ESSBASE CLOUD: THE NEW FRONTIEROpal Alapat, Cloud Oracle ACE

womaninepm.com

ABOUT OPAL ALAPAT• Vision Team Practice Lead, interRel• ~20 years BI architecture, development,

and management experience• Co-Author of the LSTYA OAC book• Cloud Specialist & Certified• Cloud Oracle ACE• Very active in Oracle user groups

CAVEATS AND CYA’S• What will intentionally not be covered in this

session:• Explanation of licensing models• Screenshots/demos of pre-release software

• What’s shown: • OAC 17.4.5 release (one patch ago)• Essbase build v12.2.1.1.108• Cube Designer v12.2.1.1.108.119• Smart View 11.1.2.5.720• Roadmap information

Also, #SafeHarbor, #SafeHarbor, #SafeHarbor!

PART I:WHAT IS ESSBASE?

A brief overview

WHAT IS ESSBASE?Essbase is a collection of three things:1. Raw data

• Loaded from any source• Stored in a central location

2. An organizational structure• Defines rollups and totals• Automatic consolidation

3. Calculations• Formulas• Scripts

Microsoft

What is Essbase’s biggest competitor?

SPREADSHEETS ARE TERRIBLE DATABASES• 100’s or 1000’s• Not timely• Not accurate • Not scalable• Not error proof• Maintenance nightmare• Spreadsheet chaos

ANALYZE PERFORMANCE

GOAL SETTING

SCORECARDS FINANCIAL REPORTING

VARIANCE ANALYSIS

ROLLING FORECAST

OPERATIONAL PLANNING

MONITOR RESULTS

$€£ ¥

SO THEN ALONG CAME AN ESSBASE…• Essbase = “Extended Spreadsheet

Database”• Essbase is commonly used to:

• Combine multiple sources of disparate data• Consolidate data• Analyze summarized data• Provide an intuitive data model• “What If ”, Planning, Forecasting, etc...• “Speed of thought”• Powers EPM applications • Used across the entire Enterprise. • Satisfy the needs of a variety of users

ESSBASE = A “CUBE” OF DATA• Dimensions

• Time• Measures• Entity

• Members• Jan, Feb, Mar (Time)• Sales, COGS, Profit (Measures)• North America, Europe, Asia

(Entity)

75

Entity

Measures

TimeJan Feb Mar

$75 profit for North America in January

Sales

COGS

Profit123

131

166

196

150

149

182

231

115

120

143Nor

th A

mer

ica,

Eur

ope,

Asia

ESSBASE = A COLLECTION OF DIMENSIONS• Dimensions are hierarchies of information• Essbase allows users to easily drill down into hierarchies

Time

Qtr2

April

Entity

Europe

Asia

Measures

Profit

SalesCOGS

North AmericaQtr1

Jan

Feb

MarSouth AmericaAfricaCentral America

THE HISTORY OF ESSBASE

1992 – Essbase could be installed with a floppy disk

“Good Ol’ Hyperion Days”

~2000 - Essbase 6

~2004 - System 9

2007 –Oracle + Hyperion =

Complete EPM Solution

2016 - Cloud Solutions

§ Essbase 6 § Size and scale of cubes are growing§ New products emerging – Hyperion

Planning, HFM§ Soon afterward: ASO was released

§ Common Workspace§ Common security§ Common reporting repository (FR,

IR, WA) § Now IT / infra resources are

required to install and configure and support “Hyperion”

§ Oracle acquires Hyperion§ Complete EPM Solution§ OBIEE & Essbase§ Exalytics§ Enterprise wide deployments§ Huge cubes but projects are bigger

§ Cloud solution introduced§ Get back to the “simpler” times,

giving all areas/all departments access to enabling technologies

§ Reduce the IT requirement

PART II:WHAT IS ESSBASE

CLOUD?A brief overview

A HISTORY OF ESSBASE CLOUD

On St. Patty’s Day OAC officially went

GA!

Est. March 17, 2017Database + data

visualization / analytics tools built into one suite

Full BI SolutionStandard

EnterpriseUniversal Credits

Multiple Flavors

Different licensing, administration options, etc.

PaaS, not SaaSSome things are familiar,

some things are new,some things are gone

Old, New, Gone?

Currently. Next big release: Mar 2018

This is a “version 1.1”On-prem folks can migrate directly. Not everything is

supported, however.

Direct MigrationThis is not a tool that can be fully owned by the business.

