Cognos 8.4.1 BI - Getting Started
description
Transcript of Cognos 8.4.1 BI - Getting Started
IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence
Version 8.4.1
Developer Edition Getting Started Guide
Product InformationThis document applies to IBM Cognos 8 Version 8.4.1 and may also apply to subsequent releases. To check for newer versions of this document,visit the IBM Cognos Information Centers (http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/cogic/v1r0m0/index.jsp).
CopyrightLicensed Materials - Property of IBM© Copyright IBM Corp. 2008, 2009.US Government Users Restricted Rights – Use, duplication or disclosure restricted by GSA ADP Schedule Contract with IBM Corp.IBM, the IBM logo, ibm.com, and Cognos are trademarks or registered trademarks of International Business Machines Corp., in many jurisdictionsworldwide. Other product and service names might be trademarks of IBM or other companies. A current list of IBM trademarks is available onthe Web at www.ibm.com/legal/copytrade.shtml.Microsoft, Windows, Windows NT, and the Windows logo are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both.UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the United States and other countries.Java and all Java-based trademarks and logos are trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. in the United States, other countries, or both.
Table of Contents
Introduction 5
Chapter 1: Installing and Configuring IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition 7Review the System Requirements 7Install IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition 8Start IBM Cognos 8 Developer Edition Manager 8Install Business Intelligence Components 9Managing Users and Roles 9
Changing Default Users 9Changing User Roles 10IBM Cognos Administration 10
Log onto Cognos Connection 11
Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data 13Install the IBM Cognos 8 Samples 13Setting Up the Samples 14
Restore Backup Files for the Samples 14Create Data Source Connections to the Samples 17Set Up Microsoft Analysis Services Cube Samples 19Create Data Source Connections to OLAP Data Sources 20Import the Samples 22Sample Database Models 23Remove the Samples Databases from IBM Cognos 8 24
About The Great Outdoors Group of Companies 24Employees 26Sales and Marketing 26Great Outdoors Database, Models, and Packages 26
Chapter 3: Using IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition 31How IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition Works 33
Viewing and Organizing Content 34How is the Developer Edition Different from IBM Cognos 8 BI? 37Building an Application 37
Designing the Model 38Creating Reports in Query Studio 43Creating Reports in Report Studio 48Create Analyses in Analysis Studio 56Manage Events in Event Studio 63Running and Scheduling Reports 66
Chapter 4: What is IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence? 71Enhanced Agility for Competitive Advantage 71
Architecture 71Date Source Support 72Enterprise Security 73
Licensed Materials – Property of IBM3© Copyright IBM Corp. 2008, 2009.
Integrating Business Intelligence with Existing Applications 74Business Intelligence Capabilities 74Total Cost of Ownership 75Global Deployment to Worldwide Communities 77Moving Your Content to IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence 77
Install IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence 78Plan Your Deployment 78Create an Export Deployment Specification 79Move the Deployment Archive 81Import to a Target Environment 82Test the Deployed Content 84Uninstall IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition 84
Glossary 85
Index 89
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Table of Contents
Introduction
This document provides instructions for setting up and using IBM® Cognos® 8 BI Developer Edition.
The Developer Edition is intended for use on a single Windows computer with up to two single-
core CPU’s or dual core CPU.
To review an up-to-date list of environments supported by Cognos products, such as operating
systems, patches, browsers, Web servers, directory servers, database servers, and application servers,
visit the IBM Cognos Resource Center site (http://www.ibm.com/software/data/support/cognos_
crc.html).
Audience
This document is intended for users who are new to IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence.
To use this guide, you should have basic administration skills and be familiar with the existing
server environment and security infrastructure in your organization.
Related Documentation
Our documentation includes user guides, getting started guides, new features guides, readmes, and
other materials to meet the needs of our varied audience. The following documents contain related
information and may be referred to in this document.
Note: For online users of this document, a Web page such as The page cannot be found may appear
when clicking individual links in the following table. Documents are made available for your par-
ticular installation and translation configuration. If a link is unavailable, you can access the document
on the IBM Cognos Resource Center (http://www.ibm.com/software/data/support/cognos_crc.html).
DescriptionDocument
Teaching new users how to use IBM Cognos 8IBM Cognos 8 Getting Started
Using IBM Cognos Connection to publish, find, manage,
organize, and view IBM Cognos content, such as reports,
analyses, and agents.
IBM Cognos Connection User Guide
Creating self-service business intelligence reportsQuery Studio User Guide
Authoring reports that analyze corporate data according
to specific needs
Report Studio Professional Authoring
User Guide
Authoring financial reports that analyze corporate data
according to specific needs
Report Studio Express Authoring User
Guide
Licensed Materials – Property of IBM5© Copyright IBM Corp. 2008, 2009.
DescriptionDocument
Creating and publishing models using Framework
Manager
Framework Manager User Guide
Understanding the IBM Cognos 8 architecture, develop-
ing installation strategies, including security considera-
tions, and optimizing performance
IBM Cognos 8 Architecture and
Deployment Guide
Printing Copyright Material
You can print selected pages, a section, or the whole book. You are granted a non-exclusive, non-
transferable license to use, copy, and reproduce the copyright materials, in printed or electronic
format, solely for the purpose of operating, maintaining, and providing internal training on IBM
Cognos software.
Upgrading to IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence
Upgrading to IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence is possible by purchasing full non-restricted
licenses, installing the new software, and then deploying the applications you developed with the
Developer Edition to the new software.
Getting Help
For more information about using this product or for technical assistance, visit the IBM Web site
(http://www.ibm.com/software/data/support/cognos_crc.html). This site provides information on
support, professional services, education, and a knowledge base of documentation and
troubleshooting information.
No support is provided for IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition.
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Introduction
Chapter 1: Installing and ConfiguringIBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
IBM® Cognos® 8 Developer Edition is provided with a 180 day trial license. This license cannot be
extended, even with a re-install. Developer Edition is not intended for production use.
The Developer Edition enables you to easily install IBM Cognos 8 on a Windows computer.
Developer Edition will also install Apache Tomcat and Apache Derby. Tomcat is used as an
application server by IBM Cognos 8, and Derby is used as a content store database.
During the installation process you are asked to provide an installation location and a password
for the administrator user and for a range of port numbers that will be used. Default values are
used for all other configuration settings.
Use the following checklist to guide you through the process of installing the Developer Edition.
❑ Review the system requirements
❑ Install IBM Cognos 8 Developer Edition
❑ Start Developer Edition Manager
❑ Install BI Components
❑ Managing users and roles
❑ Log onto IBM Cognos 8 Developer Edition
Review the System RequirementsBefore you install the Developer Edition ensure that the necessary prerequisites are met in your
environment.
Steps
● Verify the hardware and software requirements by doing the following:
● Review the system requirements for IBM Cognos 8 version 8.4.1 avaiable at http://www.
ibm.com/software/data/cognos/customercenter/
● Ensure that at minimum 1 GB of physical memory available for optimum performance and
reliability. 2 GB is recommended.
Ensure that you have at least 1.5 GB of temporary disk space available during the installa-
tion, as well as adequate disk space for the Developer Edition to operate properly.
● Ensure you are using Microsoft Windows XP SP3 or higher.
● Ensure you are using Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0 or higher or Mozilla Firefox 3.5 or
higher.
Licensed Materials – Property of IBM7© Copyright IBM Corp. 2008, 2009.
Install IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer EditionThe installation wizard installs the Developer Edition Manager. The manager allows you to install
a fully configured version of IBM® Cognos® 8 BI and Framework Manager.
Steps
1. Double-click install.exe to start the installation wizard.
The wizard takes a few moments to initialize, install temporary files, prepare for the deployment
and to create the uninstallation program settings.
2. On the Software License Agreement page, accept the agreement, and Next.
3. On the Choose Install Folder page, enter the location where you want the product installed,
and click Next.
4. On the Choose Shortcut Folder page, select the options you want, and click Next.
5. On the Configuration page, do the following:
● Select the range of port numbers you want Developer Edition to use.
Ensure that you select a range that will not conflict with any other products you have
installed on your computer. If any port numbers conflict with other software, the installation
will not be successful.
If you are unsure, use the default values.
● Enter the account information for the administrator user.
You can leave the name as administrator or you can change it to another name. We
recommend you provide a password, and that you record it in a secure place.
6. Click Next.
7. On the Pre-Installation Summary page, click Install.
After the installation wizard finishes, you can launch IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition Manager.
The manager allows you to install, configure, and start the IBM Cognos 8 BI services, and install
Framework Manager. You will need both the BI and Framework Manager components to use IBM
Cognos 8.
Start IBM Cognos 8 Developer Edition ManagerUse IBM® Cognos® 8 BI Developer Edition Manager to install and configure IBM Cognos 8 BI and
Framework Manager. You also use manager to add users to the system and start and stop services.
Steps
1. Start the manager from the installation wizard or by clicking Start, IBMCognos 8 BI Developer
Edition, IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition.
If this is the first time you have started the manager, you are prompted to complete the
installation.
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Chapter 1: Installing and Configuring IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
2. Click Finish.
The manager completes the initial installation and configuration.
3. Enter the username and password you entered on the Configuration page of the installation
wizard, and click OK.
Install Business Intelligence ComponentsThe business intelligence (BI) components include BI Suite and Framework Manager. BI Suite
includes the IBM® Cognos® 8 studios for reporting and analysis of your data. Framework Manager
is the modelling component for the IBM Cognos 8 studios. To be able to use the studios to create
reports, queries, and analyses, you must first create packages using Framework Manager.
Use Developer Edition Manager to install the BI Suite and Framework Manager components.
Steps to Install IBM Cognos 8 BI Studios
1. In Products tab of the manager, click BI Suite.
2. Click Install.
Steps to Install Framework Manager
1. In Products tab of the manager, click Framework Manager.
2. Click Install.
Managing Users and RolesDeveloper Edition allows you to have five named users as well as the administrator user that you
created during the installation.
The users have not been assigned to any roles. You can change this using the Developer Edition
Manager. Users have not been assigned to any roles. If you create new users, you must select a role
for that user. For more information about users and roles, see the IBM® Cognos® 8 Administration
and Security Guide.
You use the Developer Edition Manager to change the user names and configure their roles.
Changing Default UsersYou use the Developer Edition Manager to edit user information. For example, you can change the
user IDs and passwords for any user.
You can have a maximum of five named users, as well as the administrator user. To change the
default users, you must remove them and then add your own users.
Steps
1. In Developer Edition Manager, under Administration, click Users.
2. Click the user whose information you want to change.
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Chapter 1: Installing and Configuring IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
3. Click Remove.
4. Click Add.
5. Enter the Username, Password, and any of the other fields.
6. In the Available Entries box, double click a role to copy it into the Selected Entries box.
Tip: For information about the roles, see the IBM® Cognos® 8 Administration and Security
Guide.
7. To assign additional roles, repeat the previous step.
8. Click OK.
Changing User RolesYou use the Developer Edition Manager to change user roles. Roles allow you to change user access
to content. For more information about users and roles, see the IBM® Cognos® 8 Administration
and Security Guide.
Steps
1. In Developer Edition Manager, under Administration, click Users.
2. Click the user whose information you want to change.
3. Click Edit.
4. In the Available Entries box, double click a role to copy it into the Selected Entries box.
Tip: For information about the roles, see the IBM Cognos 8 Administration and Security Guide.
5. To assign additional roles, repeat the previous step.
6. Click OK.
IBM Cognos AdministrationIBM® Cognos® Administration allows you manage your IBM Cognos 8 BI installation, including
monitoring the system, adding data sources, managing user groups. For more information about
using IBM Cognos Administration, see the online help.
While Cognos Administration allows you to change user settings, you should use the Developer
Edition Manager to change your user IDs, permissions, and roles.
Steps to Start IBM Cognos Administration
1. Start Developer Edition Manager, and log on as an Administrator user.
2. From the Launch menu, click IBM Cognos Administration.
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Chapter 1: Installing and Configuring IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
Log onto Cognos ConnectionAfter the Developer Edition is installed and configured, and the services are started, you can start
exploring the portal and the studios by opening IBM® Cognos® Connection in a Web browser.
Steps from Deverlop Edition Manager
1. Start Developer Edition Manager.
2. From the Launch menu, click IBM Cognos Connection.
Steps
1. Open a Web browser.
2. Open IBM Cognos Connection by typing the following, where hostname is the name of the
computer where you installed the Developer Edition:
http://hostname:9300/p2pd/servlet/dispatch
The Log On page appears.
3. Enter your User ID and Password, and click OK.
Cognos Connection appears.
You can start to explore the studios and the portal by opening the links in the portal.
Sample reports and packages are available to be downloaded and installed. Once you have installed
and set up the samples, see "Building an Application" (p. 37) to learn how to use the Developer
Edition for your business reporting needs.
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Chapter 1: Installing and Configuring IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
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Chapter 1: Installing and Configuring IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
This section explains the purpose, content and location of IBM® Cognos® 8 samples. It also discusses
the sample company, Great Outdoors, its structure, databases, model and packages.
The Great Outdoors Company samples illustrate product features and technical and business best
practices. You can also use them for experimenting with and sharing report design techniques and
for troubleshooting.
For examples related to different kinds of businesses, see the product blueprints at (http://www.
ibm.com/software/data/support/cognos_crc.html). For information about specific installation choices
and environments, see the Architecture and Deployment Guide, or the Proven Practices and the
IBM Cognos Implementation Roadmaps on the IBM Cognos Resource Center (http://www.ibm.
com/software/data/support/cognos_crc.html). For information about audit samples, see the
Administration and Security Guide.
Where to Find the Samples
The samples are provided as separate downloads for each database. To use the samples, you must
download the installation files, install them to same location as you installed Developer Edition
(p. 13), and then set them up (p. 14).
What Samples Exist
The samples consist of two databases that contain all corporate data, the related sample models
for query and analysis, and sample cubes, reports, queries, query templates, and dashboards.
Install the IBM Cognos 8 SamplesThe IBM® Cognos® 8 samples illustrate product features and technical and business best practices.
You can also use them for experimenting with and sharing report design techniques, and for
troubleshooting.
Install in a directory that contains only ASCII characters in the path name.
Steps
1. Double-click install.exe to start the installation wizard for the sample for the database you
want.
The samples are provided for DB2, Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, and Informix.
2. On the Software License Agreement page, accept the agreement, and Next.
3. On the Choose Install Folder page, click Next.
The samples will be installed to the same location as you installed Developer Edition.
4. On the Pre-Installation Summary page, click Install.
Licensed Materials – Property of IBM13© Copyright IBM Corp. 2008, 2009.
The sample databases and report content are installed to the installation_loca-
tion\webcontent\samples directory.
Setting Up the SamplesIBM® Cognos® 8 provides sample databases for SQL Server, Oracle, DB2, and Informix that contain
sales and marketing information for a fictional company named the Great Outdoors. You can use
IBM Cognos sample packages and reports to help you learn how to use IBM Cognos 8.
Restore Backup Files for the SamplesTo use the samples, you must restore backup files for the samples databases. This action re-creates
multilingual versions of the Great Outdoors databases.
The following sample databases and associated files are provided with IBM® Cognos® 8. For SQL
Server and Oracle, each database is delivered as a Microsoft SQL Server backup file and an Oracle
export file (.dmp). For DB2, the database schemas are delivered in a DB2 move file. The files are
compressed, and you must extract them before you can restore the databases or schemas.
SQL Server Databases and Files
File nameDatabase or schema description
GOSALES.zipGreat Outdoors sales
GOSALES.zipGreat Outdoors retailers
GOSALESDW.zipGreat Outdoors sales data warehouse
GOSALES.zipGreat Outdoors market research
GOSALES.zipGreat Outdoors human resources
Oracle Databases and Files
File nameDatabase or schema description
GOSALES.dmp.gzGreat Outdoors sales
GOSALES.dmp.gzGreat Outdoors retailers
GOSALESDW. dmp.gzGreat Outdoors sales data warehouse
GOSALES.dmp.gzGreat Outdoors market research
GOSALES.dmp.gzGreat Outdoors human resources
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
DB2 Databases and Files
File nameDatabase or schema description
GS_DB.tar.gzGreat Outdoors sales
GS_DB.tar.gzGreat Outdoors retailers
GS_DB.tar.gzGreat Outdoors sales data warehouse
GS_DB.tar.gzGreat Outdoors market research
GS_DB.tar.gzGreat Outdoors human resources
csgodw.xmlCubing services sample cube
Informix Databases and Files
File nameDatabase or schema description
GOSALES.zipGreat Outdoors sales
GOSALES.zipGreat Outdoors retailers
GOSALESDW.zipGreat Outdoors sales data warehouse
GOSALES.zipGreat Outdoors market research
GOSALES.zipGreat Outdoors human resources
When restoring the samples databases, ensure that you do the following:
● Give the restored databases the same names as the backup or export file names.
