meeting of the ASUG Arizona Chapter.
Date: Friday, October 29, 2010
Time: 8:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Location: Intel
5000 W. Chandler Blvd. Building CH3, Conference Room
Chandler, AZ 85226 – 112
For complete information about this meeting refer to your Arizona Chapter Quarterly Update email.
Arizona Chapter Discussion Forum
Yolande Grill is the Vice President of Business Development at InfoSol Inc. I would like to think of myself as the Chief Transformation Officer. My favorite quote to ponder is one from Trina Paulus. "How Exactly does one become a butterfly? You must want to fly so badly, that you are willing to give up being a catterpillar" Possible Waterfall charts in Xcelsius
Posted on 1 October 2010 10:44 am.Femke
In Xcelsius a waterfall charts is not default available, however with a little imagination you can create one from a stacked bar chart. Below I have published 4 examples.
Waterfall Example 1AExcel source
Use the columns for the series (= coloring) and the rows for the labels (= columns in chart) by setting the data range to “Data in Columns”. On the appearance tab set the Marker Gap to 0 and the Marker Overlay to 100. Apply the series coloring accordingly.
Note: remember how Xcelsius builts up the chart; from bottom up to top. If you want your bottom bar color to be white, you have to start your series with the white color data.
Excel source
Same example as 1A only the less colors, thus less series used.
Excel source
You want to show how your profit and loss accounts are related by showing each individual account and use the colors red and green for the contribution amount (cost = red, revenue = green).
Again use the columns for the series (= coloring) and the rows for the labels (= columns in chart) by setting the data range to “Data in Columns”. On the appearance tab set the Marker Gap to 0 and the Marker Overlay to 100. Apply the series coloring accordingly.
Note: Again the order of the data columns determines the coloring in the chart. The white amount is calculated on the basis of the total of the previous column only in case of a cost account, that cost amount is subtracted from the total.
Excel source
This is based on the same principle as the previous chart only it gets more interesting as the total amount gets below zero, thus we have to deal with negative totals with a positive contribution. This can be achieved by creating extra series as the order of the negative positioned bar colors is different than when using positive bars.
Note: The coloring change in the y-axe can be changed by formating in Excel, see this post.
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder
Several years ago, I saw an exhibition of surrealist paintings in Paris including works by Salvador Dali and Joan Miro. I found the Dali paintings visually stunning as well as fascinatingly compelling whereas I had a hard time understanding the Miro ones. Others, who were with me, expressed the complete opposite opinion and loved the Miro work but had little time for the Dali pieces.
We all have different likes and dislikes to visual images whether they are paintings, cars or even business intelligence dashboards. I can personally testify to the dashboards since our company has developed over 400 of them in the last four years and they come in all shapes, sizes and visual tastes. I remember one particular dashboard that we developed for a transportation company that I thought was very visually stunning and provided multiple levels of drill down and some very powerful “What if?” scenarios. While the manager at the company also liked it a lot, his director felt it was not stunning enough and wanted different colors and more 3-D components. They both felt the dashboard met their functional needs but for the look it really just boiled down to a matter of personal taste.
The beauty of a dashboard tool like Xcelsius is that it allows you to design and cater to all these different tastes. You have a wealth of components, colors, themes and templates available and, if this is still not enough, you can develop your own.
While some people prefer simple dashboards with clear sharp components, others may prefer a more complex and richer look. If you do not like pie charts and certain colors, you do not have to use them.
Dashboard design is an art but the key to designing an effective, as well as a visually pleasing, dashboard is not to read books about the subject and it is also not to hire a graphic artist. The key is to sit down with the people who are going to be using the dashboard and to understand what they want to see and how they want to view and interact with it. While this may sound too simplistic, it is not. Of course, there can be room for visual enhancement and “cool” features but only if they serve a purpose.
