National Finance System Team
BI4 User Guide – What’s New in Business Objects
Document Control
Change Record
Date / Author / Version / Change Reference05.08.2015 / Suzanne Bell / 0.1 / First draft – no previous document
10.08.2015 / Suzanne Bell / V0.2 / Amendments
19.08.2015 / Suzanne Bell / V0.3 / Wording change per Distribution to NFST Support Martin Still
24.08.2015 / Suzanne Bell / V0.4 / Per email Khalil Rehman
24.09.2015 / Suzanne Bell / V0.5 / Wording change per Clark Paterson NHS Grampian
09.10.2015 / Suzanne bell / V0.6 / Adding Java version
Author:Suzanne Bell
Creation Date:05.08.2015
Last Updated:24.09.2015
Document Reference:BI Strategy – Phase 4 Delivery Project
Version:V0.15
Contents
BI4
Logging in
Document View
View your Reports
Create a new Webintelligence document
Properties Tab
View
Document
Application
Menu bar in Reading Tab
Menu Bar in Design Tab
Table
Heading
Report Elements
Formatting
Data Access
Analysis
Page Set up
Manipulating your Reports
Tables
Adding object names
Adding Totals
**New** - Copying tables
**New** - Formulas
User response Prompts
Hiding Dimensions
**New** - Charts
**New** - Fold/Unfold
**New** - Group Function
Rich Client
HTML V Applet
BI43
Logging in3
Document View4
View your Reports6
Create a new Webintelligence document7
Properties Tab10
View10
Document10
Application10
Menu bar in Reading Tab10
Menu Bar in Design Tab10
Table11
Heading11
Report Elements11
Formatting11
Data Access11
Analysis11
Page Set up11
Manipulating your Reports12
Tables12
Adding object names12
Adding Totals13
**New** - Copying tables13
**New** - Formulas14
User response Prompts14
Hiding Dimensions14
**New** - Charts15
**New** - Fold/Unfold15
**New** - Group Function16
Rich Client17
HTML V Applet17
BI4
Several new features in BI4 include support for Hierarchical data, new data sources, new charts and a redesigned user interface.
Logging in
The Test URL for BI4 is
The version of JAVA is 7.25
Please use your existing user name and password for Boxi R3.1
Any problems with passwords or usernames please contact CSD on 0131 275 7777
This will take you to the BI Launch Pad which runs in a Web browser and is the main interface for working with different types of objects, in our case Web Intelligence documents. BI Launchpad can be customised to allow you to view and organise your homepage with your documents etc.
Please ensure the Preferences are set to HTML not Applet (uses JAVA).
Most users will have no requirement to use the Applet as this is mainly required when adding sub queries, re-pointing, adding alerters (adding conditional rules), hierarchical charting/reports, removing and adding object headings from blocks with breaks. copying and pasting tables into webi documents and applying custom number formats, when creating new reports negative values will be shown with – minus sign rather than () brackets without the ability to change.
And the setting for document viewing locations is as shown below[w1]
Document View
In the document view there are three sections,
View your Reports
You can open a report from the Home > My Recently Viewed Documents by clicking on the document name
Launch Web intelligence from the Application panel or drop down menu on the BI Launch Pad[w2] please note: this method should only be used when creating new reports.
This opens a new window
Icon / Description/ Create a new document (Ctrl +N)
/ Open a document (ctrl +O)
/ Save menu (CTRL +S)
/ Print – Export to PDF for Printing (Ctrl +P)
/ Find text in tables and cells on page (Ctrl +F)
/ History – list of dates corresponding to the instances of the scheduled documents
/ Export v- PDF, Excel, CSV
/ Send to – Email , Inbox
/ Undo / Redo
/ Refresh – one or more data providers
/ Track – Activate or deactivate tracking changes
/ Filter bar – Click to hide/show filter bar
/ Freeze – keep the header or a portion of the table visible while the rest of the table scrolls
/ Outline – shows or hides the outline option for folding and unfolding elements
Create a new Webintelligence document
Click on
You will see a list of universes which you have permissions to use, this should not have changed
This returns the screen below
Icon / Description/ Data Outline panel - shows/hides the data panel (classes and objects)
/ Filter panel - shows/hides the Query Filters panel
/ Data Preview Panel – shows/hides the preview panel
/ Scope of analysis panel – shows/hides scope of analysis panel (hidden in the view above)
/ Add a combined query
/ Query Properties – shows/hides the query properties
/ View script – shows sql script generated by query
Query Properties
Creating a small query and clicking on Refresh in the Data Preview prior to refreshing the report shows how the report will look, very good for creating new reports and testing.