The names are case-sensitive.
● Create users with select privileges for tables in multiple schemas.
Setup for the GO Data Warehouse packages specifies a single connection object and user signon.
This requires a single user named GOSALESDW with the select privilege to tables in a single
schema named GOSALESDW.
Setup for the GO Sales packages specifies a single connection object and user signon. This
requires a single user named GOSALES with the select privilege to tables in the four schemas:
GOSALES, GOSALESHT, GOSALESMR, and GOSALESRT.
● Use the UTF-8 character set on the database server.
● Use the UTF-8 character set on the Windows computer that is the Oracle or DB2 client to see
reports in multiple languages.
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
For DB2, you must set the DB2CODEPAGE environment variable to a value of 1208. For
Oracle, you must set the NLS_LANG environment variable to a value that is specific to a region.
For example, set NLS_LANG for Americas to American_America.UTF8.
● Have sufficient disk space available in the target location. Reserve 150MB for the GO Sales
data (four schemas) and 200MB for the GO Data Warehouse data (one schema).
Oracle Considerations
To create foreign key constraints in tables that reference different schemas, you must run
gs_or_modify.sql, found in the same folder as the .dmp files.
SQL Server Considerations
If you restore the SQL Server backup files, you must use Microsoft SQL Server 2000 or Microsoft
SQL Server 2005. Ensure that TCP/IP connectivity is used for the SQL server.
DB2 Considerations
Before you restore the Great Outdoors schemas contained in the DB2 move file on UNIX or Win-
dows, extract the DB2 move file. On UNIX, extract the DB2 move file using the gnutar -xcvf
DB2_move_filename or tar -xcvf DB2_move_filename command. If you use WinZip to extract
the DB2 move file on Windows, ensure that the TAR file smart CR/LF conversion option is not
selected.
After extracting the DB2 move file, restore the schemas to a database named GS_DB.
To add views, constraints, user privileges, and stored procedures to GS_DB, prepare and run the
gs_db_modify files included with the samples in the following order:
● Update the user name and password at the top of the gs_db_modify.sql and save it.
● Execute gs_db_modify.bat
An XML file is also provided if you want to use IBM InfoSphere Warehouse Cubing Services. The
XML file, named csgodw.xml, must be imported into a data model based on the GS_DW schema,
deployed, and then added as a cube to the cube server. The cubing services sample is available only
if you install the IBM DB2 samples.
Informix Considerations
Use the dbimport command to restore the databases using the backups named gosales and gosalesdw.
Ensure that the server you restore the samples to is UTF-8. For example, the CLIENTE_LOCALE,
DB_LOCALE, and DBLANG variables must specify a UTF-8 encoding, such as EN_US.UTF8.
Steps to Restore the Database Files
1. On the computer where IBM Cognos 8 is installed, go to the sql server, oracle, db2, or informix
directory located in c8_location/webcontent/samples/datasources.
2. If required, copy the backup files for the samples databases to your database backup directory.
To ensure the security and integrity of IBM Cognos 8, copy the files to a directory that is pro-
tected from unauthorized or inappropriate access.
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
3. Restore the samples databases using your database management tool.
Tips
● For SQL backup files, restore the database from a device, and ensure that the restore loca-
tions are correct for the .ldf and .mdf database files. For more information, see the Microsoft
SQL Server documentation or the IBM Cognos Knowledge Base on the IBM Cognos Cus-
tomer Service Center (http://www.ibm.com/software/data/support/cognos_crc.html).
● For DB2, when you create the GS_DB database, create a buffer pool with a page size of
16 KB and an associated tablespace.
● For Informix, use a page size of 16 KB and a tablespace of about 300,000 KB.
4. For each database, create at least one user who has select permissions for all the tables in the
restored databases.
Steps to Use IBM the InfoSphere Warehouse Cubing Services File
1. On the computer where IBM Cognos 8 is installed, go to the db2 directory located in c8_location/
webcontent/samples/datasources.
2. If required, copy the csgodw.xml file to your database backup directory.
3. In IBM InfoSphere Warehouse Design Studio, import the csgodw.xml metadata file into a data
model based on the DB2 GS_DW schema.
4. Deploy the CSGODW cube to the DB2 GS_DW schema.
5. Use the IBM InfoSphere Warehouse Administration Console to add the new cube to a cube
server, and run it.
Note the XMLA port number for the cube, as this number is required for the datasource con-
nection.
You can now create the data source connections in the portal.
Create Data Source Connections to the SamplesYou must create data source connections to the samples databases that you restored. IBM® Cognos® 8
uses this information to connect to the samples databases and run the sample reports or use the
sample package.
The DB2 database name that you type must use uppercase letters. Also, in Framework Manager,
the schema names that you type for the DB2 data sources must use uppercase letters.
Before you create the data source connections, you must restore the backup files for the samples
databases. Also, ensure that the IBM Cognos 8 service is running.
To create data sources, you must have execute permissions for the Data Source Connections secured
feature and traverse permissions for the Administration secured function.
Steps
1. Open Developer Edition Manager.
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
2. In the upper-right corner, click Launch, IBM Cognos Administration.
3. Click the Configuration tab.
4. Click the new data source button .
5. In the Name box, type great_outdoors_sales and then click Next.
6. On the connection page, click the type of database that you restored and want to connect to,
select an isolation level, and then click Next.
The connection string page for the selected database appears.
Tip: The user specified in the great_outdoors_sales data source must have select privileges on
the tables in each of the GOSALES, GOSALESRT, GOSALESMR, and GOSALESHR schemas
(p. 14).
7. Do one of the following:
● For SQL Server, in the Server Name box, type the name of the server where the restored
databases are located. In the Database name box, type GOSALES.
IBM Cognos 8 samples require TCP/IP connectivity with SQL Server. Ensure the SQL
Server Security is set to SQL Server and Windows, instead of Windows Only. The samples
use SQL Server security for authentication.
● For Oracle, in the SQL*Net connect string box, type the Oracle connection string.
● For DB2, in the DB2 database name box, type GS_DB using uppercase letters. In the DB2
connect string box, type the DB2 connection string.
8. Under Signons, select the both Password and Create a signon that the Everyone group can usecheck boxes, type the user ID and password for the user that you created when you restored
the databases, and then click Finish.
Tip: To test whether the parameters are correct, click Test the connection....
9. Click Finish.
10. Repeat steps 4 to 9 for the GOSALESDW samples database or schema, and type great_outdoors_
warehouse in step 5.
The Great Outdoors data source connections appear as entries in Data Source Connections.
Steps for IBM InfoSphere Warehouse Cubing Services
1. Open Developer Edition Manager.
2. In the upper-right corner, click Launch, IBM Cognos Administration.
3. Click the Configuration tab.
4. Click the new data source button .
5. In the Name box, type sales_and_marketing_cs, and then click Next.
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
6. On the connection page, click IBM InfoSphere Warehouse cubing services (XMLA), and click
Next.
The connection string page for the selected database appears.
7. In the Server URL box, type the name of the server and the XMLA port number for the cube,
followed by
/IBMXmlAnalysis
For example, myserver:1999/IBMXmlAnalysis
8. Under Signons, select the both Password and Create a signon that the Everyone group can use
check boxes, and then click Finish.
Tip: To test whether the parameters are correct, click Test the connection....
9. Click Finish.
Set Up Microsoft Analysis Services Cube SamplesIBM® Cognos® Connection or Framework Manager provides sample cubes for Microsoft Analysis
Services (MSAS).
For finance data, use the GO Finance Fact cube derived from the GOSALESDW database. This
cube contains year-to-date and monthly financial data for all accounts so that you can create financial
statements in Analysis Studio, Query Studio, and Report Studio. The data is in actual US dollars
submissions for 2004, 2005, 2006, or 2007 (7 months actual data only).
The MSAS2000 version of the finance cube and database is in the GOFinanceFact_XX.cab file.
The MSAS2005 version is in the GOFinanceFact_XX.abf file. XX represents the language. For
example, XX is replaced with EN which indicates English.
For sales data, use the GOSalesFact cube derived from the GOSalesFact_XX Analysis Services
database, based on the GOSALESDW SQLSERVER Database. The cube contains measures such
as unit cost, unit price, quantity, and gross profit. Dimensions include Time, Product, and Retailers.
The MSAS2000 version of the sales cube and database is archived in the GOSalesFact_XX.cab.
The MSAS2005 version is in the GOSalesFact_XX.abf restorable backup file.
The backup files are located in the c8_location/webcontent/samples/datasources/cubes/MSAS
directory. The files must be restored to a Microsoft SQL Server database running the applicable
Microsoft Analysis Services (p. 14). and hosting the GOSALESDW database.
The MSAS samples are available only if you installed the Microsoft SQL Server samples.
Note: Both Microsoft XML 6.0 Parser and Microsoft SQL 2005 Analysis Services 9.00 OLEDB
Provider must be installed on the local client to establish data source connections to MSAS cubes.
Steps
1. On the computer where IBM Cognos 8 is installed, go to the c8_location/webcontent/samples/
datasources/cubes/MSAS/en directory.
2. Copy the GOSALESDW.cab and GOSALESDW.abf files to a directory that you can access
from the Analysis Manager console in the Analysis Servers of Microsoft SQL Server.
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
3. Use the Microsoft Analysis Services Analysis Manager to restore the database from the GOS-
ALESDW.cab and GOSALESDW.abf files.
You can now create the data source connections using either the GOSalesFact_XX or GOFinance-
Fact_XX cubes (p. 20).
Create Data Source Connections to OLAP Data SourcesIBM® Cognos® 8 provides the following OLAP samples:
● GO Sales Fact and GO Finance Fact Microsoft Analysis Services cubes
● Great Outdoors Company cubes
● Great Outdoors DB2 cube
You must create data source connections to the cubes to use the samples. You must set up the
Microsoft Analysis Services cube samples, if you are using them, before creating data source con-
nections.
You can increase the read cache size to improve query performance, although this setting has no
effect on the initial time required to open a cube.
To create data sources, you must have execute permissions for the Data Source Connections secured
feature, and traverse permissions for the Administration secured function.
Steps for PowerCubes
1. Open IBM Cognos Connection by connecting to the IBM Cognos 8 portal and clicking IBM
Cognos Content on the Welcome page.
2. In the upper-right corner, click Launch, IBM Cognos Administration.
3. On the Configuration tab, click Data Source Connections.
4. Click the new data source button.
Note: You must add a data source connection for each cube.
5. To create a data source connection for the Sales and Marketing cube, type sales_and_marketing
in the Name box, and then click Next.
6. In the connection page, under Type click IBM Cognos PowerCube.
The connection string page for the selected database appears.
7. In the Read cache size (MB) box, type the cache size of the cube in megabytes.
If you leave this field blank or type 0, IBM Cognos Connection uses the default value in the
ppds_cfg.xml file in the configuration folder.
8. In the Windows location box, type the location and name of the Sales_and_Marketing.mdc file
for the data source connection. For example, type
c8_location/webcontent/samples/datasources/cubes/PowerCubes/En/Sales_and_Marketing.
mdc
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
9. To test whether the parameters are correct, click Test.
10. Click Finish.
You can now import the sample package for the PowerCube to use this data source.
Steps for Microsoft Analysis Service Cubes
1. Open IBM Cognos Connection by connecting to the IBM Cognos 8 portal and clicking IBM
Cognos Content on the Welcome page.
2. In the upper-right corner, click Launch, IBM Cognos Administration.
3. On the Configuration tab, click New Data Source.
4. In the Name box, type the name of the data source connection, and then click Next.
● For the GOFinanceFact cube, type GOFinanceFact_XX_MSAS2005.
● For the GOSalesFact cube, type GOSalesFact_XX_MSAS2005.
5. In the Specify Connection page of the New Datasource Wizard, clickMicrosoft Analysis Services
2005 or click Microsoft Analysis Services (via ODBO) as appropriate to the cube you are
accessing.
6. Click Next.
7. In the Server Name box, type the name of the server where the restored databases are located.
Back slashes are not required.
8. Under Signon, select the Password check box and then select the Create a signon that the
Everyone group can use check box. Type the user ID and password for the MSAS database.
For MSAS2005, this is a network login.
9. Click Test the connection, and then click the Test button. Click Close.
10. Click Finish.
You are now prompted to create a package.
Alternatively, you can deploy an existing package from a sample deployment archive. The
names of the deployment archives match the datasource connection names specified in step 4
and contain sample reports that work with the associated cubes.
In Content Administration on the Configuration tab in IBM Cognos Administration, clickNew
Import. The New Import Wizard prompts you to select a deployment archive. When you select
a deployment archive, it is important to click Edit and specify a target name for the package
to prevent an existing package from being overwritten.
11. To create a package, check Create a Package and then click OK.
12. Specify a package name and then click OK.
● For the GO Finance Fact cube, type GOFinanceFact_XX_MSAS2005.
● For the GO Sales Fact cube, type GOSalesFact_XX_MSAS2005.
Developer Edition Getting Started Guide 21
Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
13. Specify the Analysis Services database you restored either GOFinanceFact_XX or GoSales-
Fact_XX:
● For either the GOFinanceFact cube or the GOSalesFact cubes, type GOSALESDW.
● For the GO Sales Fact cube, type GO Sales Fact.
14. Click the cube applicable to the database.
15. Click Finish.
Import the SamplesTo use the sample package and other content, you must import them from the sample deployment
archive.
Before you import the Cognos_Samples.zip deployment archive, you must restore the databases
(p. 14). You must also create data source connections to the samples databases (p. 17).
The IBM InfoSphere Warehouse Cubing Services sample uses the deployment file named
Cognos_csgodw.zip. The sample is available only if you installed the IBM DB2 samples.
For more information about locales, see the IBM Cognos 8 Installation and Configuration Guide.
Steps
1. Copy the zip files from the c8_location/webcontent/samples/content directory to the directory
where your deployment archives are saved.
The default location is c8_location/deployment.
2. Open IBM Cognos Connection by connecting to the IBM Cognos 8 portal and clicking IBM
Cognos Content on the Welcome page.
3. In the upper-right corner, click Launch, IBM Cognos Administration.
4. On the Configuration tab, click Content Administration.
Note: To access this area in IBM Cognos Administration, you must have the required permissions
for the Administration tasks secured feature.
5. On the toolbar, click the new import button.
The New Import wizard appears.
6. In the Deployment Archive box, select the archive. Depending on which samples you installed,
you can deploy:
● Cognos_Samples, for the Great Outdoors company samples
● Cognos_DrillThroughSamples, to use Drill Through capabilities with the Great Outdoors
company samples
● Cognos_csgodw, for the IBM InfoSphere Warehouse Cubing Services samples
7. Click Next.
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
8. Type a unique name and an optional description and screen tip for the deployment archive,
select the folder where you want to save it, and then click Next.
9. In the Public Folders Content box, select the deployment archive that you want to import.
10. Select the options you want, along with your conflict resolution choice for options that you
select, and then click Next.
11. In the Specify the general options page, select whether to include access permissions and refer-
ences to external namespaces, and who should own the entries after they are imported.
12. Click Next.
The summary information appears.
13. Review the summary information and click Next.
14. Select the action that you want:
● To run once now or later, click Save and run once. Click Finish, specify the time and date
for the run, then click Run. Review the run time and click OK.
● To schedule at a recurring time, click Save and schedule. Click Finish, and then select fre-
quency and start and end dates. Click OK.
Tip: To temporarily disable the schedule, select the Disable the schedule check box.
● To save without scheduling or running, click Save only and click Finish.
15. When the import is submitted, click Finish.
You can now use the sample packages to create reports and analyses in Report Studio, Query Studio,
and Analysis Studio or create agents in Event Studio. You can also run the sample reports that are
available on the Public Folders tab in the portal.
Sample Database ModelsThe following sample models provide information for the fictional company, the Great Outdoors
and are provided with IBM® Cognos® 8:
● great_outdoors_sales, which refers to the samples database GOSALES
● great_outdoors_warehouse, which refers to the database GOSALESDW
You can use sample database models on different platforms. For information about moving models
from one platform to another, see the Framework Manager User Guide.
GO Sales Model
This model contains sales analysis information for the fictional company, The Great Outdoors. It
also has the query items required by the Event Studio samples. The model accesses three schemas
and has two packages. One package is based on the dimensional view and the other is baed on the
query (relational) view.
Developer Edition Getting Started Guide 23
Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
GO Data Warehouse Model
This model contains financial, human resources, and sales and marketing information for the fictional
company, The Great Outdoors. The model accesses a dimensional relational data source. The model
has two packages. One package is based on the dimensional view, the other is based on the query
(relational) view.