There are many dashboard products on the market today that provide limited views and components so that you often have to force fit your requirements into what is available within the product. Xcelsius, on the other hand, allows you to design and create dashboards in an almost infinite number of ways and you are only limited by your imagination (or your user’s requirements). As to how they look, it is doubtful you will ever please everyone but remember that beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
For a gallery of Xcelsius dashboards designed by INFOSOL and defined by customers, visit INFOSOL’s Dashboard Gallery
Paul Grill started his career in Information Technology in the U.K. in 1978, as an Executive Data Processing Trainee for Honeywell. More than thirty years later, he still has a voracious appetite for learning as Information Technology continues to advance at an ever accelerating pace. He was first introduced to the world of Business Intelligence in 1991, in France, when he saw a demonstration of an early version of BusinessObjects on Windows 2.1. He returned to the U.S. to rave about this phenomenal product, but it was many years before BusinessObjects made it into the mainstream. Paul founded InfoSol in 1997, and made Business Intelligence one of the key solutions offered by the company. Today, InfoSol is a leading SAP BusinessObjects solutions partner, known for its expert consulting, education and innovative add-on solutions. Paul is well known within the SAP BusinessObjects community for his extensive knowledge of Business Intelligence, and he has lectured and written many articles on the subject. Paul enjoys writing, running and coaching kids soccer, and is passionate about Ancient Egyptology. Open document statement opens only in html viewer Crystal Reports
Posted on 14 April 2010 8:54 am.Femke
In BOXI 3.1 the opendocument statement for Crystal Reports opens the reports only in the html-viewer.
The commands are thus:
&sType=rpt&sOutputFormat=H
Monday, December 6, 2010
2008 Electoral College Calculator based on WSJ design.
Here is an interactive calculator to predict the future President of the USA. Design concept from the Wall Street Journal Electoral College calculator. I tried my best to replicate the functionality. Hope you’ll alll like it. Please leave a comment as a feedback.
Click Here for the calculator.
3 Steps in Creating Your First Report
So, you’ve been told you need to start using Crystal Reports. It’s installed on your machine and you’ve opened it. Now how do you get started?
The good news is that you don’t need to be a programmer or a database expert. However, you will need to be aware of the business requirements
for the report, how the report will be distributed, and be familiar with the data in the database. Assuming you have this knowledge, you can jump right in:
When you select Print Preview, Crystal Reports will generate the report by retrieving the records from the database and display the requested data on the report. It then is the time to be sure that the newly designed report meets all the business requirements per the request. Changes to the report, additions and deletions are simple to employ. If all is good, you can then export the report to several different Windows applications or to HTML. There is even a free Crystal Reports Viewer for those who don’t have a copy of Crystal Reports.
We provide plenty of practice creating basic reports in our Introduction to Crystal Reports 2008 class.
Christmas Lights with Xcelsius
This post shows how to create Christmas lights in Xcelsius by using just a couple components. The two components used in this example are the Push Button and Play Control component. Just five formulas were written in the spreadsheet to alternate the colors and create “blinking lights”. These formulas are all based on the Data cell in the Play Control component.
Adding Hex Codes
In this example, I used five colors for the alternating lights and listed the hex codes in the spreadsheet. These codes were entered and labeled in the spreadsheet. Be sure to add quotes around the hex codes when entering them. See the screenshot below.
Setup the Play Control Component
The next step is to add and setup the Play Control component. Drag and drop the Play Control component onto the canvas then map the Data and Scale property values to values in the spreadsheet.
Setting up Properties
Set the Minimum Limit to 1 and since we’re using five colors, set the Maximum Limit to 5. I included both 1 and 5 in the spreadsheet then mapped to them. Next, set the Data property by selecting a cell in the spreadsheet.
Color Coding
A best-practice is to color-code input cells in the spreadsheet and also include a temporary value. The screenshot below shows the cells that the Play Control component are mapped to (from the General tab of the component).
Play Control Behavior
An important step in the Play Control component is to click the Behavior tab and set the Play Time to 1 second. Also be sure to check the following Play Options:
Auto PlayAuto RewindAuto Reply
These three settings work together to force the Play Control to continually run. The purpose of the Play Control component is to increase the value in the Data cell. The value placed in the cell will be between the minimum and maximum value previously set. The value will increment by 1 and will Auto Rewind and Auto Reply (because of the previous settings).
Changing Hex Codes with Formulas
With the settings we’ve setup so far, cell J1 will continually count from 1 to 5, restart after hitting 5. In the next step we’ll write a formula that changes the Hex color code when the value in J1 changes.