Click Run Query
Opens a new application window and closes the query panel
Your report has been created.
The screen presents differently from the R3.1 screen
Save the report. Once you have saved icons which were previously greyed out will become available eg Send to..
Clicking on Send to allows you to send the report to another user[w3]
(dependence on use of JAVA / Rich Client)
The only change to the data panel on the file tab is the method of returning to the Query - by clicking on (Ctrl Q)
Properties Tab
View
Document
Application– change measurement from Inches to Centimetres
Menu bar in Reading Tab (HTML/PDF)
Apply filters and drill in this tab.
Menu Bar in Design Tab (View data/View Structure)
The design tab contains the menus for manipulating and formatting the report on tabs at the top of the report where previously these would have been spread between the data panel and menu bars. In Design mode, clicking into a table or heading adds more toolbars.
Table
Heading
Report Elements
Tables and Cells - would have been shown on the Data Panel under the templates tab
Section – Allows you to insert a section
Formatting
In the Data Panel under properties
Data Access
These icons would have been on the menu bar
Analysis
These icons would have been on the menu bar, there is one new icon in this section
Page Set up
Contains the settings for formatting your page.
Manipulating your Reports
Tables
Converting a vertical table into a crosstab report
click Turn into on the tools menu and select Cross Table.
Selecting the More Transformations options allows you to amend the columns and row headings to suit your requirements
Report has no object descriptions
Adding object names
Adding Totals
Highlight column with values
When you click Sum on a crosstab you get an Option Sum or Default Aggregation –
(on a vertical table these would be the same)
**New** - Copying tables
We can now copy queries, variable, tables and charts from one WebIntelligence document to another. When copying an object all the dependant objects are also copied.
Select Table to copy,
Create a new document with no data source
Paste the table in the report
A new connection to the universe has been created when you copied the table and can be refreshed as required.
NB: This is only available in the Java interface/Rich Client
**New** - Formulas
The formula language contains new functions and operators for working with hierarchical data,
Aggregate / Returns the default aggregation of a measure and has additional parameters to specify a member set expression on a hierarchyDepth / Returns the depth of a member in a hierarchy
Isleaf / Determines if object is a leaf member
Parent
Ancestor
Children
Descendants
Siblings
Lag
Range / Define a member set on a hierarchy
Before
After
Before after
Self
Self after
Self before
Self before after / New operators for working with hierarchies
Min
Max
Sum
Count
Average / All have additional parameters to specify a member set expression on a hierarchy
User response Prompts
A new operator has been added to the list of available operators called Prompts...the purpose of this is to allow the user to add the user response prompt easily without making errors in the prompt text.
Hiding Dimensions
In R3.1 if you wanted to restrict/filter a column and then hide the column this would be done by formatting it in white and reducing the size of the column, a new formatting property has been added called Hide Dimension, right click on column and select hide/unhide as required
**New** - Charts
Several new chart types have been introduced
- Pie chart with depth
- Scatter charts
- Bubble charts
- Box plot
- Heat map
- Tree map
And additional support for hierarchical display in charts
No longer need to go into structure mode to create/amend charts.
**New** - Fold/Unfold
This is new in BI4 but was available in Deski version 6.5.
Create a ytd balances report, create a section break at CC7
In Design mode Select Interact > Outline
Two arrows appear, shown above underlined in Red
The outer left arrow is used to perform actions on the block, the inner left arrow is used to perform actions on the section.
Clicking on the arrow at A461 hides the details
Clicking the arrow again unhides the details for A461
**New** - Group Function
This function reduces the reliance on users creating their own variables for example - where the hierarchy does not allow them to group logical items.
Select the cost centres you wish to group together, click Group and rename as required
Rich Client
- We are now able to edit documents while they are in the repository
- Support for excel 2007 format as a data source
HTML V Applet
Feature / HTML / AppletUsing Excel as a data provider / no / yes
Conditional formatting / no / yes
Re-point reports / no / yes
Custom number format / no / yes
Export a 2007 Document / yes / no
Save as 2007 Document / no / yes
Add a sub query / no / yes
Removing adding object heading where you have applied a break (properties setting) / no / Yes
Document Linking Wizard / Yes / No
Copy Table / No / Yes
What’s new in BI4 Page 1
[w1]Tidy up required
[w2] Suggest you say that reports can be opened in three ways : from the home page, from the documents page or by launching Web Inteligence. The latter should preferably only be used when creating new reports
[w3]This option is not available using the version of Java we have to use for efin. Can email but not send to inbox. Would need rich client