BPC Formating

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How-to Guide

SAP EPM

How ToHow ToMaximizeAdvancedFormatting for

BPCVersion 1.02 October 2008

Applicable Releases:SAP BPC 5.X


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1 Scenario

When implementing BPC for reporting or input of application data, the primary BPC

Excel function is EVDRE. In order to maximize the customer and user experience withEVDRE, projects should always identify planned formats for the Reports / Inputtemplates and document this in a framework called a Style Guide. The style guideshould outline the expected format options for any and all combinations of data, headers,and blank spaces used in the BPC Reporting framework.

The building of a style guide should precede the building of standard EVDRE templatesto be used during the execution of a reporting framework using EVDRE. EVDRE isflexible BPC command that may be initialized from three different sources:

1. The Action pane, under Reporting and Analysis, Build a Report using Drag andDrop

2. A new blank worksheet, suing the command =EVDRE()

3. A new Blank worksheet using the command =EVDRE(1x2)

The second option allows a project team and its users to take advantage of an Advancedformat framework that may be initialized during every template build. The framework,along with defining standard baseline EVDRE templates will expedite the template buildand creation process.

2 Introduction

This How-To guide leverages BPC 5.X and the application set called ApShell. ApShell is

currently the default application set that is loaded with the BPC software and is often thebeginning point for most customer designs. If this application set is not available at yourcustomer, please discuss gaining access to a copy of this application set fordevelopment purposes.

Maximizing the use of the advanced formatting process in EVDRE depends on a projector customers independent application requirements and needs. The Style Guide is adeliverable prepared during or prior to a BPC implementation and a suggested practice.The How-To guide discussion will provide an example of turning the Format process intoa Style Guide.

This guide will discuss the components of the Advanced Format section flowed by a

discussion on building an EVDRE baseline template to support Style Guide settings. Thegoal is to provide a basic guideline for practices that appear to work well at customerimplementations globally. Every project should at least discuss the use of thesecomponents during the design phase or blueprint phase. The use on many styles andspecific formatting designs for templates is often a requirement when dealing with anorganization that has varying company, division, function and corporate based reportrequirements. Exploring the power of advanced formatting extends the usefulness of theEVDRE functionality.

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3 The Advanced Formatting Discussion

Use this guide to help envision the design required for Style guide and practice thedesigns discussed. There are key process reasons to define a baseline EVDREtemplate and the appropriate formats. In any implementation, the building of a template

may be accelerated during the EVDRE builder process and leveraging the baselineserver stored template.

To leverage an existing FORMAT framework from a baseline, click the Allow Formattingbox in the EVDRE builder. Then select one of the 3 Options:

1. Use Default, loads the basic EVDRE format table2. Import Style form Local, loads a format table off a locally saved EVDRE template3. Import Style from Server, loads a format table off an EVDRE template stored in

an application reports folder.

It is important that the file you reference is a full EVDRE template with the Format sectionfilled out.

Note that all the following Excel definitions will be imported automatically from the styleworkbook:

- The Format range of the EVDRE function- All WebExcel workbook options- All Excel-defined styles- The workbook color palette- The range of cells to the right of the page key range and above the

column headings (which might contain some title for the report)

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3.1 Building an Advanced Format Section

The use of the advanced format range is the key to implementing the formattingdefinitions from a Style Guide. The advanced format ranges typically differ based onfactors such as, template purpose; Management Reporting, versus Data Input, versus

IFRS/SEC Reporting, versus functional reporting. Most projects will develop a few formattemplates that must be leveraged in an EVDRE design by the core user community.Utilizing the Advanced Formatting begins with an understanding of the RANGE and theCommands used inside the format range.

The format range is made up of SIX required columns. A column represents oneparameter of a formatting instruction. The columns must be in the following order andare named:

- CRITERIA- EVALUATE IN- FORMAT- USE

- PARAMETERS- APPLY TO

A format instruction is defined in a single row across the 6 columns. Multiple formattinginstructions can be specified, using multiple rows, each row representing one formattinginstruction. EVDRE applies each formatting instruction in the sequence from top tobottom of the defined FORMAT RANGE.

Here is an example that gives an idea of how a fully-fledged set of formatting instructionscould look like:

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3.2 Defining the Columns

Each column of the formatting range represents one parameter that can be applied to aformatting instruction. The columns are all required in the exact order shown above forthe formatting range to work in the EVDRE. Each column has a purpose in the formatting

instruction, however not all columns need to be defined in order to allow an instruction towork since some use default values when left blank.