Here’s the syntax for the first formula: =IF(J1=1,A4,IF(J1=2,B4,IF(J1=3,C4,IF(J1=4,D4,IF(J1=5,E4)))))
This code says, if J1 equals 1, then return the first Hex color code. If J1 equals 2, then return the second Hex code. The formula continues on through J1 = 5. By writing this formula, the Hex code in the formula cell will continually change as J1 changes (thanks to the looping action in the Play Control component).
The next thing I did was create four new formulas with slightly different conditions to show five different hex codes at all times. Observe the pattern and differences in the five formulas listed below.
=IF(J1=1,A4,IF(J1=2,B4,IF(J1=3,C4,IF(J1=4,D4,IF(J1=5,E4)))))=IF(J1=1,B4,IF(J1=2,C4,IF(J1=3,D4,IF(J1=4,E4,IF(J1=5,A4)))))=IF(J1=1,C4,IF(J1=2,D4,IF(J1=3,E4,IF(J1=4,A4,IF(J1=5,B4)))))=IF(J1=1,D4,IF(J1=2,E4,IF(J1=3,A4,IF(J1=4,B4,IF(J1=5,C4)))))=IF(J1=1,E4,IF(J1=2,A4,IF(J1=3,B4,IF(J1=4,C4,IF(J1=5,D4)))))The screenshot below shows how the five formula fields used to change the hex codes appear in the spreadsheet.
Note
After setting up the Play Control component, move it to the back layer behind all components so it will not be seen. An easy way of doing this is to select the component and hold down the minus symbol until it’s at the very bottom layer.
Adding Blinking Lights
The final step is to add the blinking lights. Each light is actually and individual Push Button component - mapped to one of the five formulas previously described.
Begin by adding a Push Button component to the canvasAdjust it to the shape you preferSelect the component then remove the word Push from the component’s Label valueNext, click the component’s Appearance tab followed by the Color tabChange the Default color and Pressed color (pictured below)
All that’s left now is to copy and paste the 5 existing Push Button components many times and place them appropriately on the canvas. That’s it! Blinking Christimas lights with Xcelsius!
Please let me know if you have any questions.
Thank you!
Jim.Brogden@daugherty.com
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!SAP Crystal Dashboard Design
Following SAP’s free download offer for SAP Crystal Presentation Design, there’s now an excellent offer on the grown up product: SAP Crystal Dashboard Design. This extends functionality to make all the widgets available, plus live data, web services, all singing and dancing! If you have Crystal Reports Server with Named User Licenses, you can even publish dashboards for all your users to play with.
Headline offer is 45% off, I’m hoping to make that half price once I can get a confirmed cost price.
For those who’ve been struggling to keep up with the name changes, this used to be called Xcelsius.
Prices through, managed to trim to half price:
Single license £395 + VAT
Discounts available on 3+. Extra discounts for Government, Non-profit, Education
Order on 01759 369827 or via Pursuit Technology
Analytics - out of the box: SAP Business Analytics
SAP finally announced on September 14, 2010 that it was getting onto the pre-packaged analytics bandwagon. SAP announced ten applications in this first release for six industries (Consumer Products, Healthcare, Financial Services, Public Sector, Retail and Telecommunications) in its BusinessObjects offering.
Building on the rapid-marts offering that the then BOBJ used to have and leveraging SAP’s industry and line of business expertise, these new applications are based on the SAP Business Objects XI platform – WebIntelligence, Crystal Reports and Dashboards (formerly Xcelsius). Bill McDermott, the joint CEO of SAP, described it as “complete and ready-to-go” and claimed the applications can be deployed in as less as eight weeks.
You may remember the brouhaha created by SAS last year , when it kicked off the controversy on Business Analytics being the future, rather than Business Intelligence. Going back even further, Oracle already had this in its Siebel Analytics pre-built analytic applications for various industries. Therefore, it would seem that SAP is already late in the game, but considering that neither Microsoft nor IBM have similar offerings, it may not be too bad for SAP. Better late than never…
Under the hood:
The pre-packaged analytic applications are based on the BusinessObjects XI platform – with the universe as the semantic layer or metadata model. It can be based on both SAP and non-SAP data, OLTP and data warehouse, relational and unstructured. SAP would work with its partners HP and Teradata to optimize the analytic solutions on their hosting and data warehousing solutions.
Business Analytics dashboards are Xcelsius flash files which can be used with web services/QAWS to deliver real-time analytics. It may also be possible to use these with SAP Business Objects Explorer (formerly Polestar) and/or SAP BW Accelerator or the SAP high-performance analytic appliance (HANA).
