Desktop Intelligence Reports Conversion

Desktop Intelligence Reports ConversionDesktop Intelligence Reports ConversionTable of ContentsStep 1: Create Folders for Backup of Reports1Step 2 : Copy Reports to your conversion folder1Step 3 : Steps to upgrade Deski 3.x Reports to Web Intelligence 4.02Step 4 : Validate the new Webi report to the original Deski report8Feature Comparison between Desktop Intelligence and Web Intelligence 3.1 & Web Intelligence 4.091. Features which cannot be converted102. Features which are partially converted123. Features which are fully converted but with changes16Training19References20

Revision History

DateVersionDescriptionAuthor

2rd APR 20131.0Initial DraftSandip Vyas/Bhim Sahi

3th APR 20132.0Second DraftSandip Vyas/Bhim Sahi

4th APR 20133.0Third DraftSandip Vyas/Bhim Sahi

Document Distribution

NameRole

Desktop Intelligence Reports ConversionBusiness Objects XI Release 3.1 SP 5

The Upgrade Management tool does not upgrade desktop intelligence documents as Desktop Intelligence has reached end of life. Desktop Intelligence documents don't work in BI4.0. You can convert Desktop Intelligence documents to Web Intelligence. You can convert them to Web Intelligence using the Report Conversion Tool in your existing XI 3.x deployment and then bring those Web Intelligence documents with the Upgrade Management tool. You can convert your Desktop Intelligence documents residing in your existing XI 3.x using BI 4.0 Report Conversion Tool and then publish them to your new BI 4.0 deployment using Upgrade Management tool.

Our approach: Convert Deski 3.x reports to Webi 4.0 using Report Conversion Tool provided in Business Objects 4.0

Overview of the process: Identify all the corporate Deski documents by function/department to be converted after inventory clean-up Identify the Datasources for the Deski Documents. Filter out the reports which uses the data sources that cannot be converted and communicate that those need to be redeveloped Identify easy, medium and complex reports for conversion based on the datasources and the number of datasources being used. Identify the features in the report which does not exist in Webi. Run the report through the RCT, publish and check the result. Validate the new Webi report to the original Deski document and see if it needs to be modified or need any manual intervention.If RCT fails, identify the cause and inform the Business/IT project team the need for re-developStep 1: Create Folders for Backup of ReportsExample:1) Reports To Be Converted2) Reports Not To Be Converted3) Reports Giving Error During Conversion4) Reports Fixed5) Reports Can Not Be ConvertedStep 2 : Copy Reports to your conversion folder

Start Desktop Intelligence but do not create a new query. Click Cancel.

Click open. Navigate to where your Desktop Intelligence documents are stored.Then open that folder from the My Documents and copy all the Reports to the Location you want.

Step 3 : Steps to upgrade Deski 3.x Reports to Web Intelligence 4.0

RCT 4.0 works differently compared to previous versions since it connects to pre-4.0 system (as a source) and a BI 4.0 system (as the target)

Facts about Report Conversion Tool

RCT Converts Deski XI Reports to Webi 4.0 and Publishes converted reports to BO 4.0 CMS RCT does not convert all Deski features. The level of conversion depends on the features used in Deski report. Deski features that are not yet available in Webi 4.0 are not converted RCT assigns one of the three statuses to each report after conversion process is finished1) Fully Converted (Published to CMS)2) Partially Converted (Published to CMS)3) Not Converted (Not Published to CMS) Investigate the Partially Converted Documents properly. Eventhough they are published to the BO 4.0 CMS it sometimes produces completely different results than original document. The main reason for this is that corresponding capability is not available in Webi 4.0 Conversion Results Log provides information about reasons why reports are not converted RCT does not convert/import Schedules

Overview of the process:

1. Launch 4.0 RCT from the start menu2. Login to XI 3.X & Login to BI 4.03. Select the DeskI document(s) intended for conversion4. Select other options as needed5. Start the conversion process6. On success, view results, review audit report (optional)7. Publish the newly converted WebI document(s) to the BI 4.0 CMS

Steps to upgrade to Web IntelligenceI. Login screen

II. Report Conversion ProcessSelect document(s) for conversion

III. Report Conversion in Progress

IV. Conversion Finished

V. Report Conversion Results and Comparison

VI. Auditing in BI 4.0

Select Check Box Save Conversion Results in audit database and select Connection from drop down

VII. Publishing document to BI 4.0

Publish converted documents to BI 4.0 CMS Document publishing is considered partial if a universe is not associated with it in the XI 4.0 CMS Open and view is still possible Refresh is not possible (therefore publishing is partial) A variety of options are available while publishing to CMS (Change target name of document, change target folder, change target category) etc.