Remove the Samples Databases from IBM Cognos 8After you finish using the sample reports to learn about IBM® Cognos® 8, including Framework
Manager, you can delete the packages on which the samples are based. This action permanently
removes the samples from the content store.
Steps
1. Open IBM Cognos Connection by connecting to the IBM Cognos 8 portal and clicking IBM
Cognos Content on the Welcome page.
2. Click the Public Folders tab.
3. Select the check box for the sample package you want to delete.
4. Click the delete button on the toolbar, and click OK.
To use the samples again, you must set up the samples.
About The Great Outdoors Group of CompaniesTo make designing examples faster, especially financial examples, some general information about
The Great Outdoors Company is useful. To look for samples that use particular product features,
see the individual sample descriptions in this appendix.
Revenue for The Great Outdoors Company comes from corporate stores and from franchise oper-
ations. The revenues are consolidated from the wholly-owned subsidiaries. There are six distinct
organizations, each with its own departments and sales branches. Five of these are regionally-based
companies.
The sixth company, GO Accessories
● has its own collection of products, differentiated from the other GO companies by brand, name,
price, color and size
● sells from a single branch to all regions and retailers
● functions both as an operating company based in Geneva, and as a part owner of the three GO
subsidiaries in Europe.
The diagram below illustrates the consolidated corporate structure, including the percentage changes
in ownership for GO Central Europe, and shows the reporting currency and GL prefix for each
subsidiary.
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
GO Americas(AMX 1099) USD
Great Outdoors Consolidated(holding company) USD
GO Central Europe(CEU 6199) EURO
GO Accessories(EUX 8199) EURO
GO Asia Pacific(EAX 4199) YEN
GO Northern Europe(NEU 5199) EURO
GO Southern Europe(SEU 7199) EURO
Year 1 60%Year 3 50%
Year 1 40%Year 3 50%
Each corporation has the same departmental structure and the same GL structure, shown in the
table below. Divisions may not report in the same currencies. For example, the Americas subsidiary
reports in US dollars, but the Corporate division local currency is Canadian dollars, and the Oper-
ations division local currency is pesos.
Department (GL)Division (GL)
Sales (1720)Corporate (1700)
Marketing (1750)
IS&T (1760)
Human Resources (1730)
Finance (1740)
Procurement (1710)
Production and Distribution (1820)Operations (1800)
Customer Service (1820)
Each corporation has a complete chart of accounts. Most of the accounts, such as those under non-
personnel expenses, are at the department level, and contain only summary amounts. For example,
although each marketing department has expenses, the cost is unspecified at the transaction level
where marketing promotions occur.
Developer Edition Getting Started Guide 25
Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
EmployeesThe Great Outdoors data contains a full list of employees in all divisions, departments, and locations.
Data is available for reports about bonuses (Global Bonus report) and sales commissions (Sales
Commissions for Central Europe report), training (Employee Training by Year report), and perform-
ance reviews and employee satisfaction surveys (Employee Satisfaction 2006). If you use Metric
Studio, sample metrics for human resources are also available.
In the GO Data Warehouse (analysis) package, groups of measures and the related dimensions are
organized into folders. The employees are organized in hierarchies for region, manager, position
or department, and organization, to make different kinds of aggregation easy to report on.
Aggregation has been defined for the Employee Position Summary measures, so that Position count
and Planned position count aggregate correctly at each level of time: monthly, quarterly, or yearly.
For example, see the Planned Headcount report.
Sales and MarketingData about sales and marketing is available for all of the companies in the Great Outdoors group.
GO Accessories has richer details to support analysis examples. For example, see the Revenue vs
% Gross Profit by Product Brand analysis, based on the Sales and Marketing cube. Marketing and
sales campaigns are tied to the Great Outdoors regional companies.
Overall, the GO companies have experienced solid growth across most product lines (Sales Growth
Year Over Year), in all regions (Revenue by GO Subsidiary 2005), because of factors like an increase
in repeat business and new or improved products, such as the high margin sunglasses product line.
In the product lines sold by the five regional companies (all but GO Accessories) promotions have
had mixed success (Promotion Success by Campaign, Bundle and Quarter).
Customer Surveys
The data also contains information from customer surveys. For example, the product line that
includes bug spray, sun screen, and so on has not been successful (Product Satisfaction - Outdoor
Protection 2005) and a source of retailer dissatisfaction may be the level of customer service rather
than the returns (Customer Returns and Satisfaction).
Sales Outlets
Revenue from the corporate outlets is available at the transaction level. Revenue from the franchise
outlets is available at the consolidated level only (Sales and Marketing cube). Metrics about retailers
show that the number of new retail outlets has dropped over the time period covered by this data.
GO Accessories sells worldwide, and sells only accessories. Transaction data for GO Accessories
is the primary source for analysis of product by brand, color and size. The other five subsidiaries
in the group of companies are regional and sell all product lines for retailers in their region. For
example, the report Top 10 Retailers in 2005 uses sparklines and list data to review revenues at
the retailer level.
Great Outdoors Database, Models, and PackagesThe Great Outdoors models illustrate modeling techniques and support the samples. The models
are based on the GO data warehouse and the GO sales transactional database and are the basis for
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
the sample reports and queries. Each model contains two packages for publishing analysis (dimen-
sional) and query views of the data.
For a description of each sample report or query, see the user guide for the studio that you open
the sample in. For more information about modeling techniques, see the Guidelines for Modeling
Metadata, or the Framework Manager User Guide.
You must have access to Framework Manager, the modeling tool in IBM Cognos 8, to look at the
sample models. You may also need to set up the sample databases and connections. For instructions,
see the Administration and Security Guide or the Installation and Configuration Guide.
GO Data Warehouse
The GO Data Warehouse model, great_outdoors_warehouse.cpf, is based on the database GOS-
ALESDW. It contains data about human resources, sales and marketing, and finance, grouped into
business areas. In the Database view, the three business areas are grouped into separate namespaces.
The Database view contains a fourth namespace (GO Data) for the common information.
The Database view is very similar to the structure of the underlying database. All tables (database
query subjects) are unchanged. This enables IBM Cognos 8 to retrieve metadata directly from the
package in most cases, instead of using a metadata call to the database. The following changes and
additions have been made in the Database view:
● Joins have been added as necessary.
● To allow for aggregation at different levels of granularity, some model query subjects have
been created. For example, see the relationships between Time and Sales or Sales fact.
● To allow single joins to be made between the lookup tables and each level in a dimension,
lookup tables have been copied. For example, see the Products look up tables.
The Business view contains only model query subjects, with no joins. The following changes and
additions have been made in the Business view:
● Calculations were added to the model query subjects. For example, the time dimension contains
language calculations.
● Where the database has multiple hierarchies, new dimensions have been created to organize
each hierarchy. For example, see the employee hierarchies, where employees are organized by
manager, organization, region, and position.
Developer Edition Getting Started Guide 27
Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
The GO Sales Transactional Database
The GO Sales model, great_outdoors_sales.cpf, is based on the GOSALES database, which is
structured as a transactional database. It contains principally sales data.
The Database view is very similar to the underlying database structure. The following changes and
additions have been made in the Database view:
● To make it possible to join the fact tables to the time dimension, model query subjects and
multipart joins have been used.
● Other joins have been added as necessary.
The Business view contains only model query subjects, with no joins. The following changes and
additions have been made in the Business view:
● Calculations were added to the model query subjects.
● Model query subjects that were created in the Database view to enable joins on the time
dimension have been linked as reference shortcuts.
● Where the database has multiple hierarchies, new dimensions have been created to organize
each hierarchy.
● Sales Staff is a subset of the slowly changing Employee dimension.There is no unique Employee
key in GO Sales, so a filter retrieves the current record only. This model does not use historical
data.
The Samples Cubes
The following cubes are delivered with the Great Outdoors samples:
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Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
● sales_and_marketing.mdc
● employee_expenses.mdc
● go_accessories.mdc
● go_americas.mdc
● go_asia_pacific.mdc
● great_outdoor_sales.mdc
The Samples Packages
The Great Outdoors samples include seven packages. Below is a brief description of each available
package.
Go Data Warehouse (analysis) is a dimensionally modeled view of the GOSALESDW database.
This package can be used in all studios, including Analysis Studio. Using this package you can drill
up and down.
Go Sales (analysis) is a dimensionally modeled view of the GOSALES database. This package can
be used in all studios, including Analysis Studio. Using this package you can drill up and down.
Go Data Warehouse (query) is a non-dimensional view of the GOSALESDW database. This package
can be used in all studios except Analysis Studio, and is useful for reporting when there is no need
for drilling up and down.
Go Sales (query) is a non-dimension view of the GOSALES database. This package can be used in
all studios except Analysis Studio, and is useful for reporting when there is no need for drilling up
and down.
Sales and Marketing (conformed) is based on the GOSALESDW database. Dimensions are conformed
with the dimensions found in the Sales and Marketing (cube) package, in order to enable drill-
through from the cube package to the dimensional package.
Sales and Marketing (cube) is an OLAP package, based on the sales_and_marketing.mdc cube.
Great Outdoor Sales (cube) is an OLAP package, based on the great_outdoors_sales_en.mdc cube.
Developer Edition Getting Started Guide 29
Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
30
Chapter 2: Installing and Setting up Sample Data
Chapter 3: Using IBM Cognos 8 BI DeveloperEdition
IBM® Cognos® 8 BI is an integrated business intelligence (BI) suite that provides a wide range of
functionality to help you understand your organization's data. IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
leverages the report, analysis, and query capabilities of Cognos 8 BI to help you make effective
business decisions.
The Developer Edition integrates the following business intelligence activities:
ComponentActivity
Framework ManagerCreating and publishing a business view of data
Cognos ConnectionPublishing, managing, and viewing content
Query StudioAd hoc querying and self-service reporting
Report StudioProfessional reporting
Analysis StudioAnalyze your business
Event StudioEvent management and alerting
Creating a Business View of Your Data - Framework Manager
You model data within data sources to structure it in a way that is meaningful to users.
Framework Manager is the modeling tool for creating and managing business-related metadata for
use in reporting. Reporting tools, such as Query Studio or Report Studio, use the metadata, which
is published as a package, to provide a single, integrated business view of your data.
Publishing, Managing, and Viewing Content - Cognos Connection
Cognos Connection is the Web portal. It provides the starting point for accessing your BI information
and the functionality of the Developer Edition. Use the portal to publish, find, manage, organize,
and view your organization’s business intelligence content, such as reports. If you have the necessary
permissions, you can access the various studios from the portal. You can also use the portal for
content administration, including scheduling and distributing reports, and creating jobs.
Ad Hoc Querying and Self-Service Reporting - Query Studio
Query Studio is the reporting tool for creating simple queries and reports. A casual or novice user
can use Query Studio to create self-serve reports that answer simple business questions. With minimal
steps, you can
● view data
Licensed Materials – Property of IBM31© Copyright IBM Corp. 2008, 2009.
● author basic reports
● change the report layout
● filter and sort data
● add formatting
● create charts
When you use Query Studio, you interact directly with your data.
Professional Reporting - Report Studio
Report Studio lets professional report authors create, edit, and distribute a wide range of professional
reports. They can also define corporate-standard report templates for use in Query Studio, and edit
and modify reports created in Query Studio.
Report Studio offers two distinct authoring modes to meet the needs of both regular report authors
and financial report authors: Professional authoring mode and Express authoring mode. The user
interface for each authoring mode contains reporting features relevant to each role.
● Professional Authoring Mode for Advanced Reporting Capabilities
The Professional authoring mode gives users access to the full range of Report Studio function-
ality. In this mode, you can create any report type, including charts, maps, lists, and repeaters.
This mode contains a superset of the features available in the Express authoring mode. However,
you cannot view live data.
● Express Authoring Mode for Business and Financial Analysts
The Express authoring mode provides a simplified and focused Report Studio interface. It lets
business and financial analysts create traditional financial statement-style reports. By default,
this mode allows access to dimensionally-modeled data and uses a member-oriented data tree.
This authoring mode allows you to see live data and supports crosstab reports. It contains a
subset of the features available in the Professional authoring mode.
When you are in the Express authoring mode, if you open a report that was authored in the
Professional authoring mode, you can see the objects that you can insert only in the Professional
authoring mode, such as charts, maps, and lists. However, you cannot modify these objects.
Analyze Your Business - Analysis Studio
Managers and analysts use Analysis Studio to better understand their business and to get answers
to questions that they have about their business. Users can quickly and easily perform analysis to
get to the what and why behind an event or action so that they can improve business performance.
With analysis, it is possible to see trends and understand anomalies or variances that may not be
evident with other types of reporting. Analysis Studio users can easily focus on what is important
even with large volumes of dimensional data.
When you use Analysis Studio, you interact directly with visible data.
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Chapter 3: Using IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
Event Management and Alerting - Event Studio
Event Studio is the notification tool used to alert decision-makers in your organization of events as
they happen, so that they can make timely and effective decisions.
You can use Event Studio to create agents that monitor status changes, priority customers, your
organization’s data to detect occurrences of business events, or any other factor that is important
to your business.
Specify the event condition, or a change in data, that is important to you. When an agent detects
an event, it can perform tasks, such as sending an email, adding information to the portal, and
running reports.
How IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition WorksWhen you view or create a report, you are viewing and manipulating data stored in your organiza-
tion’s databases. The following diagram explains the steps involved in using the Developer Edition.
Run, view,and managecontent
CognosConnection
4 3
Customerdatabases
Data modelingand packaging
1
2
Source databases
FrameworkManager
Report Studio:create reports
Cognos viewer:view reports
Analysis Studio:create analyses
Query Studio:create queries
Event Studio:manage events
1. In Framework Manager, the modeler ensures that metadata is presented in a manner that business users canunderstand. Modelers import the metadata from one or more databases, and then add to the model to meet userrequirements.
2. The modeler then publishes and updates packages to Cognos Connection so that authors can use them to createreports.
3. Business users and report authors use the published packages to understand their business data.
4. Users run, view, and manage their content in Cognos Connection. Depending on their security permissions, theymay be able to simply run and view reports or manage schedules, portal layout, and other users’ permissions.
For more information, see the IBM® Cognos® 8 Architecture and Deployment Guide.
Developer Edition Getting Started Guide 33
Chapter 3: Using IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
Models and Packages
Because stored data is typically designed for storage and not for reporting, a data modeler uses
Framework Manager to create metadata models. A model structures, adds to, and manages data
in ways that make sense to business users. For example, a model defines
● business rules
● data descriptions
● data relationships
● business dimensions and hierarchies
● other administrative tasks
Modelers use a defined metadata model to create a package to make metadata available to report
authors. Each package must contain all the information that a specific user or group of users needs
to create reports. For example, one package can contain human resources data, and another sales
data. When users open an authoring studio, they must select which package to use. Each report
can contain data from only one package.
Planning and creating a model is an important task that should be performed by a modeler or a
modeling team familiar with both the database structure and the needs of the business users.
For information about data modeling, see the online help in Framework Manager.
Reports
When authors create a report, they are actually creating a report specification. The report specific-
ation is an XML representation of the queries and prompts that retrieve data, as well as the layouts
and styles used to present the data. For simplicity, the report specification is called the report.
Report specifications can be useful to report authors for troubleshooting.
For information about working with report specifications, see the online help in Report Studio.
Samples
Sample reports, models, and packages are available for Developer Edition. To understand the
modeling and packaging process, users can study the sample models, packages, and reports.
The samples must be downloaded, installed, and set up for the databases you have installed.
Viewing and Organizing ContentWhen you view and run a report the information that you see comes from data sources, the package,
calculations, other properties added by the author, and from the product itself.
You use IBM® Cognos® Connection to organize your reports and other content such as URLs, and
folders. You can access public content on the Public Folders tab or custom portal pages, and store
and access your favorite content on the My Folders tab.
For more information about viewing and organizing content, see the online help in IBM Cognos
Connection.
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Chapter 3: Using IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
Report Views
If you want to personalize an existing public report, you can create a report and save the view on
the My Folders tab. This allows you to save prompt values, modify the schedule, and change the
output format of reports.
Report Outputs
When a report is run, it contains the latest data from the data source. However, viewing the most
recent data may not always meet your needs. When you want to view older data, save and view
the report output.
Report outputs are created when you schedule a report, when a report has multiple formats or
languages, when a report has a delivery method of save, print, or email, and when a report is burst.
You can produce report outputs in the following formats:
● HTML
● Excel
● delimited text (CSV)
● XML
If you are the owner of a report or have the necessary permissions, you can specify the default
format for each report. You can also specify how many report output versions to keep.