Business Analytics vs. Business Intelligence – Revisiting the controversy:
When SAS created this controversy last year, an important point noted by many was the SAS home page titled:
SAS | Business Intelligence Software and Predictive Analytics
It’s important to see how the rebranding has reflected in a change to the SAS home page a year hence. It now reads:
SAS | Business Analytics and Business Intelligence Software
SAS Institute was always viewed as a niche vendor, operating in the pure-play statistical and predictive analytics space and this marketing was to re-brand SAS’ offerings to move it mainstream. In effect, it signaled the market assessment by these major vendors, that in tough times, customers were seeking shorter lead times and demanding better tools which are quick and easy to introduce and provide quicker return on investment. As we come around the downturn, with SAP still focusing on this segment, it is clear that traditional BI is clearly seen as complex, costly and difficult to implement.
Open questions:
There are several questions open at the moment, given that this is an initial launch. SAP plans to offer more applications over the next year-18 months in collaboration with customers and its partners. The partners include Aster Group, Blueprint, Capgemini, Column5, CSC, Fusion Consulting, The Glenture Group, LSI Consulting and syskoplan and surely it would take quite a while for the ecosystem to develop. It remains to be seen whether the prepackaged analytics catches on like Xcelsius dashboards did for BOBJ.
It is not clear whether the prepackaged analytics would be positioned at the bigger enterprises or the SME segment only, as its success could cannibalize revenues from the flagship Enterprise XI suite.
There are also questions around the scalability of the framework the analytic applications are built on. The extensibility APIs and reference architectures for partners to build their own add-ons and plugins / applications of their own is not yet out (planned in 2011), so it’s not quite like the iPhone/iPad app store yet. It is also not clear how customizations to the applications would be supported or to what extent these could be customized. The long awaited universe rewrite including data federation might be a part of plans if the analytic applications turn out to be truly backend-agnostic and do support future in-memory data structures (SAP’s acquisition of Sybase would indicate likely support for the Sybase ASE in-memory database). If this happens, it would be in line with earlier plans to roll-out in-memory EPM and OLTP solutions.
Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder
Several years ago, I saw an exhibition of surrealist paintings in Paris including works by Salvador Dali and Joan Miro. I found the Dali paintings visually stunning as well as fascinatingly compelling whereas I had a hard time understanding the Miro ones. Others, who were with me, expressed the complete opposite opinion and loved the Miro work but had little time for the Dali pieces.
We all have different likes and dislikes to visual images whether they are paintings, cars or even business intelligence dashboards. I can personally testify to the dashboards since our company has developed over 400 of them in the last four years and they come in all shapes, sizes and visual tastes. I remember one particular dashboard that we developed for a transportation company that I thought was very visually stunning and provided multiple levels of drill down and some very powerful “What if?” scenarios. While the manager at the company also liked it a lot, his director felt it was not stunning enough and wanted different colors and more 3-D components. They both felt the dashboard met their functional needs but for the look it really just boiled down to a matter of personal taste.
The beauty of a dashboard tool like Xcelsius is that it allows you to design and cater to all these different tastes. You have a wealth of components, colors, themes and templates available and, if this is still not enough, you can develop your own.
While some people prefer simple dashboards with clear sharp components, others may prefer a more complex and richer look. If you do not like pie charts and certain colors, you do not have to use them.
Dashboard design is an art but the key to designing an effective, as well as a visually pleasing, dashboard is not to read books about the subject and it is also not to hire a graphic artist. The key is to sit down with the people who are going to be using the dashboard and to understand what they want to see and how they want to view and interact with it. While this may sound too simplistic, it is not. Of course, there can be room for visual enhancement and “cool” features but only if they serve a purpose.