The columns and their definitions are as follows:

1. CRITERIA - What triggers the specified format2. EVALUATE IN - The range in which the criteria must be evaluated3. FORMAT - The desired format of the cells4. USE - The portions of the format that should be applied5. PARAMETERS - Some textual definition of the format to apply6. APPLY TO - The portions of the report to which the format should be applied

3.2.1 CRITERIA Column

The CRITERIA column defines what triggers the formatting instruction. For example, inan Input Template, use CALC if for any given database calculated level across alldimensions you wish to impose a format combination for color to illustrate that the valuecannot be changed. Or, if you need to format data based on a Property of a Dimension,then use the statement, Dimension.Property = Property value, (ie. Account.ACCTYPE= INC)

The valid values are below:

Default Is applied anyway, irrespective of any criteriaCALC Is only applied to calculated members

INPUT Is only applied to non-calculated membersDimension.Property= or PropertyValue

Is only applied to the members of dimension {dim} with

property {property} = or {value}

KEY = STRING Is only applied if the row/column keys contain the passed

{string}; Wildcards are not yet supportedHEADING =STRING

Is only applied if the row/column headings contain the

passed {string}; Wildcards are not yet supported

FORMULA Is only applied to cells containing Excel formulas

VALUE= | | < |> | = {value}

Is only applied to cells with a value matching the testexpression

CHANGED Is only applied to cells being modified by a data entry

action and the workbook has been set as an Input

Schedule

The CRITERIA column is just the first part of the column definition, but is one of the mostimportant settings. There is NO option to leave the first parameter BLANK, so if you donot use a VALUE defined above, you will not get the expected formatting. Examples ofthe options available include the following:

Entity.HLevel=1 Uses Dimension called ENTITY and Property HLEVEL,

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with a value of 1

Entity.HLevel=2 Uses Dimension called ENTITY and Property HLEVEL,with a value of 2

Entity.HLevel=3 Uses Dimension called ENTITY and Property HLEVEL,with a value of 3

Account.SCALING=Thousands Uses Dimension called Account and PropertySCALING, with a value of ThousandsAccount.SCALING=Percent Uses Dimension called Account and Property

SCALING, with a value of Percent

Account.SCALING=Ratio Uses Dimension called Account and PropertySCALING, with a value of Ratio

HEADING="%" Uses the VALUE called HEADING looking for a valueof % in the Heading.

HEADING="B" Uses the VALUE called HEADING looking for a valueof B in the Heading. Useful when you want to createBlank Columns in a Formatted Reporting range

VALUE > 100000 Uses the VALUE called VALUE, and applies formats to

cells where the number is > 100,000VALUE < -100000 Uses the VALUE called VALUE and applies formats to

cells where the number is < -100,000

3.2.2 EVALUATE IN Column

The EVALUATE IN defines the region to apply the format. There are only 3 currentchoices for this column value.

ALL / (or a blankcell)

Evaluate the CRITERIA in the PAGE, COLUMN, ROW, orCell.

COL Evaluate to CRITERIA in ROWS ONLYROW Evaluate to CRITERIA in COLUMNS ONLY

This setting selection is particularly important when evaluating structured formats thatdiffer for the whole page, versus rows or versus columns. The key is to remember thatthe instructions in the format table are applied from the top to the bottom of the chart insequence. So, if you set the format for the COLUMNS, and then set the format by ROW,the COLUMN formats may be overwritten.

For example:

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3.2.3 FORMAT Column

The FORMAT column defines the formatting that will be used by each ROW of the

instructions. The definition is derived by the native Excel functionality. This allows forease of use and simplicity when defining the application of a desired format for a cell.Any format defined in the cell will be utilized in the format of the EVDRE output area.Included in this functionality is the Lock property, which is used by the EVDRE toprevent or allow a user to modify the content of the cells of the workbook.

Choosing the formats needs to be directly tied to the design of the Style Guide during aproject.

3.2.4 USE Column

The USE column defines formatting functions that will be used by each ROWs FORMATinstruction, and which formats will be ignored. The USE column may utilize one or morecommands from the list below. If the design includes multiple USE instructions, theyneed to be presented in a comma delimited statement, such as, PATTERN, FONTSIZE,FONT. If the cell is left BLANK, then all the formatting properties defined in theFORMAT column will be applied.

Below is a list of the recognized format commands for the USE column cells:

ALLBORDER ColorIndex, LineStyle, Weight (of each segment:

xlDiagonalDown, xlDiagonalUp, xlEdgeBottom,

xlEdgeLeft, xlEdgeRight, xlEdgeTop)

CONTENT (ALL + the text in the cell)

FONT Font.Name, Font.Size, Font.Bold, Font.Color

FONTBOLD

FONTCOLOR

FONTNAME

FONTSIZE

FONTSTYLEFRAME (see BORDER)

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HORIZONTALALIGNMENT

INDENTLEVEL

LOCK Locked

NUMBERFORMAT

PATTERN ColorIndex, Pattern, PatternColorIndex

PROTECTION Locked, FormulaHiddenSTYLE (the Excel style)

VERTICALALIGNMENT

{VBA property} Over and above the keywords listed above, the USE and thePARAMETERS columns will honor the name of any formatting

property recognized by Excel VBA code. This allows the user to

customize its formatting definitions to a very fine level of precision.