Drill-through Links
A report can contain drill-through links, also known as Go To links, so that you can easily open
related content. A value in the report is linked to more detailed information in another report. For
example, a report includes sales information for each continent. When you click a continent name,
a more detailed report about sales for that specific continent opens.
When you view report data in IBM Cognos Connection and Query Studio, you can also drill down
and drill up. When you drill down, you follow a link from one layer of data to a more detailed
layer within the same report. When you drill up, you access a less detailed layer.
Multilingual User Interface and Content
The product is a multilingual suite that lets you author reports once and deploy them globally.
When users open a report, it automatically opens in the proper language, based on their locale set-
tings.
You can select the language that you prefer for the user interface. If your data and reports are
available in multiple languages, you can also select the language that you prefer for the content.
To deliver multilingual content, you can create each entry with multilingual properties in the
appropriate studio.
Developer Edition Getting Started Guide 35
Chapter 3: Using IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
Portal Pages
In IBM Cognos Connection, you can create your own custom portal pages. You use these portal
pages to view frequently-used content, to group related reports and folders, and to combine content
within a single page. Within your portal pages, you can add portlets, which you use to view and
interact with your content.
If you have the necessary permissions, you can create public pages that other users and groups can
access and even use as their own. You can assign security permissions to allow only certain users
to access the pages.
Content Store
The installation creates and initializes the content store. The content store is an instance of an
Apache Derby database. It contains the data that the IBM® Cognos® 8 components need to operate,
such as report specifications, published models, and the packages that contain them; connection
information for data sources; information about the authentication namespace, and the Cognos
namespace for user access; and information about scheduling and bursting reports.
Design models and log files are not stored in the content store.
Administration
Administrators ensure that the product runs smoothly and at its optimum performance. They can
● define connections to data sources
● define security permissions for users and groups in the organization
● specify distribution lists, contacts, and printers
● manage servers and dispatchers and fine-tune the performance
● pre-define links for an entire package that authors can then easily add to their reports
Security
The Developer Edition is secured by setting permissions and user authentication. Anonymous access
is disabled. Users must provide a username and password when logging on.
Administrators define permissions so that users can access functionality. For example, to edit a
report using Report Studio, you must have the appropriate security permissions.
In addition, each entry in IBM Cognos Connection is secured to define who can read, edit, and run
the entry.
You use the Developer Edition Manager to maintain the five named users allowed to use the product.
This authentication provider is referred to as a namespace.
Scheduling Content
You can schedule most content that appears in Cognos Connection to run at a time that is convenient
for you. For example, you can schedule reports and deployments.
You can also create jobs to schedule multiple entries together.
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Chapter 3: Using IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition
How is the Developer Edition Different from IBM Cognos 8BI?
The Developer Edition delivers a subset of the capabilities that are available in IBM® Cognos® 8.
It also provides some differences, such as an integrated installation, preconfigured settings, and
simplified user management.
Integrated Installation
The installation program for the Developer Edition installs all of the components that you need for
a reporting solution on a single Windows server. The components include Report Studio, Analysis
Studio, Query Studio, Event Studio, Framework Manager, and IBM Cognos Connection.
Preconfigured Settings
Preconfigured settings makes the installation of Developer Edition easy, allowing you to start using
the tools quickly. The product is configured to run using Apache Tomcat application server and
an instance of an Apache Derby database as the content store. Automatic configuration helps to
reduce any possible confusion regarding startup options. In addition, sample models and reports
are available to be installed allowing you to start to explore product features without the need to
set up corporate data.
Simplified User Management
In the Developer Edition, user management is simple. Anonymous access is disabled, and five named
users are allowed to access the BI capabilities provided by the software. User and password security
administration is managed by the Developer Edition Manager.
Building an ApplicationTo help you learn the features in IBM® Cognos® 8 BI Developer Edition, use the samples to guide
you through the process of building an application. The samples are an introduction to key concepts
you need to understand how to model your data, create reports, and query the reports.
For more information to help you become familiar with business intelligence capabilities, see the
online help in the IBM Cognos Administration console.
Before you get started building an application, you will need to setup your environment (p. 7).
We also recommend that you download and install the product samples, and then review the dis-
cussion about the samples.
Locate and preparedata sources and models
Build and publishthe content Deliver the information
The following checklist guides you through a high level view of the different functional areas and
roles involved in building an application.
❑ Locate and prepare data sources and models (p. 38).
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The Developer Edition reports from one or more data sources. Database connections are created
in the web administration interface, and are used for modeling, for authoring and for running
the application.
To use data for authoring and viewing, the business intelligence studios need a subset of a
model of the metadata (called a package). The metadata may need extensive modeling in
Framework Manager.
❑ Build and publish the content (p. 48).
Reports and so on are created in the business intelligence studios. The studio you use depends
on the content, lifespan and audience of the report. For example, use Query Studio for self-
service reporting, and use Report Studio for scheduled reports. Report Studio reports are usually
prepared for a wider audience, published to IBM Cognos Connection, and scheduled there for
bursting, distribution, and so on. You can also use Report Studio to prepare templates for self-
service reporting. For more information, see "Creating Your Own Report Templates" (p. 51).
❑ Deliver and view the information (p. 66).
You deliver content from the portal, and view information that has been saved, or delivered
by other mechanisms. You can also run reports from within the business intelligence studio in
which they were created.
Designing the ModelCreating an application begins with designing a model.
Framework Manager is a metadata modeling tool that drives query generation. A model is a collec-
tion of metadata that includes physical information and business information for one or more data
sources. When you add security and multilingual capabilities, one model can serve the reporting
and ad hoc querying of many groups of users around the globe.
Additional Information
For information about using Framework Manager, see the online help.
Prerequisites
To get started with modeling, we recommend that you thoroughly understand the reporting problem
that you want to solve. As part of this analysis you must also know what data is available to solve
the problem, and whether the data source contains the data and metadata that you need.
You should also become familiar with Framework Manager before you start modeling. Learn about
the objects you will use in a project (p. 39). Try to create a simple project, or open the sample
project. Explore the panes and menu commands in the user interface.
The Process for Creating Models
Follow these steps to create a model:
❑ Create a data source connection.
You must create data source connections to the databases that hold your data. The product
uses this information to connect to the database and retrieve metadata and data.
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❑ Create a project.
In Framework Manager, you work in the context of a project. The Framework Manager project
contains objects that you organize for your users according to the business model and business
rules of your organization. You view these objects in the project page.
❑ Import metadata.
Include all data-source query subjects required to access the data. You can create one or more
of these namespaces for all tables in your data mart or data warehouse.
❑ Review relationships in the data view.
Confirm the relationships and ensure cardinality rules are appropriate. Framework Manager
uses cardinality rules to generate the appropriate SQL statements. Verify all relationships to
ensure that reporting and analysis needs are met.
❑ Verify the usage, aggregation rules and format properties for the query items, and modify them
as necessary.
Set the Usage and Regular Aggregate properties to reflect the intended use of the query item.
Format the query items to control how data appears in a report.
❑ Create business rules and definitions.
❑ Rename query subjects and column names with business names, and use folders and namespaces
to organize the data. Create model objects to represent the data in terms of the business or
application needs.
❑ Resolve the multilingual data by adding a parameter map and creating filters and calculations
to retrieve the data in the locale language.
❑ Create presentation views using shortcuts.
A business-oriented presentation view will be helpful for navigation. Create star schema
groupings using shortcuts to the model query subjects from the business view.
❑ Use the Model Advisor.
After finding and fixing errors, use the Model Advisor to analyze the metadata in the model.
The Model Advisor applies rules based on current modeling guidelines and identifies areas of
the model that you need to examine.
❑ Create a package for each functional area.
This ensures that the package stays as concise as possible, and also limits the requirement for
regression testing.
❑ Publish packages.
Always validate the model before publishing.
Working with Objects in Framework Manager
When you work in Framework Manager, you work with a number of objects that are contained
in a project.
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Projects
A project contains a model, namespaces, packages, data sources, and related information for
maintaining and sharing model information. A single project can span many data sources or tables.
A Framework Manager project appears as a folder that contains a project file (.cpf) and the specific
.xml files that define the project. The files in a project folder are unique to each project. The project
and its associated files are contained in a project folder.
Models
A model is the set of related dimensions, query subjects, and other objects required for one or more
related reporting applications.
A model provides a business view of the information in the source data to simplify building reports
and queries. The business view can
● organize items in folders that represent business areas for reporting
● format items using numeric, currency, date, time, and other formats
● present multilingual folder and item names, descriptions, tips, and data so that users can
operate in their language of choice
Namespaces
A namespace uniquely identifies query items, dimensions, query subjects and other objects. You
import different databases into separate namespace to avoid duplicate names.
Packages
A package is a subset of the dimensions, query subjects, and other objects defined in the project. A
package is what is actually published to the portal, and it is used to create reports and ad hoc
queries.
Dimensions
A dimension is a broad grouping of data about a major aspect of a business, such as products,
dates, or markets.
Query Subjects
A query subject is a set of query items that have an inherent relationship.
In most cases, query subjects behave like tables. Query subjects produce the same set of rows
regardless of which columns were queried.
Query Items
A query item is the smallest piece of the model that can be placed in a report. It represents a single
characteristic of something, such as the date that a product was introduced.
Query items are contained in query subjects or dimensions. For example, a query subject that refer-
ences an entire table contains query items that represent each column in the table.
For your users, query items are the most important objects for creating reports. They use query
item properties of query items to build their reports.
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Parameter Maps
Use parameters to create conditional query subjects that allow for substitutions when the report is
run. Parameter maps are objects that store key-value pairs. Parameter maps are similar to data
source look-up tables. Each parameter map has two columns, one for the key and one for the value
that the key represents. You can manually enter the keys and values, import them from a file, or
base them on existing query items in the model.
Example - The GO Data Warehouse Model
The GO Data Warehouse model, great_outdoors_warehouse.cpf, is based on the database GOS-
ALESDW.
The GO Data Warehouse model is a collection of metadata that includes physical information and
business information about human resources, sales and marketing, and finance, grouped into
business areas.
In this exercise you will learn some of the modeling techniques that were used to create the GO
Data Warehouse model.
You are a data modeler in the Great Outdoors Company. You create the models and packages on
which performance management reports are based.
Things to Notice
● In the Database view, the three business areas are grouped into separate namespaces. The
Database view contains a fourth namespace (GO Data) for the common information.
● The Business view contains only model query subjects, with no joins.
● Calculations were added to the model query subjects. For example, the time dimension contains
language calculations.
● The Dimensional view contains regular dimensions, measure dimensions, and scope relationships
that were created in Framework Manager.
● The Analysis view contains the part of the model that is visible in the studios for the analysis
(dimensional) package
Shortcuts to the regular and measure dimensions in the Dimensional view are grouped in star
schemas and placed in the root of the model in folders, one for each business area. They are
clearly marked with "(analysis)" at the end of the name. They are not in a separate namespace
because that would add another level in the metadata tree in the studios.
● The Query view contains the part of the model that is visible in the studios for the query and
reporting package.
Shortcuts to the model query subjects in the Dimensional view are grouped in star schemas and
are placed in folders, one for each business area. They are clearly marked with "(query)" at
the end of the name in the root of the model.
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● Where the database has multiple hierarchies, new dimensions have been created to organize
each hierarchy.
Steps
1. From the Start menu, click Programs, IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition, IBM Cognos
Framework Manager.
2. From the Welcome page, click Open a project.
3. Go to the c8_location\webcontent\samples\Models\great_outdoors_warehouse and click great_
outdoors_warehouse.cpf.
4. Click OK.
5. Click Finish.
The project page appears. The project page is where you design, package, and publish project
metadata. The Project Viewer shows the objects in a project in a hierarchical view. You can
use the Project Viewer to view, modify, and create objects.
6. In the Project Viewer, expand go_data_warehouse, and expand Database View.
The Database view is very similar to the structure of the underlying database. All tables (data
source query subjects) are unchanged. This enables the product to retrieve metadata directly
from the package in most cases, instead of using a metadata call to the database. The following
changes and additions have been made in the Database view:
● Joins have been added as necessary.
● To allow for aggregation at different levels of granularity, some model query subjects have
been created. For example, see the relationships between Time and Sales or Sales fact.
● To allow single joins to be made between the lookup tables and each level in a dimension,
lookup tables have been copied. For example, see the Products look up tables.
7. In the Project Viewer, expand Business View.
The following changes and additions have been made in the Business view:
● Calculations were added to the model query subjects. For example, the time dimension
contains language calculations.
● Where the database has multiple hierarchies, new dimensions have been created to organize
each hierarchy. For example, see the employee hierarchies, where employees are organized
by manager, organization, region, and position.
8. In the Project Viewer, expand Dimensional View.
This view contains regular dimensions, measure dimensions, and scope relationships that were
created in Framework Manager.
9. In the Project Viewer, notice that the analysis view contains the part of the model, such as HR
(analysis) that is visible in the studios for the analysis (dimensional) package.
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10. In the Project Viewer, notice that the query view contains the part of the model, such as Sales
and Marketing (query) that is visible in the studios for the reporting and query package.
11. In the Project Viewer, expand Packages.
Notice there are two packages, one for publishing analysis (dimensional) and one for query
views of the data. You can publish a package to any folder in the portal so your users can access
it.
Try on Your Own
Create your own model based in the sample data:
● In the Database view, select related tables and import the metadata into a namespace by running
the metadata wizard from the Actions menu.
● Verify existing relationships by selecting the object and clicking Launch Context Explorer from
the Tools menu.
● Create a relationship to join logically related objects that your users want to combine in a single
report.
This is useful for relationships between objects that were not selected during metadata import,
were not joined in the data source, or are from multiple sources.
For More Information
For information about using Framework Manager, see the Framework Manager online help.
Creating Reports in Query StudioWhen you create a report in Query Studio, you are actually creating a query definition, which is a
specific set of instructions for extracting particular data. You can create list, crosstab and chart
reports in Query Studio.
In Query Studio, you cannot open a report that an author created in Report Studio. However, you
can open a Query Studio report in Report Studio to add additional functionality.
Before you create a report in Query Studio, consider whether you can answer the following questions:
● What business question do you want to answer? For example, you can ask "Which sales rep-
resentative sold the most products?"
● Which type of report best answers the business question, a crosstab report or a chart?
● Who is the target audience?
● What data items and calculations do you need?
Creating a report in Query Studio involves the following:
❑ Specify the package.
The package (p. 40) provides items for the report and are based on models (p. 40) that are
created in Framework Manager.
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❑ Add data items.
A new report contains no data. You choose the report items that you want to include in the
report from the package. Packages can include query subjects (p. 40), query items (p. 40), such
as columns of measures and non-measures, and calculated report items.
❑ Save the report.
❑ Run the report.
You can run a report to retrieve any recently updated data from the data source. A Query
Studio report also runs when you open it, or when you make any changes.
❑ View the report.
You can view reports in various formats, such as PDF, XML, CSV, or Excel format.
❑ Open the report in Report Studio.
Add more functionality to the report in Report Studio.
Working with Objects in Query Studio
Query Studio is the reporting tool for creating simple queries and reports.
To understand how to work in Query Studio, you should be familiar with the Query Studio objects.
Report Items
Items added from the package to your report are called report items. Report items appear as columns
in list reports, and as rows and columns in crosstab reports. In charts, report items appear as data
markers and axis labels.
Query definition
What you save in Query Studio is the query definition, which is a specific set of instructions for
extracting particular data. It is not a snapshot of the data you retrieve at the time you save the
report. For example, if you run a report that you saved two weeks ago, the data in the report reflects
any changes in the updated data source.
Report Definition
The Report Definition command describes the report items in each report and gives users, adminis-
trators, and customer support an important troubleshooting tool. For information about using this
command, see the Query Studio online help.
Prompts
Use prompts to ask for user input to define the content of a report. If a report contains prompts,
you are prompted when you open the report and when you run the report.
Preview Reports with No Data
Preview reports with no data when you want to see what your report will look like without using
actual data. This is useful when you are designing your report or when you want to make formatting
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changes. When you preview reports with no data, you do not use the data source at all. Artificial
data replaces the numbers and characters from the data source. None of the data is meaningful.
Example - Create a Query to Show Rate of Product Return and Revenue Loss
Use Query Studio to retrieve information from a data source, when you want to create reports that
answer simple business questions. Also use Query Studio to publish reports for audiences who do
not require complex layout or formatting.
In this exercise, you will learn how to
● add columns
● add calculations
● add conditional formatting
● apply a template to the report
● save the report
You are a business analyst for the Great Outdoors Company. You want to create a report that
shows which products have the highest rate of return and how much revenue was lost from product
returns.