There are many dashboard products on the market today that provide limited views and components so that you often have to force fit your requirements into what is available within the product. Xcelsius, on the other hand, allows you to design and create dashboards in an almost infinite number of ways and you are only limited by your imagination (or your user’s requirements). As to how they look, it is doubtful you will ever please everyone but remember that beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
For a gallery of Xcelsius dashboards designed by INFOSOL and defined by customers, visit INFOSOL’s Dashboard Gallery
Paul Grill started his career in Information Technology in the U.K. in 1978, as an Executive Data Processing Trainee for Honeywell. More than thirty years later, he still has a voracious appetite for learning as Information Technology continues to advance at an ever accelerating pace. He was first introduced to the world of Business Intelligence in 1991, in France, when he saw a demonstration of an early version of BusinessObjects on Windows 2.1. He returned to the U.S. to rave about this phenomenal product, but it was many years before BusinessObjects made it into the mainstream. Paul founded InfoSol in 1997, and made Business Intelligence one of the key solutions offered by the company. Today, InfoSol is a leading SAP BusinessObjects solutions partner, known for its expert consulting, education and innovative add-on solutions. Paul is well known within the SAP BusinessObjects community for his extensive knowledge of Business Intelligence, and he has lectured and written many articles on the subject. Paul enjoys writing, running and coaching kids soccer, and is passionate about Ancient Egyptology. Passing Data From a Parent to Child SWF (Flash Variables)
Due to performance limitations within Xcelsius, it can be difficult to build large scale dashboards that are easy to manage. Fortunately, Xcelsius comes equipped with components that makes it easier to create a single “Parent” SWF which can load multiple “Child” SWFs inside itself. Perhaps the biggest challenge with this design architecture is enabling the “Parent” SWF to communicate with the “Child” SWF.
Luckily, with the use of Flash Variables and the SWF loader component, we can easily overcome this challenge.
How to do it:
1. Create your child.xlf
2. Establish a cell where your parameter will be passed. I used cell E6 in my example
3. Access the data manager within the child.xlf and add a Flash Variables connection
4. Add a range and give it a name. In my example I named the range “salesman”
5. Select the range in which the data parameter will be passed. Cell E6 is the range in my example
6. Create your parent.xlf
7. Setup a sheet within your parent.xlf as follows:
a) Enter the URL where your will store your child.swf in cell B5
b) Enter the name of the range that you used in your child.swf in cell B7 “salesman”
c) Reserve cell B9 for the parameter that is going to be passed
d) Enter the following formula in cell B11: =B5&”?”&B7&”=”&B9
8. Add a component to input your parameter – I chose to use a list box for my example
9. Bind the output destination of your component to cell B9
10. Add a SWF Loader component to the dashboard
11. Bind the Source URL to cell B11
There you have it. Although my example is fairly simple, this should get you moving in the right direction to developing larger scale dashboard applications that are easier to manage.
As always, feel free to download the source files.
Reset a selector like combo box or radio button
Posted on 7 July 2010 4:18 pm.Femke
1. Bind labels of the selector (eg. B2:B5)
2. Set Insertion type and destination (eg. C2)
3. Set the selected item type on Dynamic on the behaviour tab of the selector
4. Bind the item to a cell (eg F2)
5. Bind source cell of Push button (eg. E2)
6. Bind destination cell of Push button (eg. F2, same as selected item of combo!)
7. Add formula in source cell push =if(F2=”x”,B2,”x”)
8. Add “x” value in destion cell F2
Comes in handy when you want to reset only certain parts of the dashboard and not resetting it to its initial state (as you do with the reset button).
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.Integrating Xcelsius into Crystal Reports Series – 1 of 3
Before getting started, I want to provide a quick update on the Reportapalooza competition:
Unfortunately, I fell a bit behind while attending 2 SAP Conferences back to back this month. Sorry if I let anyone down but I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the support. I also want to give a huge CONGRATS to our current leader David Deitch who is an Xcelsius beginner turned Guru in this competition!
Now to Challenge #5. Labeled the ‘Report Remix’ challenge, I am tasked with learning more about Crystal Reports 2008 and sharing it with YOU the community, hence the ‘remix’ which is to take you on the journey with me of learning a new Crystal product 
. Below is my official public statement:
So let’s get started with a few simple questions?
Q. How can you integrate Xcelsius flash files into your Crystal Reports?
A. It’s a 2 step process. You first have to configure the Crystal Reports Data Consumer connection in Xcelsius (seen below) and then use the .swf button in Crystal Reports to embed the Xcelsius flash file. (More details on how to setup each will be provided in the next article)
Q. What are the Pros and Cons?
A. Pros – It is no secret that Xcelsius’ ability to handle large amounts of data is VERY limited. By embedding your Xcelsius flash file into Crystal Reports you get to leverage the power of the Crystal engine while utilizing the beautiful graphics in Xcelsius. It’s like having the best of both worlds. In fact, in my next blog posts I am going to show how to integrate a map in Xcelsius into a Crystal Report.