Please refer to Excel documentation for a full list of the supported

Formatting properties

An example is below:

3.2.5 PARAMETERS Column

The PARAMETERS column is used to directly enter format instructions via TEXT. Theseinstructions are applied in addition to the USE instructions. For example, if a rowincludes USE column with instructions FRAMES, PATTERNS, but a big font is needed,then one may add FONTSIZE=14, in the PARAMETERS column.

In addition, a more powerful use of the PARAMETERS column is to supportindividualized formatting instructions dynamically from a dimension property. Forexample, you could place in the PARAMETERS column,NUMBERFORMAT=ACCOUNT.FORMAT. Dynamically upon expansion for eachmember applied, get the appropriate property from the Account dimension calledFORMAT and use it in the process.

The available syntaxs are as follow:

{Format property} = value

Or:

{Format property} = {dimension}.{property}

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Below is a table of the available Keywords supported:

CONTENT All + the text in the cell

FONTBOLD

FONTCOLORFONTNAME

FONTSIZE

FONTSTYLE

HORIZONTALALIGNMENT

INDENTLEVEL

LOCK Locked

NUMBERFORMAT

STYLE

VERTICALALIGNMENT

{VBA property} Over and above the keywords listed above, the USE and thePARAMETERS columns will honor the name of any formattingproperty recognized by Excel VBA code. This allows the user to

customize its formatting definitions to a very fine level of precision.

Please refer to Excel documentation for a full list of the supported

Formatting properties

3.2.6 APPLY TO Column

The APPLY TO column is the last instruction of the row. It defines WHERE the formatswill be applied in sequence. The instructions may be used alone, unless you are adding

ODDROWS to another value.

For Example:

Below is a table of the available Keywords supported:

{blank} or ALL Apply to the Key Range, Headings Range and Data

Range

KEY Apply to the row or column Key Range (or both)

PAGEKEY Apply to the Page Key range (only valid withCRITERIA=DEFAULT)

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HEADING Apply to the row or column Headings Range (or both)

DATA Apply to the Data range

ODDROWS Any of the APPLY TO values may be optionally

combined with an ODDROWS parameter. This

parameter can be used to trigger the defined formatting

only to the odd rows in a query.

4 Building the EVDRE Baseline and Style Guide

Based on the understanding of what the Format Range does in an EVDRE template,now we should focus on how to define a baseline EVDRE template to test out all styleguide assumptions. The first step is to initiate an EVDRE template using a blankworkbook and following the steps discussed at the beginning of Section 3 in this guide,

but often using the default format values.

Once we have a new template, now we must convert the definitions from the Style Guideto use in the baseline template. Assuming we have only visual requirements from thestyle guide, we will then select commands that will help us build the template.

Guidelines for Reporting defined via an example in excel shown below:

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We need to convert the image from the excel file example into Formats in an EVDREreport. There are a couple ways of approaching this process. Based on our knowledgeof the available commands and understanding that FORMATS are applied from the TOPto BOTTOM in a layered process from the format section, we may choose to attempt topre-define the commands needed, or simply just add commands in an EVDRE until we

get the result that best matches. Both work well, but sometimes the second approachwastes valuable time. A recommended approach is to initially define the FORMATcommands required by an example.

What do we see in the example?- Grey Column Header- Bold Font on Accounts that are Calculated in the Header- Bold Font on the Account Values that are Calculated in DATA- Yellow background for Net Income in Data- Taxes and PreTax accounts as Italics in Data- Blue Font for any Account VALUE greater than 1,400,000 in Data- Side Borders on all Accounts in Data

- Full Borders on Calculated Data

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Based on this information, we may now begin to layout our FORMAT section. The firststep is to define the CRITERIA settings that we see as a possible match to example. Weknow we need DEFAULT settings, the use of Dimension.Property = X, HEADER, andVALUE. We also know that we have EVALUATE IN settings applied to columns versusrows. Based on some of these initial design ideas, we would and add commands fromthe top to the bottom to test our design.

The first section of commands would look like the following:

Our results would look like:

Next we would focus on adding specifics for the data components.

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Now we have the following results.

Then we may finish using trial and error to produce the remaining commands:

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Which give us the final product to look like the following:

Once the required format definitions have been built, we would add them to the Style

Guide as the guiding formats for all report building. Plus, baseline templates should be

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built and stored for EVDRE formatting selections or as the foundation for any additionaltemplate development design work.


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