Things to Notice
● Data that can be added to the report has a different icon depending on the type of data.
● You can use Report Studio to view and edit the reports that you create in Query Studio.
● At any time, you can click the arrow next to the help button, and click Go to the Welcome
Page.
Steps
1. Open IBM Cognos Connection:
● Start your Web browser.
● In the address bar, type the URL supplied by your administrator, and then press Enter. The
URL looks something like this:
http://hostname:9300/p2pd/servlet/dispatch
2. In the Welcome page, click Query my data, and select the GO Data Warehouse (analysis)package.
A blank report appears.
3. Add columns to the report:
● From the Menu, click Insert Data.
● Expand Sales and Marketing (analysis), expand Sales, Product, and drag Product type and
Base product to the work area.
The work area contains the report or query you are currently using.
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● From Sales, expand Sales fact, and drag Quantity and Unit cost to the work area.
The item Unit cost will not appear in the final report, but you need it to build a calculation.
● Expand Returned items, and Returned items, and drag Return quantity to the work area.
4. Create a calculation to show the lost revenue (Return quantity * Unit cost = Lost revenue):
● Select the column headings that you want for the calculation. In the work area, click the
heading for Return quantity and Ctrl+click the heading for the Unit cost column.
● Click the calculate button .
● In the Operation box, select * (multiplication).
● In the New item name box, type Lost revenue.
● Click Insert.
● Delete the Unit cost column.
5. Format the calculated column that you added:
● Right-click the heading for the Lost revenue column and click Format Data.
● In the Category list, click Currency.
● In the Thousands separator list, click Yes, and then click OK.
6. Create a calculation to show the percentage of returns (Return quantity / Quantity)*100):
● In the work area, click the heading for the Return quantity column and Ctrl+click the
heading for the Quantity column.
● Click the calculate button.
● In the Operation type box, select Percentage.
● The content of the Operation box changes to %.
● In the New item name box, type % Returned.
● Click Insert.
7. Sort the % Returned column in descending order:
● Right-click the heading for the % Returned column and click the sort button .
● Under Sort order, click Descending (9 to 1), and then click OK.
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8. Apply conditional formatting to highlight products with a lost revenue greater than $200,000.
● Click the heading for the Lost revenue column.
● From the Menu, click Change Layout, and click Define Conditional Styles.
● In the New value: box, type 200000 and click Insert.
● For the first range, in the Style column, select Poor, and click OK.
The cells with a lost revenue greater than $200,000 appear with a red background.
9. Apply a template to the report:
● From the Menu, click Change Layout, and click Apply Template.
● Select Apply a template and click Select a template.
● In Public Folders, click Sample Template, select Great Outdoors Template, and click OKtwice.
The report appears with the styles from the template.
10. Add a title to the report:
● Above the report, click the report title.
● In the Title box, type Returns by Product Type and click OK.
11. Save the report:
● From the toolbar, click the save button.
● In the Name box, type Returns by Product Type.
● Accept the default save location and click OK.
The final report looks like this.
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You notice that the Star Gazer 2 tent is the product that has the highest lost revenue rate.
Try on Your Own
● Every time you modify a report, Query Studio updates the results by running a query. Use the
run options to preview the report with no data. From the Run Report menu, click Preview with
No Data.
Tip: To preview a report with limited data, you must define design filters in the model.
● Review the definition of all report items in the report. From the Manage File menu, click Report
Definition. This is useful for troubleshooting a report.
For More Information
For information about using Query Studio, see the Query Studio online help. For more tutorials
about creating reports using the samples, see the Getting Started Guide which is available from the
Help menu in IBM® Cognos® Connection.
Creating Reports in Report StudioWhen you create a report, you are actually creating a report specification. The report specification
defines the queries and prompts that are used to retrieve data, as well as the layouts and styles used
to present the data. For simplicity, a report specification is the same as a report.
Creating a new report involves the following tasks:
❑ Specify the package.
The package (p. 40) provides items for the report is based on models that are created in
Framework Manager.
❑ Choose a report template.
When creating a new report, choose a report template to get you started quickly. You can select
a predefined template that is formatted as a particular report type, or you can open an existing
report as a template.
❑ Add data items.
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Select the data items, such as query subjects (p. 40), query items (p. 40), measures, dimensions
(p. 40), and so on, that you want to appear in the report.
❑ Save the report.
You can save your report to the server so that it is available to users, or you can save it locally.
❑ Run the report.
Run your report to see the data that is retrieved.
Report Structure
Before you can create reports in Report Studio, you must become familiar with the Report Studio
environment.
All reports have two components, a layout component that defines the report appearance, and a
query component that defines report data.
Layout
A layout is a set of pages that defines the appearance and formatting of a report. When you design
the layout of a report, you
● present the data in a meaningful way by using lists, crosstabs, charts, and maps
● give the report the appearance you want by adding formatting, such as borders, color, images,
and page numbers
● specify how the data flows from one page to the next
Pages
Pages are containers for the layout objects that you use to build a report. A page is made up of the
following mandatory and optional components:
● page header (optional)
● page body (mandatory)
● page footer (optional)
When you run a report, the amount of data queried often exceeds one page. As a result, a page will
repeat until all the data is shown. You have control over how data flows from one page to the next.
For example, here are alternative representations of a report that contains a chart and a lengthy
list.
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1. The chart appears on its own page. The list begins on the next page and fills subsequent pages until all rows appear.
2. The chart and the first few rows of the list appear on the first page. The rest of the data in the list appears on thesubsequent pages.
Objects
You add layout objects to a page when you create a report. Example of objects that you will use
often when building reports in Report Studio include: lists, crosstabs, charts, maps, text, and tables.
You can add a repeater to show each instance of a certain column or data item in a separate frame.
You can also add a block to hold text or other information. Blocks are often used to display hori-
zontal bands of information.
Queries
Queries determine what data items appear in the report. Sometimes you want detail rows of data,
which you obtain by using a simple SELECT statement. Other times you must calculate totals or
averages using aggregate functions and grouped columns, or must apply filters to show only the
data you want.
Report Studio automatically creates the queries you need as you build reports. However, you can
modify these queries or create your own custom queries to get the results you want.
Working with Objects in Report Studio
You build reports by adding objects and manipulating them to obtain the results you want. To
understand how to work with objects in Report Studio, you must be familiar with the some key
concepts.
Object Types
In Report Studio, layout objects are either inline or block. You can insert other objects on the same
line as an inline object, but not on the same line as a block object. When you insert an object to
the left or to the right of a block object, the object appears on the line above or below the block
object respectively. Examples of inline objects include graphics and text items. Examples of block
objects include any report type (list, crosstab, chart, map, or repeater) and tables.
Objects as Containers
Objects, such as tables, blocks, and any report frame, are containers in which you can insert other
objects. For example, you can insert a list in one cell of a table and a chart in another.
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Locking and Unlocking Objects
To manipulate the contents of some objects, you must first unlock the object. For example, you
have a list that contains the column Product Name. You want to insert a graphic inside the Product
Name column to show an image of each product. Unlocking the list allows you to insert the image
object inside a list column.
Hierarchy of Objects
In Report Studio, objects are organized hierarchically. For example, a list contains list columns,
and each list column contains a text item, which is the name of the inserted data item.
The hierarchy of objects is useful to remember when you apply formatting because formatting is
applied to the child objects of the object. For example, you can specify that all list column titles in
a list have red as the background color. The formatting is automatically applied to any new columns
you add to the list, because the formatting is applied to the list and is therefore applied to the objects
in the list. If you apply formatting to a specific object, it will override the same formatting specified
for the parent object.
Creating Your Own Report Templates
A report template is a pattern you use to build reports. Create your own report templates when
you frequently produce the same type of report.
To create a report template, you can convert a report to a template or create a new template.
For more information about how to create a report template, see the Report Studio Tour and the
Report Studio online help. In addition, you can use sample templates provided with Report Studio.
Example - Create a Report with Prompts for Product Returns by Order Method
Use Report Studio to create reports with complex layout, formatting, and report user interactions.
These types of report are generally created by professional report authors, who have a good
knowledge of the data and tools.
In this exercise, you will learn how to
● create a chart
● make the report interactive with prompts
You are a business analyst for the Great Outdoors Company. You create a chart report in Report
Studio to show the performance of returns over the last few years. You make the report interactive
by adding a prompt.
You will create a report that looks like the Report Studio sample Returns by Order Method -
Prompted Chart in the GO Sales sample package.
Things to Notice
● When you use Report Studio, data is not live. You must run the report to view data.
● You can view the XML report specification.
● You can add multilingual capabilities.
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● At any time, you can click the arrow next to the help button, and click Go to the Welcome
Page.
Steps
1. Open IBM Cognos Connection:
● Start your Web browser.
● In the address bar, type the URL supplied by your administrator, and then press Enter. The
URL looks something like this:
http://hostname:9300/p2pd/servlet/dispatch
2. In the Welcome page, click Create professional reports.
3. Click the GO Data Warehouse (analysis) package.
4. Click Create a new report or template, click Crosstab, and click OK.
Tip: If you are in Report Studio Express, switch to Report Studio Professional for this example.
From the View menu, select Authoring Mode, and click Professional.
5. Insert data in the crosstab zones:
● In the Insertable Objects pane, expand Sales and Marketing (analysis), Returned items,
Return reason and Return reason.
● Drag Return reason to the Columns zone.
● In the Insertable Objects pane, expand Returned items and Returned items.
● Drag Return quantity to the Measures zone.
● In the Insertable Objects pane, expand Inventory, Product, and Product.
● Drag Product line to the Rows zone.
6. Click the run report button to run your report and verify the content.
The report output appears in Cognos Viewer.
Tip: To return to Report Studio, close the Cognos Viewer Web browser.
7. Insert another column in the report:
● In the Insertable Objects pane, expand Sales, Time dimension, and Time dimension.
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● Drag Year to the column after the Return reason column.
8. Insert a chart in the report:
● In the Insertable Objects pane, click the toolbox tab .
● Drag the Chart object below the crosstab.
● In the Insert Chart dialog box, in the Chart pane, click the Column chart type, and click
OK.
● Click the chart to select it, and in the Properties - Combination Chart pane on the left, in
the Data properties, select the Query property.
● Select Query1 from the list.
Tip: When you change the Query property to the query that you used for the crosstab, it
is easier for you to find and reuse the same data items for the chart.
● In the Insertable Objects pane, click the data items tab .
● Drag Return quantity to the Default measure (y-axis), Product line to the Series, and Return
reason and Year to the Category (x-axis).
9. Create a filter to exclude the Wrong product ordered return reason from the crosstab:
● In the crosstab, click the Return reason column heading.
● On the toolbar, click the filter button .
● Click the Detail Filters tab.
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● Click the add button .
● Define the following expression:
[Return reason] not in ([Returned items].[Return reason].[Return reason].[Return reason]-
>[all].[9003])
Tip: Insert items from the Available Components pane. The value 9003 is the code for the
Wrong product ordered return reason.
● Click the validate button to validate your expression.
● Click OK twice.
10. Create a prompt page for the order method to allow users to filter data in the report and retrieve
data only for the order method they select:
● Click the background of the work area to deselect.
● From the Tools menu, click Build Prompt Page.
● Use Ctrl+click to select the Back and Next buttons, and the Double click to edit text prompt
page title, that are automatically created, and delete them.
● In the Insertable Objects pane, click the toolbox tab .
● Drag the Value Prompt object and drag it in the prompt page.
The Prompt Wizard - Value Prompt dialog box appears.
● Click Next.
● Beside the Package item box, click the ellipsis (...).
● In the Choose Package Item dialog box, expand Sales and Marketing (analysis), Sales,
Order method, and Order method dimension.
● Click the lowest-level Order method dimension and then click OK.
● Click Next twice to accept the defaults, and click Finish.
11. Move the cursor over the Page Explorer between the Insertable Objects pane and the work
area, and in Report Pages, click Page1 to return to the report page.
Tip: Click the Prompt Pages folder title to remove or rename a page or to edit properties.
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12. Add a title to the report:
● Double-click the Double click to edit text title area, type Returns by Order Method, and
click OK.
13. Save the report:
● From the File menu, click Save As.
● Name the report Returns by Order Method - Prompted Chart and click Save.
14. Run your report and verify the content,
● Click the run report button .
● In the Order method dimension drop down list, click E-mail and then click Finish.
The report output appears in Cognos Viewer.
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Try on Your Own
● Save the report as a template so you can create a new report with the same layout and include
different data.
Tip: From the File menu, click Convert to Template and then save the report with a new name.
● Change the color of the background of the chart.
Tip: In the work area, click the chart. In the Properties pane, expand Color & Background,
and click the ellipsis (...) next to Background Color.
● View the XML specification for the report.
Tip: From the Tools menu, click Show Specification.
For More Information
For information about using Report Studio, see the Report Studio Professional Authoring User
Guide.
Create Analyses in Analysis StudioUsing Analysis Studio, you can
● find and focus on items that are important to your business
● understand trends and anomalies
● compare data, such as details to summaries, or actual results to budgeted results
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● assess performance by focusing on the best or worst results
● establish relative importance using calculations such as growth or rank
● share your findings with others
Who Uses Analysis Studio?
Analysis Studio is not only for people with the word analyst in their job title, but for any business
user who must understand and discover answers to business questions in company data. People
who can use Analysis Studio to support their decisions include
● regional managers who must assess performance
● manufacturing managers who must conduct defect analysis
● customer representatives who must understand their customer relationships
What is Exploration?
You can use Analysis Studio to quickly change how you view performance indicators, such as revenue
or production costs.
OLAP (online analytical processing) exploration refers to the term slicing and dicing to describe
the ease with which you can change context and view details. For example, you look at revenue
for the years 2001 to 2005 by sales region. You notice a dip in the revenue for 2004. By clicking
on 2004, you can drill down to show revenue results by quarters for 2004. You can easily change
the view from quarters for 2004 to sales personnel by replacing quarters with sales personnel.
To help you focus on the data that answers your business questions, Analysis Studio automatically
maintains the context of your analysis so that you can focus on the results, not the tool. In the
previous example, when you change the view from the quarters in 2004 to sales personnel, Analysis
Studio retains 2004 as the context.
What is Analysis?
You can use Analysis Studio to compare and manipulate data to understand the relationships
between data and its relative importance. Whether you want to assess revenue growth or to identify
top performers, Analysis Studio provides the filtering, calculating, and sorting support you need
for analysis.
To extend the example of reviewing revenue by sales region and sales personnel, you can add sales
targets and then calculate the percentage difference between the sales target and actual revenue for
each salesperson. Because the top 10% performers are awarded a bonus, you can also rank the
sales personnel across all regions using the percentile calculation. The result indicates who made
their sales quota as well as who is eligible for a bonus.
Large Data Considerations
Analysis Studio intelligently manages large data volumes to improve performance and to avoid
overwhelming you with details. You can then focus on your analysis.
Analysis Studio helps you find meaningful details while keeping summaries in view to maintain a
clear overview of your data. You can
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● use Search in the source tree to find only the items you need
● keep crosstabs small by using top/bottom and other filters
● limit the number of visible items in the source tree or crosstab
● control the presentation of rolled up data by using subtotals
If you want to see all the items in a large set, you can click the run button on the toolbar to
view the analysis as an HTML report.
Sharing the Results
When you view an analysis by using Cognos Viewer, you produce a report that can be scheduled,
viewed, or saved in HTML, PDF, or spreadsheet format. Reports created by any studio in IBM®
Cognos® 8, including Analysis Studio, can be shared with other users using IBM Cognos Connection.
For more information, see the IBM Cognos Connection User Guide.
You can also use Report Studio to extend the report definition to include other reporting elements,
or enhance the report by defining bursting rules. For more information, see the Report Studio User
Guide.
Example - Create an Analysis
In Analysis Studio, you can manipulate items in your data interactively so that you can identify and
understand the problems and issues in your business.
In this exercise, you will learn how to
● drill down
● create a top filter
● create a summary calculation
● create a crosstab and a chart
You are a business analyst for the Great Outdoors Company. You want to further analyze the
returns business items to find out where and why products are the most frequently returned, and
that have the biggest impact on the company’s profit.
To perform this exercise, you must have the appropriate licensing and security permissions.
Things to Notice
The items and measures that you can add to your analysis appear in the data tree in the left pane.
The overview area above the work area is a convenient place to quickly explore and change the
contents of your analysis. You manipulate rows and columns, drill up or down, and provide context
for the work area.
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Analysis Studio uses sets, which are collections of similar items. You manipulate items by applying
actions to sets. You can sort, filter, and nest sets. You can also save custom sets and view subtotals
for your sets.