Business/IT Owned

KEY CUSTOMER USE CASES FOR OAC• Hardware/software refresh

• On-prem version support ending• Older hardware• Looking to upgrade software features and

functionality

KEY CUSTOMER USE CASES FOR ESSBASE CLOUD• Essbase users looking for a Cloud solution

• Reduce costs and simplify maintenance• Hybrid Deployments between on-prem applications and Cloud cubes• Faster access to latest Essbase innovation

KEY USE CASES FOR BI CLOUD• Guided analytics for the

enterprise• Analytics has been on the rise• Wants to directly integrate with Essbase Cloud• Has multiple (too many) BI tools and needs to

consolidate to single solution that can meet ALL needs

• Looking for leading edge, modern BI features like Day by Day, AI, and Machine Learning

KEY CUSTOMER USE CASES FOR ESSBASE CLOUD• An analytics platform for

every Excel user• Effort to recreate data visualizations in

Excel is high, comparatively• Most still use Excel, using data downloaded

from other applications• Essbase empowers Excel by adding in a

unified analysis model, interactivity, and collaboration

KEY CUSTOMER USE CASES FOR ESSBASE CLOUD• Integration with other Cloud services

• Essbase as a data source for BI Cloud and DV• EPBCS & PBCS for BI Cloud and DV• Consolidated data from multiple EPM cloud and on-prem instances• Analyze data from other SaaS applications

PART III:A COMPARISON

Essbase Cloud vs. Essbase On-prem

ESSBASE CLOUD WEB INTERFACE

DVCS WEB INTERFACE

BICS WEB INTERFACE

THE DETAILS: ESSCS VS. ESSBASE - IN COMMON

THE DETAILS: ESSCS VS. ESSBASE - DIFFERENT

*

THE ADMINISTRATOR EXPERIENCE

The Mind of an AdministratorHow does the Essbase Cloud experience compare to on-prem?

Creating applications and cubes, loading dimensions, loading data, creating scripts and variables, etc.

Building Cubes

Updating dimensions, updating data, maintaining variables, automation, locks, security, connections, statistics, etc.

Maintenance

Ensuring that your applications and databases are performing as efficiently and quickly for your users!

Performance Tuning

Upstream and downstream systems, hybrid (on-prem and Cloud) integration, Cloud-to-Cloud integrations

Data Integration

DEMO: DEVELOPING CUBES USING CUBE DESIGNER

DEMO: CREATING THE CUBE IN ESSBASE CLOUD

MAINTENANCE

DBXTool

LCM(lifecycle management) CLI

(command line interface)

Web Interface(Jobs, Locks, Connections, Files, Outline, Variables,

Connections, Data Sources)

Cube Designer

MaxL

MAINTAINING THE OUTLINE: MANUALLY VIA WEB UI

MAINTAINING THE OUTLINE: RULES FILE EDITOR

SECURITY – ADDING USERS, GROUPS, FILTERS, PROVISIONING

VARIABLES – APP OR DATABASE LEVEL

CREATING CONNECTIONS

*JDBC is coming. Tentative ETA: March 2018. #safeharbor

DRILL-THROUGH REPORTS

<— Datasource option

URL option —>

*Next major feature enhancement: March 2018 #safeharbor

ACCESSING LOG FILES

PERFORMANCE TUNING• Hardware

• Introducing the “Compute shape”

• Design• Dense and sparse settings• Outline ordering• Member properties• App/db properties

DEMO: CREATING THE ESSCS CONNECTION

THE END USER EXPERIENCE

The Mind of an End UserHow does the Essbase Cloud experience compare to on-prem?

Static and interactive methods for internal or external reporting

Reporting

Ad hoc, data visualizations, dashboarding, data at your fingertips!

Analytics

Ensuring that there are database-specific that are important, intuitive, and easy to use for end users.

Essbase Cloud Feature Sets

Ability to access data from all pertinent sources easily and quickly, without having to rely on IT.

Accessibility and Performance

SMART VIEW

• Direct Microsoft Office integration

• Can be used for both inputs (Excel version of forms) and outputs

• Custom Excel reporting and more!

• Direct connection to the database to maintain “one version of the truth”

EPRCS (ENTERPRISE PERFORMANCE REPORTING CLOUD)

Cloud + Smart View

Standalone – does not require EPM

Narrative reporting solution

Flexible & Collaborative

Regulatory filing solution

Process management, oversight, and

visibility

Works with any Excel-supported

data source

Oracle’s strategic reporting solution

DEMO: BUILDING VISUALIZATIONS QUICKLY WITH DVCS

DVCS CONNECTION TYPES

PART IV:MYTHBUSTERS

Fact or Fiction?

MYTH: ESSBASE CLOUD IS NOT REAL ESSBASE.

BI CSIFinding the Essbase Version Number in

Cloud

MYTH: NO IT DEPENDENCY IS REQUIRED FOR ESSBASE CLOUD.

TERMINAL ACCESS(a.k.a. proof)

PORT ACCESS(a.k.a. proof again)

MYTH: ESSBASE CLOUD SUPPORTS FINANCIAL REPORTING.

EPRCSThe New Static Reporting World for

Oracle EPM & BI Cloud

MYTH: EVERY ON-PREM ESSBASE CUSTOMER SHOULD MIGRATE TO ESSBASE CLOUD IMMEDIATELY.

EFFORT - THINGS TO CONSIDER

MAGNITUDE

FEATURE GAPS

CHANGE

QUESTIONS?

ESSBASE CLOUD: THE NEW FRONTIEROpal Alapat, Cloud Oracle ACE

womaninepm.com