A. Cons – If your not as familiar with Xcelsius you may have some issues using the ‘Crystal Reports Data Consumer’ connection. It could use some fine tuning (note to the Product Team )
One more thing! This is your last week to submit your dashboards to the community Reportapalooza competition. Hope you read this far down, because if you have something worth seeing I am opening the door to review any entries that you send via email to gurus at everythingxcelsius.com and provide feedback if sent by 10/31 @ 12am EST.
Mico Yuk is a 2010 SAP Mentor and the founder of the Xcelsius Guru Network and the Everything Xcelsius blog. To learn more about her, please visit our About Us page.
Tags: Business Objects, Reportapalooza, SAP Crystal Dashboard Design, Xcelsius 2008
Label Based Menu Interaction Options
Label Based Menu Interaction Options
In this post we will review interaction options of the Label Based Menu component.
One of the nice features under the interaction options of the label based menu component is the “Expand On” feature. This turns the menu into a condensed button which when clicked or mouse over expands a list or menu similar to a web based fly menu.
This feature is great for gaining a little extra canvas space for the more important components such as the chart or indicators on the dashboard.
How to achieve:
1. On the behavior tab of the label based menu component uncheck “Always Expanded”
2. Choose whether or not you want to expand on mouse click or mouse over. I prefer mouse over.
3. Choose the direction you want to expand. For horizontal orientation you have the option to expand left or right. For vertical orientation you can choose from center down, left down, right down, center up, left up, or right up.
4. Open Animation gives an animated “Flash” feel when the menu expands.
There you have it. An easy way to gain some additional real estate on your canvas.
Please let me know if you have any questions and as always please feel free to download the source files.
BO XI 3.1: To Upgrade or Not to Upgrade?
As SAP announces the “ramp up” or controlled release for SAP BusinessObjects XI 4.0, some companies who are planning to upgrade to BO XI 3.1 are wondering if they should now wait.
The simple answer is “no” and there are many good reasons to upgrade to XI 3.1 as soon as possible.
Firstly, BusinessObjects XI 3.1 has been the general release for a couple of years now and has proven to be a stable and solid platform. It brings a new version of Web Intelligence with the Rich Client (offline) capability with access to external data providers like Excel. It also has other features, previously only available in Desktop Intelligence, like the fold/unfold feature and stored procedure support through the universe. It adds new functionality also like the ability to track data changes between versions, contextual hyperlinking and use of drop-down selection boxes for prompts.
At the same time, XI 3.1 fully supports Desktop Intelligence reports unchanged which is quite significant when you consider that there will be no support for Desktop Intelligence in XI 4. This means that XI 3.1 will be the last BusinessObjects release to support Desktop Intelligence or the old Full Client reports.
BusinessObjects XI 4.0 will be a major new release with a lot of new functionality some of which will be available in the first 4.0 release and some which will be released later in service pack updates. It will be a 64-bit software application. It will have a new semantic layer that will combine the capabilities of the old BusinessObjects universe and Crystal Business Views and with a slew of new functionality including support of OLAP (MDX) data sources like SAP BW and MS OLAP cubes. The old BusinessObjects Universe Designer will remain supported in XI 4 for compatibility and easier transition.
There are new functionalities and capabilities in Web Intelligence, Xcelsius, Crystal and other content providers including taking advantage of the new semantic layer and universe design tool. There are two versions of Crystal – Crystal Enterprise which is new and uses the new semantic layer and Crystal Reports 2011 which is a continuation of Crystal Reports 2008. There is a new OLAP analysis tool called Advanced Analysis which replaces Voyager and there are significant improvements to Data Services and the BOE infrastructure functionality.
There will also be a new utility to move the contents of your old BusinessObjects content to XI 4. The Import Wizard is effectively replaced by this new tool called the Upgrade Manager Tool. This works for upgrades from XI 3.1 and the plan is to also be able to upgrade from XI R2 with security model changes. There is no upgrade available from earlier releases meaning you would need to move to XI R2 or XI 3.1 before moving to XI 4.