Steps
1. Open IBM Cognos Connection:
● Start your Web browser.
● In the address bar, type the URL supplied by your administrator, and then press Enter. The
URL looks something like this:
http://hostname:9300/p2pd/servlet/dispatch
2. In the IBM Cognos 8 Welcome page, click Analyze my business.
3. Click the Sales and Marketing (cube) package.
4. Click Blank Analysis, and click OK.
5. Insert data in the crosstab:
● In the Insertable Objects pane, expand Measures and drag Returns to the Measure zone
or to the upper-left corner of the work area.
● Drag Products to the Rows zone.
● Expand the Time folder, and Time, and multiselect all four years (2004, 2005, 2006, 2007).
● Drag all four years to the Columns zone.
You now see the returns for all the product brands over a four year span. The total number of
returns is visible in the Total column. Notice that the year 2007 is not a complete year of data.
6. Filter the top ten product brands based on their total returns over the last four years:
● In the overview area, right-click Products and click Down a Level.
The overview area is located above the work area. You can use the overview area as a
convenient place to quickly explore and change the contents of the work area. The overview
area shows any applied filters and sorting.
● Repeat the previous step to see a list of all individual products.
● In the overview area, right-click Products (depth 3), select Top or Bottom, select Top, and
then click 10.
You see that the top ten products are now the only products in the crosstab.
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Tip: To use a specific product name rather than having to drill down multiple layers, in the
Insertable Objects pane, navigate to the product that you want. Select the product you want,
and in the Information pane, drag the level name into the crosstab.
7. Create a summary calculation to see what the average returns are per year for the top ten
products:
● In the overview area, right-click Time (list), select Summarize, and then click Average (Time
(list)).
The Average (Time (list)) summary is added to the crosstab. This summary shows the
average number of returns over the fours years in the crosstab.
8. View your analysis as a chart to see if there is a trend or spike in any of the top ten returns:
● From the View menu, select Select Chart Type, select Line Chart, and then click Standard.
Take note of the top ten products with the highest returns. There may be some products,
like Single Edge, that are anomalies. You may want to exclude them from your analysis,
or you may decide that you need to be comparing returns to other metrics; such as quantity
sold or gross profit.
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9. Change the top ten definition to filter on year 2007 to give you the most recent data for product
returns. As stated earlier, notice that the year 2007 is not a complete year of data.
● In the overview area, right-click Products (depth 3), select Top or Bottom, select Top, and
then click Custom.
● In the Define top or bottom filter pane, from the For column list, select 2007.
By specifying 2007 in the top definition, you change the filter context to focus on the highest
top ten returns for the year 2007. In addition, you see the other years in the crosstab, to
give you some additional historical information.
Tip: In the definition, you can specify the number of items you want by number, percentage,
or sum.
● Click OK.
Notice that Cat Eye has the highest number of returns. The list also includes Inferno and
Zone.
Tip: In the overview area, using the Time (list) column, you can also filter on 2007. The
data returned when using this filter will be different than setting the 2007 context in the
top definition. Only 2007 data will appear in the crosstab, instead of including the historical
data. You can use this type of filter to help you analyze your data to find more information.
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10. Look at the top ten products with the highest gross profit to see whether they include any of
the products with the highest returns, which might impact the company’s bottom line:
● You can change the Context filter section of the overview area. When you do this, the
values shown for the selected set also change. If you want the applied settings to ignore
context changes, you can preserve the context of the selected set.
At the bottom of the work area is a properties pane. Click the up arrows to open the pane.
Click Definition, Hold Current Context, and click OK.
Notice that a pin icon appears in the overview area.
● Drag the Gross Profit measure to the Measure zone in the crosstab.
Your top ten definition is automatically updated. Analysis Studio uses dynamic context by
default, so that any changes you make in the crosstab are reflected in your analysis.
Notice that Cat Eye doesn’t appear in the top ten products with the highest gross profit.
However, the product Inferno has the second highest gross profit. Returns of Inferno will really
impact the bottom line, since it contributes so much more than the other products to gross
profit.
11. Save the analysis as Returns vs Gross Profit over Time.
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Try on Your Own
● For report formatting and layout control, edit the report in Report Studio. With Report Studio,
you can extend the report definition to include other reporting elements, or enhance the report
by defining bursting rules. To use Report Studio, you must have the appropriate licensing and
security permissions.
Tip: From the File menu, click Open in Report Studio. After you save an analysis in Report
Studio, you can no longer edit the analysis in Analysis Studio.
For information about using Analysis Studio, see the Analysis Studio online help.
Manage Events in Event StudioUse Event Studio to define business events or exceptional conditions in your data that require
attention. Create agents to monitor your data and notify decision-makers in your organization of
events as they happen, so that they can make timely and effective decisions. You create agents to
perform tasks or deliver alerts when the data meets predefined thresholds.
Example - Manage an Event
This exercise shows how to
● define business events
● define agent tasks
● review the status of events
You are a business analyst for the Great Outdoors Company. You want to ensure that your customers
are satisfied with the products and services that you provide. In particular, if products are returned,
you want to investigate why, and ensure that you offer a replacement before your customers decide
to shop elsewhere.
Event Studio can notify you when a customer returns a product because it was defective, unsatis-
factory, incomplete, or because the wrong product was shipped to them. You want to immediately
send an email to your customer service department with details about the order and the customer,
so that they can contact the customer.
You will create an agent that looks like the Event Studio sample Returns Agent in the GO Sales
(query) sample package.
To perform this exercise, you must have the appropriate licensing and security permissions.
Things to Notice
The tasks that you need to perform to create an agent in Event Studio appear in the I want to...area in the left pane. By default, when you open Event Studio, you start with the first task, defining
an event.
Steps
1. Open IBM Cognos Connection:
● Start your Web browser.
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● In the address bar, type the URL supplied by your administrator, and then press Enter. The
URL looks something like this:
http://hostname:9300/p2pd/servlet/dispatch
2. In the IBM Cognos 8 Welcome page, click Manage my events, and select the GO Sales (query)package.
3. Create the expression that defines the event:
● In the Insertable Objects pane, expand Returned items (query) and Returned items.
● In the Insertable Objects pane, expand Return reason.
● Use both Return quantity and Reason description to create the following expression:
[Return quantity]>0 AND [Reason description] IN ('Wrong product shipped','Unsatisfactory
product','Incomplete product','Defective product')
Tip: Insert items from the Insertable Objects pane. To select from a list of possible values
for the return reason, click the select values button . Move the values you want from
the Select Value box to the Selected Items box and click OK.
● Click the validate button to validate your expression.
Tip: You can also click Preview from the Actions menu to see the data retrieved from the
data source.
You defined the expression that will notify you whenever a customer returns a product because
it was defective, unsatisfactory, incomplete, or because the wrong product was shipped to them.
4. Create an email task to immediately send an email to your customer service department with
details about the returned order and the customer so that they can contact the customer:
● In the I want to list, click Add a task and click Send an email.
● In the To box, type the email address for the customer service department.
Tip: Since this example is for learning purposes, the agent will not actually run. Therefore,
you can type any email address.
● In the Subject, type Products Returned.
● Above the Body box, click the insert table button and add four columns and two
rows.
● Add information about returned products to the table as follows:
Manually type in the text for the heading row of the table. As you add text to the table,
delete the insert text... text from each cell.
Drag objects from the Insertable Objects pane to the bottom row of the table.
Tip: From the Insertable Objects pane, expand Returned items (query). Expand Order to
find Order number; Product for Product name; Returned items for Return quantity, and
Retailer site for Company name.
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Company NameQuantityProduct NameOrder Number
[Company name][Return quantity][Product name][Order number]
When the agent runs, the data item for each event is replaced by the current value in the
package.
● Select the heading row and then click bold to make the column headings more prominent.
5. Set the execution rules so that a notification is sent for new events only:
● In the I want to list, click Manage the task execution rules.
● Click the Event Key tab.
● In the Insertable Objects pane, click the Source tab.
● Expand Sales (query), Order, and drag Order number to the Event key box.
● Click the Event Selection tab.
● Under Select when to perform this task, ensure that only the New events check box is
selected.
● Click OK.
6. Set the schedule for when you want to the event to run:
● In the I want to list, click Schedule the agent.
● In the Set the schedule pane, under Frequency, click the By Day tab, and select Every 1
hour(s).
● Click OK.
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7. Save the agent as Returns Agent.
Each hour, the agent runs and the next time a customer returns a product, an email is sent to the
customer service department with information about the order.
Try on Your Own
● Attach the event list to the email. An event list shows the events that the agent processed. In
this example, the event that we defined is when a customer returns a product.
Tip: In the summary area, click the Products Returned email task. Below the Body box, click
Attach, and then click Attach the event output.
For More Information
For information about creating agents, see the Event Studio online help.
Running and Scheduling ReportsYou can schedule reports to run at a convenient time. For example, you may want to run reports
during off hours when demands on the system are low. Or you may want to run them at a regular
weekly or monthly interval.
You schedule a report to run it at a later time or at a recurring date and time.
Example - Run a Report
IBM® Cognos® Connection is the Web portal that gives you access to all the Developer Edition
functionality. In the portal, you can run reports.
In this exercise, you will learn how to
● navigate the portal
● run a report
● navigate within a report
● view the report in a different format
You are a business analyst for the Great Outdoors Company. You are asked to study the percentage
of products that are returned. Returned items reveal important information about the quality of
products, especially when products are returned because they are defective or are missing parts.
Things to Notice
● The icon for a report shows the default format and default action of the report.
● Reports that have saved outputs have an additional icon in the Actions column.
● At any time, you can click the arrow next to the help button, and click Go to the Welcome
Page to return to the Welcome page.
Steps
1. Open IBM Cognos Connection:
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● Start your Web browser.
● In the address bar, type the URL supplied by your administrator, and then press Enter. The
URL looks something like this:
http://hostname:9300/p2pd/servlet/dispatch
2. In the Welcome page, click Cognos content, click the GO Data Warehouse (analysis) package,
and then click Query Studio Report Samples.
3. Locate the Return Quantity by Product Line Chart report.
Tip: The icons beside an entry identify its default action and format. The default format
for this report is HTML and the default action is to run the report.
4. Click the report name to run the report.
The report runs and opens with the latest data about product returns.
You notice that Outdoor Protection products have the highest number of returns. You want
to drill down to obtain more detailed information.
5. Click the Outdoor Protection area in the pie chart to drill down to more detailed information.
Tip: You can also drill down by right-clicking the pie area, by clicking the drill down button
on the toolbar, or by clicking the legend label.
At a quick glance, you notice that insect repellents have the highest number of returns.
6. Drill down on Insect Repellents.
You notice that the BugShield Lotion has the highest number of returns.
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Try on Your Own
● Change the report format to PDF.
Tip: In the Actions menu, click the run with options button . From the Format list, select
PDF, and click Run.
● Change the language settings in your Web browser or in IBM® Cognos® Connection and then
run the report again. Because the sample data is multilingual, all data will be translated.
Tip: Next to the my area button , click the down arrow, and click My Preferences. Under
Regional options, change the Product language and the Content language. You need to run the
report in order to see the content language changes.
● On the toolbar, click the home or return button to return to the portal.
For more information about running reports, see the online help in IBM Cognos Connection.
Example - Schedule a Report
You can schedule entries that are stored in IBM® Cognos® Connection, such as reports, queries,
and agents, so that they run at a time that is convenient for you.
In this exercise, you will learn how to
● save a report as a report view
● schedule a report so it runs daily
● use the schedule management tool to view the status of the schedule
You are a business analyst for the Great Outdoors company. You want to schedule the Return
Quantity by Product Line Chart report because some people in your organization need the data
updated daily. You schedule the report to run daily, and then check that it is properly scheduled.
Things to Notice
● When a report runs according to a schedule, the report output is saved and appears in the
Action column in IBM Cognos Connection.
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● At any time, you can click the arrow next to the help button, and click Go to the Welcome
Page.
Steps
1. Open IBM Cognos Connection:
● Start your Web browser.
● In the address bar, type the URL supplied by your administrator, and then press Enter. The
URL looks something like this:
http://hostname:9300/p2pd/servlet/dispatch
2. In the Welcome page, click Cognos content, click the GO Data Warehouse (analysis) package,
and then click Query Studio Report Samples.
Locate the Return Quantity by Product Line Chart report. You can also use any one of the
sample reports.
3. Create a report view for a daily view of the report:
● In the Actions column, click the create a report view button next to the report.
● In the Name box, remove the words Report View of from the beginning of the name, type
(Daily) at the end of the name, and then click Finish.
A new entry appears in IBM Cognos Connection, with the report view icon .
4. Schedule the report view to run daily:
● For the entry, in the Actions column, click the schedule button .
● Under Frequency, click the By Day tab.
● Accept the default time and other defaults.
● Click OK.
5. Check the schedule:
● Next to the my area icon , click the down arrow, and click MyActivities and Schedules.
● Click Schedules.
● In the Filter pane, select Any status and Any priority, and click Apply.
If you are accepting the default settings, you will not see any changes in the schedule.
Your report view appears in the list of scheduled reports.
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Try on Your Own
● Modify the schedule so that the report runs weekly.
Tip: In the Actions tab, click More, and then click Modify the schedule.
● Permanently remove the schedule.
Tip: In the Actions tab, click More, and then click Remove the schedule.
For more information about scheduling reports, see the online help in IBM Cognos Connection.
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Chapter 4: What is IBM Cognos 8 Business Intel-ligence?
IBM® Cognos® 8 is a business intelligence solution that addresses many of the current issues facing
companies. It provides the ability for companies to meet their growing needs for enhanced agility,
standardization, lower operating costs, and global operations.
IBM Cognos 8 BI provides a complete set of performance management functionality, including
reporting, analysis, query, event management, dashboarding, scorecarding, and data integration
capabilities.
Important: IBM Cognos 8 Developer Edition is a subset of the full IBM Cognos 8 BI product.
Enhanced Agility for Competitive AdvantageTo have a competitive advantage, businesses must be able to adapt to changing conditions. Businesses
must make critical decisions sooner, faster, and more accurately. The ability of an organization to
respond quickly to demands or opportunities depends on how well their decision making tools
integrate with existing business processes.
ArchitectureThe separation of the architectural components into tiers supports the secure deployment strategies
used by small and large organizations, whose data and infrastructure are secured and guarded by
firewalls.
The service-oriented architecture is designed for scalability, availability, and openness. It uses plat-
form independent, industry proven technology, such as Extensible Markup Language (XML), Simple
Object Access Protocol (SOAP), and Web Services Definition Language (WSDL). For these reasons,
IBM® Cognos® 8 BI can integrate with and leverage your existing technology infrastructure on
multiple platforms.
The architecture features a zero footprint, Web-based user interface for viewing, creating, and
administering reports, analyses, dashboards, scorecards, and events. It has a common dispatcher
and supports leading relational databases, industry-standard cubes and dimensionally-modeled
relational sources. The architecture ensures dynamic load balancing and provides failover recovery
for high availability operation. It also provides a single point of administration.
IBM Cognos 8 has a multitiered architecture: Web server, applications, and data. The tiers are
based on business function, and are typically separated by network firewalls. The user interfaces
sit above the tiers.
Licensed Materials – Property of IBM71© Copyright IBM Corp. 2008, 2009.
Web serverTier 1: Web server
IBM Cognos 8 server
JDBC JDBCAPI
Tier 2: Applications
Web-based andWindows-based interfaces
IBM Cognos 8 ApplicationTier Components withdispatcher and ContentManager
IBM Cognos 8user interfaces
Tier 3: Data
IBM Cognos 8 gateways
Content storeQuery databases
Metric stores
network firewall
network firewall
network firewall
Date Source SupportIn many organizations, data is typically fragmented, incomplete, and not readily available in a form
that the people who need it can use effectively. The IBM® Cognos® 8 open data strategy lets you
consolidate data from any source to create a single business view of your enterprise that you can
use to drive better performance.
You can source a single reporting application from heterogeneous data sources, such as multiple
relational warehouses, SAP BW objects, PeopleSoft deployments, and real-time XML data. You
can easily develop reporting applications in a development environment and deploy them on pro-
duction databases. You can dynamically set database connections at report runtime based on user
prompting or session parameters. This data source flexibility allows organizations to achieve a
comprehensive view of their business with their reports.
IBM Cognos 8 supports reporting and analysis against a wide variety of relational and dimensional
data sources.
Enterprise Information Integrators
You can use IBM Cognos 8 with Enterprise Information Integration (EII) products such as Com-
posite Information Server. Composite Information Server provides access to additional data sources
such as LDAP, JDBC, Open XML, and WSDL, and improves performance when querying data
from different data sources. In the following diagram, the EII product models a set of databases,
producing a unified view as a single virtual data source. IBM Cognos 8 accesses the EII service as
though it were a single database, and the EII service joins data from the various enterprise data
sources as needed.
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Chapter 4: What is IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence?
Tier 3: DataAPI
EII modeling
Enterprise data sources
EnterpriseInformationIntegrator (EII)Service
network firewall
Enterprise SecurityIBM® Cognos® 8 provides a security architecture that is flexible and compatible with your existing
security model. It is easily integrated with authentication and cryptographic providers.
IBM Cognos 8 leverages your existing enterprise security providers for user authentication. For
example, users are authenticated using the corporate LDAP, NTLM, or other such provider rather
than an application-specific authentication method. This eliminates extra administration overhead
and the need to replicate existing security models. In addition, IBM Cognos 8 allows users to use
multiple security authentication providers simultaneously. This saves you time, money, and resources
and ensures that you can continue with a security approach that is already familiar to users.
IBM Cognos 8 security involves the following:
● Cognos authentication services
● Cognos authorization services
● Cryptographic services
GatewayTier 1: Web server
IBM Cognos 8server
JDBC API
Tier 2: Applications
Web-based andWindows-based interfaces
IBM CognosApplication Firewall
IBM Cognos 8user interfaces
Tier 3: Data
Content storeQuery databases
Authorizationservice
ContentManager
Authenticationservice
Cryptog
raph
icservices:appliedtoallcom
ponents
network firewall
network firewall
network firewall
Authenticationsource
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Chapter 4: What is IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence?
Authentication
IBM Cognos 8 BI can use whatever authentication mechanism or provider is in place. It supports
Microsoft Active Directory, Windows NTLM, SiteMinder, LDAP, existing Cognos Series 7
namespaces, or combinations of these where multiple security providers are used.
Authorization
You can apply security to virtually any level, including the metadata model, query subjects, rows,
columns, or to the entire published BI packages. You can also apply security to specific objects,
including reports, analyses, dashboards, scorecards, and agents.
Cryptography
Apply cryptography to all information, including transient communications between services, and
static and temporary data artifacts generated by the system. The standard cryptographic provider
uses SSL, and includes trusted communications with digital signing of SOAP-based messages on
the BI Bus. Strong encryption of up to 168 bits is available when using enhanced cryptographic
providers.
An important distinction of the cryptographic services is that, if required, you can fully encrypt all
inter-service communication between services in the application tier. This ensures the highest possible
level of encryption.
Integrating Business Intelligence with Existing ApplicationsIBM® Cognos® 8 BI provides a fully open and documented application programming interface. You
can integrate the full range of BI capabilities into any existing system, and choose from widely used
programming languages such as Java, C#, C++, or Microsoft Visual Basic.
The Software Development Kit exposes the same Web services API that IBM Cognos 8 BI uses itself.
The API is also accessible using Web Services Definition Language (WSDL), and can be consumed
by any programming language that understands SOAP.
Business Intelligence CapabilitiesIBM® Cognos® 8 delivers all BI capabilities, including reporting, analysis, dashboards, scorecarding,
event management and data integration. In addition Go! Mobile, Go! Office, and Go! Search extend
these BI capabilities.
Reporting
Report Studio provides you with complete reporting coverage, advanced report authoring capabil-
ities that match your needs, and a collaborative workflow environment that operates on a proven,
Web services architecture.
Analysis
Analysis Studio enables the guided exploration of information that pertains to all dimensions of
your business, regardless of where the data is stored. Robust, easy to use, and easy to deploy,
Analysis Studio lets you explore and analyze large volumes of data covering all dimensions of the
business, whether stored in OLAP or dimensionally aware relational sources.
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Chapter 4: What is IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence?
Dashboards
IBM Cognos 8 creates business dashboards that let you communicate complex information quickly.
They present information from your various corporate systems and data as visually rich presentations
using gauges, maps, charts, and other graphical elements to show multiple results together. IBM
Cognos 8 BI offers the full range of dashboards, including operational, tactical, and strategic, to
help you monitor, measure, and manage corporate performance.
Scorecarding
Metric Studio lets you create and deliver a customized scorecarding environment for monitoring
and analyzing metrics throughout your organization. Users can monitor, analyze, and report on
time-critical information by using scorecards based on cross-functional metrics.
Event Management
Event Studio allows you to set up agents to monitor your data and perform tasks when business
events or exceptional conditions occur in your data that requires attention. When an event occurs,
people are alerted to take action. Agents can publish details to the portal, deliver alerts by email,
run and distribute reports based on events, and monitor the status of events. For example, a support
call from a key customer or the cancellation of a large order may trigger an event, sending an email
to the appropriate people.
Data Integration
Data Manager creates data warehouses and data repositories for reporting, analysis, and performance
management.
Office Compatibility
Go! Office lets you view and consume IBM Cognos content within Microsoft Office applications
such as Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Excel, and Microsoft Word.
Mobile Users
Go! Mobile extends the value of the proven IBM Cognos 8 architecture by providing users with
access to timely, secure, and personalized information on their BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, or
Symbian wireless devices.
Search and Navigation
Go! Search is a BI search capability that enables users to instantly find relevant, strategic, enterprise
information available through IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence. With a familiar, browser-based
search that ranks results based on user priorities, Go! Search delivers an intuitive and efficient way
for everyday users to quickly find reports, scorecards, and other content created in IBM Cognos 8
Business Intelligence.
Total Cost of OwnershipThe zero footprint for business users and authors, with no Windows desktops, Java or Web browser
applets, enables IT to centrally manage installations on one platform.
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IBM® Cognos® 8 delivers all capabilities using a browser-based user interface. There is nothing to
install or maintain on users’ desktops. For large organizations, which are often geographically dis-
persed, this means administration can be distributed, allowing local or regional administrators to
handle updates for users and roles.
Web Deployability
The IBM Cognos 8 infrastructure supports Web-based analysis and lets you author, manage, view,
and manipulate reports through a browser-based solution.
You can deploy complete enterprise reporting functionality, including ad hoc and professional
report authoring, over the Web, to a large number of users. Additionally, remote and distributed
Web-based administration is enabled. Maintenance and administration are cost-effective.
BenefitsInfrastructure Component
Lightweight Web gateways fit into commonly and widely
deployed Web servers, such as Microsoft IIS, WebSphere,
Apache, and so on.
Web server
Leverages a company’s existing, in-place application servers,
such as BEA WebLogic, WebSphere, SAP J2EE Engine, or
Oracle Application Server.
Application server
Supports broad and secure access to all components in
secured Web configurations.
Firewall
Integrates with existing, in-place load balancing mechanisms
to ensure optimal use of hardware resources.
Router
Integrates with widely used portal environments, such as
WebSphere, SAP Enterprise portal, and Plumtree. Built to
integrate with portal environments that comply with Web
Services for Remote Portlets (WSRP).
Portal
Metadata Interaction
A single metadata foundation supports all BI capabilities. The metadata model delivers user-friendly
terms and value-added business rules to the business intelligence application. The software lets you
import metadata from other popular modeling tools to leverage your existing investment, and
accelerate the modeling process.
The IBM Cognos 8 BI solution uses a single query engine across all data sources, regardless of
whether they are relational sources or dimensional sources. In conjunction with common metadata,
this means users can have confidence that the numbers in their reports will match those from other
departments. Additionally, the single query engine leverages modern data access standards, with
queries that leverage SQL 99, MDX, and BAPI.
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Global Deployment to Worldwide CommunitiesIBM® Cognos® 8 BI delivers easy global deployment to worldwide communities. It provides multiple
languages for all business user interfaces and simultaneous releases in all languages for all releases.
The solution enables the delivery of multi-language reports in multiple delivery formats.
Globalization Options
IBM Cognos 8 BI provides a multinational business intelligence environment in which users can
access data, create reports, and view reports in different languages.
Support for global deployments is built into the metadata layer. With no coding required, metadata
models can drive multilingual deployments. You can provide BI deliverables, such as reports, in-
depth analyses, dashboards, and scorecards, in any language or locale, all from one unicode server.
At runtime, the local settings in a user’s browser direct IBM Cognos 8 to render results in the
appropriate language, using appropriate locale settings for currency symbols and the formatting of
monetary values.
The sample databases provided with IBM Cognos 8 BI use a selection of text fields, such as names
and descriptions in different languages, to demonstrate a multilingual environment.
One IBM Cognos 8 BI environment can support many languages:
● Language options for the user interface
Individual users can personalize the Web user interface by changing the language used for menu
items, tools tips, and documentation.
● Language options for reports
One IBM Cognos 8 BI environment can deliver data in many languages. Individual users can
choose the language used for reports. A report is authored only once, not multiple times for
different languages. The report language selection is independent of the user interface language
settings.
● Unicode support
IBM Cognos 8 BI supports both unicode and non-unicode data sources.
Moving Your Content to IBM Cognos 8 Business IntelligenceYou can move the applications that you created with the Developer Edition to IBM® Cognos® 8
BI. To do this, you must deploy IBM Cognos Connection entries, such as folders, reports, and report
views from your source environment to your IBM Cognos 8 BI environment.
For a complete description of deployment, see the online help in the IBM Cognos Administration
console.
To move your existing content to IBM Cognos 8 BI, follow these steps:
❑ Install IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence.
❑ Plan your deployment.
❑ Create an Export Deployment Specification.
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❑ Move the Deployment Archive.
❑ Import to a Target Environment.
❑ Test the deployed content.
❑ Uninstall Developer Edition.
Install IBM Cognos 8 Business IntelligenceIf you want to extend the BI capabilities in the Developer Edition, and continue to use the content
you created, you can upgrade to IBM® Cognos® 8 Business Intelligence. Upgrading provides full
support and more functionality. In addition, the installation and configuration options for IBM
Cognos 8 BI provide the flexibility you need to leverage the existing assets, such as corporate
security, in your environment.
When you upgrade to IBM Cognos 8 BI you must install it to a different location than the Developer
Edition. For more information, see the IBM Cognos 8 Installation and Configuration Guide.
Plan Your DeploymentWhen you deploy, you must consider security and whether to deploy some or all of your content.
Security
Before you deploy, you must consider access permissions and security of deployment archives.
To deploy IBM Cognos Connection entries, you must have the following permissions:
● Execute permissions for the Administration tasks secured feature.
● Traverse permissions for the Administration secured function.
We also recommend that you belong to the System Administrators group, and have read and write
access to the Cognos namespace, so that you can deploy the System Administrators group.
The Developer Edition uses the IBM® Cognos® 8 roles, but they are managed differently. In Developer
Edition you use the Developer Edition Manager to changes users and their roles. In IBM Cognos 8
you use IBM Cognos Administration. Before you move your content, you must set up the appropriate
policies using the Cognos namespace. In the source environment, you must map the Cognos groups
and roles to the actual users in the target (new) environment.
For information about deploying Cognos groups and roles, see the online help in the IBM Cognos
Administration console.
Deploying the Entire Content Store
Deploying the entire content store ensures that all packages, folders, and directory content are
copied to a new location. For example, if you are moving IBM Cognos 8 BI to another computer,
you can move the entire content store from the old environment to the new environment. You can
also keep all the reports and other entries created by administrators and users.
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When you import an entire content store, configuration data is included in the export, but excluded
from the import by default. We recommend that you do not change this setting. However, if you
must import configuration settings (p. 83), you can change the default in the Advanced Settings.
Deploying Selected Public Folders and Directory Content
You can choose to do a partial deployment, deploying only selected public folders and directory
content.
You can choose the packages and folders that you want to deploy by browsing the Public Folders
hierarchy and select a package or folder. Once you select a package or folder, its contents are
deployed. You cannot select specific entries in the packages or folders. During export, the parent
packages and folders are not exported and Content Manager does not create placeholder locations
for them in the target environment. During both export and import, you can specify a new target
location in the Content Manager hierarchy for each deployed package and folder.
When you do a partial export of public folders and directory content, you must have the following
permissions:
● Read and traverse permissions for the entries that you export.
● Write permissions because you create a deployment specification and deployment history when
you export.
● Write and set policy permissions for the entries that you import.
Deploying Packages
A package is an entry that contains published reports and metadata. Packages are stored in the
content store and appear as entries in IBM Cognos Connection.
During a partial deployment, you can deploy one or more packages at a time. A package can reference
objects that are outside the package, such as security objects, data sources, and distribution lists.
However, referenced objects are not deployed with the package.
Create an Export Deployment SpecificationAfter planning your deployment, the first step in moving content from the Developer Edition
environment to IBM® Cognos® 8 BI is to export the entries that you want to keep in your new
environment. To do this, you create an export deployment specification in your source environment.
The entries are exported to an export deployment archive in the source environment. Later, you
import the archive entries into the target environment. You can update the entries in the target
environment using the entries from the deployment archive.
We recommend that you stop the IBM Cognos 8 service before you export and import.
Steps to Create a New Export Deployment Specification for the Content Store
1. In IBM Cognos Administration, on the Configuration tab, click Content Administration.
2. On the toolbar, click the new export button and follow the instructions in the New Exportwizard.
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3. To export the entire content store, click Select the entire content store and select whether to
include user account information.
4. Click Next.
5. If you want to secure the archive, under Encryption, click Set the encryption password, type a
password, and then click OK, and then click Next.
The summary information appears.
6. Review the summary information and click Next.
Tip: If you want to change information, click Back and follow the instructions.
7. Determine how you want to run the export by selecting the action you want.
After you run the export, you can move the deployment archive. You can also see the export run
history.
Steps to Create a New Export Deployment Specification for Partial Deployments
1. In IBM Cognos Administration, on the Configuration tab, click Content Administration.
2. On the toolbar, click the new export button and follow the instructions in the New Exportwizard.
3. To export specific folders and directory content, click Select public folders and directory content,
and then click Next.
4. In the Select the Public folders content page, click Add.
5. In the Select entries page, in the Available Entries box, select the packages or folders that you
want to export.
You can browse the Public Folders hierarchy and choose the packages and folders you want.
Click the right arrow button to move the selected items to the Selected entries box, and
click OK.
6. For each package and folder that you export, do one of the following:
● If you want to make any changes to the package or folder in the target environment, click
the edit icon make your changes, and click OK.
● To restrict access to the package or folder and its entries, select the check box in the Disable
after import column. This is useful when you want to test the reports before you make
them available in the target environment.
7. Under Options, select whether you want to include the report output versions, run history, and
schedules and what to do with entries in case of a conflict, and then click Next.
8. In the Select the directory content page, select whether you want to export Cognos groups and
roles, distribution lists and contacts, and data sources and connections and what to do with
the entries in case of a conflict, and then click Next.
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9. In the Specify the general options page, select whether to include access permissions and who
should own the entries after they are imported in the target environment.
10. Specify the Recording Level for the deployment history, and then click Next.
11. In the Specify a deployment archive page, under Deployment archive, select an existing
deployment archive from the list, or type a new name to create one.
If you are typing a new name for the deployment archive, we recommend that you do not use
spaces in the name. If the name of the new deployment specification matches the name of an
existing deployment archive, the characters _# are added to the end of the name, where # is a
number such as 1.
12. If you want to secure the archive, under Encryption, click Set the encryption password, type a
password, and then click OK.
13. Click Next.
The summary information appears.
14. Review the summary information and click Next.
Tip: If you want to change information, click Back and follow the instructions.
15. Determine how you want to run the export by selecting the action you want.
After you run the export, you can move the deployment archive. You can also see the export run
history.
Steps to Run an Export
1. In the Actions column, click the run with options button .
2. Click Now to run the export immediately, or click Later, and enter the time, that you want the
export to run.
You can also schedule a task to run on a recurring basis, and view a list of scheduled tasks
using the Schedule Management tool.
You can now move the deployment archive.
Move the Deployment ArchiveMove the deployment archive that you created in the source environment to the target environment.
Later, you use the deployment archive to import entries into the target environment.
If the source and target environments use the same content store, you can import without moving
the deployment archive.
The default location is c8_location\deployment.
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If you plan to move the deployment archive to a location on a LAN, ensure that there is enough
disk space. If you did not encrypt the deployment archive, we recommend that you copy it to a
secure location.
Steps
1. Copy the deployment archive from the source environment to a LAN location or to a CD.
2. Copy the deployment archive from the LAN or CD to the target environment location specified
in the configuration tool.
You can now include configuration objects if you’re importing an entire content store or import to
the target environment.
Import to a Target EnvironmentYou import entries from the deployment archive into the target environment. To import the entries,
you create an import deployment specification.
When you import, you select from entries that were exported. You can either accept the default
options set during the export, or change them. You can only select options that were included in
the deployment archive during the export.