The ramp up will probably last 3 to 6 months so the general availability of XI 4.0 is expected sometime between February 2011 and May 2011. It is unlikely that the first service pack will be available until late in the year and most existing BO customers will probably not look at moving to XI 4 until 2012 or 2013 (based on previous trends).
For these BO customers still using Desktop Intelligence, there will be the added consideration and work of converting or replacing their old reports with Web Intelligence which for some may be a considerable effort and cost.
According to information disseminated at the ASUG BO annual conference in October, in addition to Desktop Intelligence, the following other existing BO XI products will be end of life : Voyager, Encyclopedia/Discussions and Performance Manager.
Historically, the current and immediately prior software releases tend to be actively supported for all software issues which would suggest that at some point in 2011 only XI 4.0 and XI 3.1 will be considered the actively supported releases.
Taking all of this information into consideration, it does make sense to upgrade to BusinessObjects XI 3.1 in the coming months if you have not done so already.
Paul Grill started his career in Information Technology in the U.K. in 1978, as an Executive Data Processing Trainee for Honeywell. More than thirty years later, he still has a voracious appetite for learning as Information Technology continues to advance at an ever accelerating pace. He was first introduced to the world of Business Intelligence in 1991, in France, when he saw a demonstration of an early version of BusinessObjects on Windows 2.1. He returned to the U.S. to rave about this phenomenal product, but it was many years before BusinessObjects made it into the mainstream. Paul founded InfoSol in 1997, and made Business Intelligence one of the key solutions offered by the company. Today, InfoSol is a leading SAP BusinessObjects solutions partner, known for its expert consulting, education and innovative add-on solutions. Paul is well known within the SAP BusinessObjects community for his extensive knowledge of Business Intelligence, and he has lectured and written many articles on the subject. Paul enjoys writing, running and coaching kids soccer, and is passionate about Ancient Egyptology. Crystal Reports: Using the Highlighting Expert
Have you ever used the Highlighting Expert in Crystal Reports? Chances are your response is no, and you are wondering what it is. The Highlighting Expert is a button on the Experts Toolbar. The button looks like this: 
.
The Highlighting Expert is also on the shortcut menu of the right-click. Once you choose this Expert, this dialog box opens:
Try it out, the Highlighting Expert is fast and easy to use!! It gives the “wow” to your report.
Happy Reporting!
Passing Data From a Parent to Child SWF (Data Sharer Component)
In my previous post I demonstrated how to pass data from a parent to child SWF with the use of Flash Variables and the SWF Loader component. Today, I’m going to demonstrate how to accomplish the same functionality leveraging a free add-on component from Inovista.com called the “Data Sharer”.
One of the noticeable difference in this solution compared to the use of Flash Variables is that the child SWF does not have to load and initialize each time the parameter is changed.
How to do it:
1. Go to Inovista.com and download the free data sharer component
2. Add the data sharer component with Xcelsius’ Add-On Manager GUI or see Kalyan’s post “Using the command-line version of the Add-On Manger in Xcelsius 2008” to add using command line
3. Using the same child.xlf as in my previous example I have kept the same cell (E6) reserved for my parameter
4. Next add the data sharer component found under the “Inovista Other” category in your components list. Note that the component will not be visible at run time.
5. Give the data sharer a connection name. In my example I have used “salesman”
6. Check the “Import Values” box
7. Select the range of cells for the “Import Data Cells”. In my example it is cell E6
8. Save and export your child SWF
9. Using the same parent.xls as in my previous example I have made a few changes to the underlying excel sheet.
a. Cell B5 should have the URL to your child SWF (Note that your SWF Loader Component will link to this URL)
b. Cell B7 should be reserved for the parameter that is going to be passed
10. Add the data sharer component to your canvas
11. Use the same connection name that you used in your child SWF. I used “salesman” in my example
12. Check the “Transmit Values” box
13. Select the range of cells for the “Transmit Data Cells”. In my example it is cell B7
14. Save and export your parent SWF. Note that the parent and child SWF should be located on the same server or file directory.
There you have it. Passing data from a Parent to Child SWF leveraging what I feel to be one of the best free components available to the Xcelsius community. There are a few quirks with this component so be sure to read the supporting documentation when implementing into a more complex model.
As always, please feel free to download the source files.
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