If you do a partial deployment of specific public folders and directory content, the import wizard
shows whether packages and folders already exist in the target environment and the date and time
they were last modified. You can use this information to help you decide how to resolve conflicts.
When you redeploy, the wizard also shows whether the packages and folders were in the original
deployment.
Steps to Create a New Import Deployment Specification
1. In the target environment, in IBM Cognos Administration, on the Configuration tab, click
Content Administration.
2. On the toolbar, click the new import button .
The New Import wizard appears.
3. In the Deployment archive box, click the deployment archive that you want to import.
4. If the deployment archive is encrypted, type the password, and then click OK.
5. Click Next.
6. Type a unique name and an optional description and screen tip for the deployment specification,
select the folder where you want to save it, and then click Next.
7. Select the content that you want to include in the import.
Tip: To ensure that the required target package or folder exists in the target content store, click
the edit button next to the package, and check the location. If you want, you can change
the target location now.
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8. Select the options you want, along with your conflict resolution choice for the options that you
select.
9. In the Specify the general options page, select whether to include access permissions and who
should own the entries after they are imported in the target environment.
10. Specify the Recording Level for the deployment history.
11. Click Next.
The summary information appears.
12. Review the summary information, and click Next.
13. Determine how you want to run the import by selecting the action you want.
After you run the import, you can test the deployment.
Steps to Run an Import
1. In the Actions column, click the run with options button .
2. Click Now to run the import immediately, or click Later, and enter the time, that you want
the import to run.
3. If you want to upgrade the report specifications, click Upgrade all report specifications to the
latest version.
You can also use the Schedule Management tool to schedule a task to run on a recurring basis,
and view a list of scheduled tasks.
You can now test the deployment.
Include Configuration Objects in Import of Entire Content Store
You can include configuration objects when importing an entire content store. For example, you
may want to import the configuration because you have a series of advanced settings for your services
that you want from the source environment.
By default, configuration objects are excluded when you import an entire content store, even though
they are included in the export. Configuration objects include dispatchers and configuration folders
used to group dispatchers.
Important: You should not import configuration objects when moving content from the Developer
Edition.
Steps
1. In IBM Cognos Administration, on the Configuration tab, click Dispatchers and Services.
2. Click the dispatcher you want.
3. Next to ContentManagerService, click the set properties button.
4. Click the Settings tab.
5. In the Value column, click Edit.
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6. Select the Override the settings acquired from the parent entry check box.
7. In the Parameter column that appears, type the following in uppercase:
CM.DEPLOYMENTINCLUDECONFIGURATION
8. In the Value column, type true
9. Click OK to finish.
Test the Deployed ContentAfter you import the packages from the deployment archive, you can check that all the entries were
deployed successfully in the target environment.
You can test your deployment by doing the following:
❑ Review the run history for a deployment.
❑ Ensure that the correct packages and folders were imported, along with their contents.
❑ Run imported reports and report views.
For more information, see the online help in the IBM Cognos Administration console.
After you test your deployed content, you can remove the Developer Edition.
Uninstall IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer EditionRemove the Developer Edition from your computer when you upgrade, or when you no longer
need the product.
Removing the Developer Edition using the uninstallation program uninstalls all components.
Steps
1. From the Start menu, click Programs, IBM Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition, Uninstall IBM
Cognos 8 BI Developer Edition.
2. Follow the instructions to uninstall the components.
Uninstalling does not remove any files that changed since the installation, such as configuration
and user data files. You must remove these manually.
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Glossary
access permissions
Rules defining the access rights to resources. Access permissions can be granted to any combination
of namespaces, groups, or users. Examples of resources are reports and folders.
anonymous access
A type of access that allows users and servers to access a server without first authenticating with
it.
authentication
The process of validating the identity of a user or server.
burst
To create several report results by running a single report once. For example, the user can create a
report that shows sales for each employee, and run it once, sending different results to regional
managers by bursting on region.
capabilities
Capabilities refer to the ability to use certain functions and features within IBM Cognos 8. The
Capabilities tool controls access to secured functions such as Administration and the IBM Cognos
Query Studio, and secured features, such as User Defined SQL and Bursting. The permissions define
which of the predefined and built-in Cognos groups and roles have access to which secured functions
and features, and the type of access. Access to these capabilities is set by the security administrator.
Users can see their access permissions in the Personal area of their Preferences, under Capabilities.
condition
An expression that yields a Boolean value. Conditions are used in query expressions, query filters,
and Boolean report variables that can be used for conditional formatting, styles, data sources, layouts,
and blocks.
Content Manager
The service that retrieves information from the content store, and saves information to the content
store.
content store
The database that contains the data needed to operate, such as report specifications, published
models, and security rights.
data source
The source of data itself, such as a database or XML file, and the connection information necessary
for accessing the data.
Licensed Materials – Property of IBM85© Copyright IBM Corp. 2008, 2009.
deployment
The process of moving an application (such as a report or model) to a different instance. For example,
reports are often created in a test environment and then deployed to production. When an application
is deployed, it is exported, transferred, and imported.
deployment archive
A file used for deployment. A deployment archive contains the data from the content store that is
being moved.
deployment specification
A definition of what packages to move (deploy) between source and target environments, the
deployment preferences, and the archive name. You use deployment specifications for import and
for export.
layout
The arrangement of printed matter on a screen or page, including margins, line spacing, type spe-
cification, header and footer information, indents, and more.
model
A physical or business representation of the structure of the data from one or more data sources.
A model describes data objects, structure, and grouping, as well as relationships and security. In
Cognos BI, a model is created and maintained in Framework Manager. The model or a subset of
the model must be published to the Cognos server as a package for users to create and run reports.
In Cognos Planning, a group of D-cubes, D-lists, D-links, and other objects stored in a library. A
model may reside in one or more libraries, with a maximum of two for Contributor.
namespace
In XML and XQuery, a uniform resource identifier (URI) that provides a unique name to associate
with the element, attribute, and type definitions in an XML schema or with the names of elements,
attributes, types, functions, and errors in XQuery expressions.
package
A subset of a model, which can be the whole model, to be made available to the Cognos server.
portlet
A Web component that provides specific services or information to users and that is specifically
designed to be aggregated with other portlets in the context of a composite page or portal.
project
In Framework Manager, a set of models, packages, and related information for administration,
and for sharing model information.
In Metric Studio, a task or set of tasks undertaken by a team and monitored on a scorecard. A
project tracks the dates, resources, and status of the project.
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Glossary
In Metric Designer, a group of extracts. Each extract contains the metadata that is used to populate
the Metric Studio data store or to create applications.
prompt
A report element that asks for parameter values before the report is run.
publish
In Cognos BI, to expose all or part of a Framework Manager model or Transformer PowerCube,
through a package, to the Cognos server, so that the data can be used to create reports and other
content.
In Cognos Planning, to copy the data from Contributor or Analyst to a data store, typically so that
the data can be used for reporting purposes.
query
A request for information from a data source based on specific conditions: for example, a request
for a list of all customers in a customer table whose balances are greater than $1000.
query item
A representation of a column of data in a data source. Query items may appear in a model or in a
report and contain a reference to a database column, a reference to another query item, or a calcu-
lation.
query subject
A named collection of query items that are closely functionally related. Query subjects are defined
using Framework Manager to represent relational data and form the set of available data for
authoring reports in Query Studio and Report Studio. A query subject is similar to a relational view
in that it can be treated as a table but does not necessarily reflect the data storage.
report
A set of data deliberately laid out to communicate business information.
report output
The output produced as a result of executing a report specification against a data set.
report specification
An executable definition of a report, including query and layout rules, which can be combined with
data to produce a report output.
report view
A reference to another report that has its own properties, such as prompt values, schedules, and
results. Report views can be used to share a report specification instead of making copies of it.
template
A reusable report layout or style that can be used to set the presentation of a query or report.
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Glossary
user
Any individual, organization, process, device, program, protocol, or system that uses the services
of a computing system.
work area
The area within a studio that contains the report, analysis, query, or agent currently being used.
88
Glossary
Index
Aaccess permissions
definition, 85
ad hoc reports, 31
administration, 36
agents
examples, 63
aggregating
samples and time dimensions, 26
analyses
creating, 58
creating in Analysis Studio, 56
examples, 58
analysis
user capabilities, 74
Analysis Studio, 32
creating analyses, 56
examples, 58
users, 57
analyzing
data in Analysis Studio, 58
anonymous access
definition, 85
applications
creating using samples, 37
moving to IBM Cognos 8 BI, 77
architecture
IBM Cognos 8 BI, 71
audience, 5
authentication
definition, 85
IBM Cognos 8 BI, 74
authorization
IBM Cognos 8 BI, 74
Bbursts
definition, 85
Ccapabilities
definition, 85
changing user information, 9
charts
creating in Report Studio, 51
Cognos 8 BI
lower total cost of ownership, 75
Cognos Administration, 36
Cognos Connection, 31
examples, 66, 68
running reports, 66
Cognos Viewer, 66
components, 31
installation, 7
installing, 37
conditional formatting
applying in Query Studio, 45
conditions
defining in Event Studio, 63
definition, 85
configuration settings, 37
configuring
process, 7
connections
data source connections, 17
OLAP data sources, 20
Content Manager
definition, 85
content store
deploying, 78
content stores
definition, 85
crosstabs
creating in Analysis Studio, 58
cryptography, See encryption
CSV
report outputs, 35
Licensed Materials – Property of IBM89© Copyright IBM Corp. 2008, 2009.
Ddashboards
user capabilities, 75
data
exporting, 79
IBM Cognos samples, 14
importing, 82
large, 57
databases
IBM Cognos samples, 14
data management
user capabilities, 75
data source connections, 36
data source query subjects
definition, 40
data sources
definition, 85
IBM Cognos 8 BI, 72
samples connections, 17
deleting
IBM Cognos samples, 24
deploying
configuration objects, 83
content store, 78
directory content, 79
exporting, 79
global markets, 77
IBM Cognos 8 BI, 76
importing, 82
moving archives, 81
packages, 79
partial deployment, 79
Public Folders, 79
reports, 77
testing, 84
deployment, 77
definition, 85
permissions, 78
planning, 78
deployment archives
definition, 86
deployments
creating an export specification, 79
deployment specifications
definition, 86
differences
Developer Edition and IBM Cognos 8 BI, 71
IBM Cognos 8 BI suite, 37
dimensions
definition, 40
directories
deploying content, 79
disabling
content maintenance job, 23
dispatchers
importing, 83
drill down, 58
drilling through, 35
Eencryption
IBM Cognos 8 BI, 74
event management
user capabilities, 75
events
managing, 63
managing in Event Studio, 63
Event Studio, 33
examples, 63
managing events, 63
examples
analyzing data in Analysis Studio, 58
creating a model, 41
creating a query using Query Studio, 45
creating a report in Report Studio, 51
managing events in Event Studio, 63
running reports, 66
scheduling reports, 68
exporting, 79
creating a specification, 79
data, 79
Ffilters
creating in Analysis Studio, 58
creating in Report Studio, 51
folders
deploying public, 79
formatting
conditional, 45
90
Index
Framework Manager, 31, 34
designing models, 38
models, 39
namespaces, 39
packages, 39
projects, 39
sample models, 23
Gglobal deployments, 77
options, 77
GO Data Warehouse model, 41
Go To links, 35
Great Outdoors, See IBM Cognos samples
Great Outdoors samples, 13
Hhelp
getting, 6
histories
deployment, 84
HTML
report outputs, 35
IIBM Cognos
samples, 14
IBM Cognos 8 BI
agility, 71
architecture, 71
data source support, 72
installing, 78
integration with other applications, 74
metadata interaction, 76
security, 73
user capabilities, 74
web deployability, 76
IBM Cognos Administration, 10
IBM Cognos samples, 14
importing
configurations, 83
data into target environment, 82
samples, 22
installing
components, 37
IBM Cognos 8 BI, 78
process, 7
steps, 8
integrating
IBM Cognos 8 BI with other applications, 74
international solution, 35
introduction, 5
Llanguages, 35
layouts
definition, 86
pages, 49
report objects, 50
linking reports, 35
log on, 11
lower total cost of ownership (TCO), 75
Mmetadata, 31
IBM Cognos 8 BI, 76
metrics, See scorecarding
Microsoft Analysis Services
setting up MSAS cube samples, 19
Microsoft Excel
report outputs, 35
Microsoft Office
user capabilities, 75
mobile users
user capabilities, 75
modeling, 31
sample models and packages, 26
model query subjects
definition, 40
models, 34
creating, 38
database samples, 23
definition, 40, 86
designing, 38
Framework Manager, 39
GO Data Warehouse model, 41
modifying for samples, 22
moving
deployment archives, 81
multilingual solution, 35
My Folders, 34
Developer Edition Getting Started Guide 91
Index
Nnamespaces
definition, 40, 86
Framework Manager, 39
navigation
user capabilities, 75
Oobjects
inheritance, 51
OLAP data sources
connections, 20
organizing
entries in the portal, 34
outputs
reports, 35
Ppackages, 34
definition, 40, 86
deploying, 79
Framework Manager, 39
pages
Report Studio, 49
PDFs
report outputs, 35
permissions, 36
deployment, 78
portal
organizing content, 34
portal pages, 36
personalizing, 36
portals, 31
portlets, 36
definition, 86
projects
definition, 40, 86
Framework Manager, 39
prompts
creating in Report Studio, 51
definition, 87
Query Studio, 44
Public Folders, 34
deploying, 79
publishing
definition, 87
Qqueries, 31
definition, 87
examples, 45
Report Studio, 50
query definitions
creating, 43
Query Studio, 44
query items
definition, 40, 87
Query Studio, 31
creating reports, 43
examples, 45
objects, 44
preview reports with no data, 44
prompts, 44
query definitions, 44
report definitions, 44
report items, 44
query subjects
definition, 40, 87
Rremoving, See uninstalling
report definitions
creating in Report Studio, 48
Query Studio, 44
reporting
process, 33
user capabilities, 74
report items
Query Studio, 44
report objects
hierarchy, 51
locking and unlocking, 51
Report Studio, 50
report outputs, 35
definition, 87
reports, 34
advanced, 32
creating in Query Studio, 43, 45
creating in Report Studio, 48
definition, 87
deploying, 77
express authoring mode, 32
layouts, 49
92
Index
managing, 34
pages, 49
personalizing, 35
preview with no data in Query Studio, 44
professional authoring mode, 32
running, 66
scheduling, 36, 68
statement-style, 32
structure in Report Studio, 49
viewing, 31
report specifications, 34
definition, 87
Report Studio, 32
creating reports, 48
examples, 51
express authoring mode, 32
locking and unlocking objects, 51
object hierarchies, 51
objects, 50
objects as containers, 50
objects types, 50
pages, 49
professional authoring mode, 32
queries, 50
report layouts, 49
report objects, 50
report tempates, 51
report templates
Report Studio, 51
report views, 35
creating, 68
definition, 87
requirements
system, 7
restoring
samples databases, 14
running
reports, 66
Ssamples
building applications, 37
data source connections, 17
deleting, 24
general employee information, 26
general financial information, 24
general sales and marketing information, 26
GO data warehouse, 27
GO Data Warehouse model, 41
GO Sales transactional database, 28
Great Outdoors, 13
Great Outdoors company structure, 24
importing, 22
model design, 26
models, 23
MSAS cube, 19
OLAP data sources, 20
restoring samples databases, 14
setting up, 14
scheduling, 36
reports, 68
scorecarding
user capabilities, 75
search
user capabilities, 75
security, 36
authentication in IBM Cognos 8 BI, 74
authorization in IBM Cognos 8 BI, 74
encryption in IBM Cognos 8 BI, 74
IBM Cognos 8 BI, 73
services
uninstalling, 84
setting up
samples, 14
sources
deployment environments, 77
starting, 11
stored procedure query subjects
definition, 40
system reauirements, 7
Ttarget environments
deployment, 77
TCO, See lower total cost of ownership (TCO)
templates
applying in Query Studio, 45
definition, 87
testing
deployment, 84
Developer Edition Getting Started Guide 93
Index
Uuninstalling, 84
upgrading, See deploying
user capabilities
analysis, 74
dashboards, 75
data management, 75
event management, 75
Microsoft Office, 75
mobile users, 75
reporting, 74
scorecarding, 75
search and navigation, 75
user management, 37
users
Analysis Studio, 57
capabilities in IBM Cognos 8 BI, 74
changing information, 9, 10
definition, 87
users of Analysis Studio, 57
Vviewing
large amounts of data, 57
Wweb deployments
IBM Cognos 8 BI, 76
work areas
definition, 88
workflow, 33
XXML
report outputs, 35
report specifications, 34
94
Index