VIII. Published document to BI 4.0

CMC now shows both original Deski and converted Webi Reports

Step 4 : Validate the new Webi report to the original Deski report Verify converted Webi document with original Deski document and see if it needs to be modified or need any manual intervention If RCT fails, identify the cause and inform the Business/IT project team the need for re-developmentIn Summary, Develop a Strategy/Migration Plan and stick to it Put more efforts in developing a strategy. The more detailed the plan, the lower the risk and hence better the chances of a successful migration No general rules to calculate total cost and efforts of the project. Many factors effect time horizon and cost of the migration and Deski to Webi conversion. Features used and complexity of Deski reports reflect on conversion process Consult original report designer/Business to keep some features of reports. E.g. Synchronizations and calculation used. Define the acceptance rate for report conversion if report is not 100% same. What differences are acceptable and what must not be?Feature Comparison between Desktop Intelligence and Web Intelligence 3.1 & Web Intelligence 4.0 the feature exists or can have a different workflow the feature exists partially, has a different workflow or have workarounds the feature does not exist

Features which cannot be converted Deski Webi 4.0

OLAP data provider

XML as data provider

Visual Basic Data Provider

Freehand-SQL

Filter with a Calculation operand

User defined objects

Save option with protection password

Features which are partially converted

Automatic refresh setting

Scope of analysis with filter on a measure

Context operator

Variance and Variance percentage calculation

Complex Filter using condition in a formula

Block and global filter

Filter applied on a measure in a block

Same-level Break on multiple dimensions

Break on an object not in the block

Value-based break

Deski functions

Sort on an object not in the block

Dual axes line chart

Multiple groups chart

Automate & Extend functionality via VBA macros

Across Edge Display settings in crosstabs

Page break header/footer

Features which are fully converted but with changes

Fold/unfold

Sort on query

Retrieve the top N rows

Option of "Delete trailing blanks"

Option of "Do not retrieve data"

Option of "Do not generate SQL before running"

Filter on a formula

Windows OLE objects

Picture format

Dynamic Picture or OLE object

Page setup options

Date format

Cell shading

Variable description

User defined grouping of values in a variable

Series color in Charts

Stored Procedure as data provider

Multi-column table

Relative position by setting negative number

Center across page

Conditional hide section, table/chart, cell, dimension

1. Features which cannot be convertedNot all the Deski documents can be converted with the Report Conversion Tool (RCT). The level of conversion depends on the features that are used in the original report. Desktop Intelligence features that are not (yet) available in Web Intelligence are not converted. In these section, we will list the types of Deski features cannot be converted, and describe the workaround in Webi on how to accomplish the functionality in different way.

OLAP data providerDeski used to support several types of OLAP data provider

Webi In Webi, users may create documents against OLAP provider using OLAP universes. Especially in 4.0 release, you may create reports on top of dimensional semantic layer, which is very powerful to leverage OLAP functionalities. The Deski documents based on OLAP data provider cannot be converted, and you need to create a UNX universe and then create documents based on the universe

XML as data providerDeski In Deski, XML can be data provider directly.

Webi Deski document based on XML could not be converted with RCT. In Webi, you may use the universe which is made against XML via third party Database drivers, you may refer to the following articles: 1. Querying XML data through a Universe https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/scn/weblogs?blog=/pub/wlg/11419 2. Querying XML data with Oracle through the semantic layerhttps://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/scn/weblogs?blog=/pub/wlg/11424 3. Consume Web services, Query XML files & columns with IBM DB2https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/scn/weblogs?blog=/pub/wlg/11428 Another option is to use the Custom Data Provider Plug-in which provides a framework to develop your own data provider, therefore allows you to consume potentially any data provider into Web Intelligence. The Developer Guide posted at http://help.sap.com/businessobject/product_guides/boexir31SP2/en/xi31_sp2_cdp_dev_en.pdf goes in more details.

Visual Basic Data ProviderDeski In Deski, you can create report on Visual Basic data provider directly.

Webi Deski documents based on Visual Basic Data Provider could not be converted. Anyway, you can use the Custom Data Provider Plug-in which provides a framework to develop your own data provider, therefore allows you to consume potentially any data provider into Web Intelligence. The Developer Guide posted at http://help.sap.com/businessobject/product_guides/boexir31SP2/en/xi31_sp2_cdp_dev_en.pdf goes in more details. Essentially this should allow Visual Basic Data Providers developed for Deski to be re-used in Webi.

Freehand-SQLDeski In Deski, Freehand-SQL(FHSQL) can be used directly as data source

Webi Deski documents based on Freehand-SQL cannot be converted, and you need to created them manually in Webi. In Webi, there are two approaches, one is to create derived table with FHSQL at the universe level, and the other is to overwrite the SQL when designing the Webi query. For the second approach, you may create a dummy universe with sufficient dummy objects in each data type(Char, Date, Number, etc.), when designing the document, first drag the objects into Result pane, then modify the SQL and change it to the FHSQL which you desire to use.

Filter with a Calculation operandDeski In Deski, you can define calculation in the query panel. For example, below is a query generated when the calculation operand is used:

Select col1,col2,col3 from table1 group by col1,col2 having ( sum(col3) > all select sum(col3) from table1 group by col4)

Webi This type of Deski document is not converted. Webi doesn't have this shortcut, but can make it through query-on-query. For example, to accomplish the above report, you need to create two queries. Query 1 is:

select col4,sum(col3) from table1 group by col4; Query 2 is: Select col1,col2,col3 from table1 group by col1,col2 having sum(col3) > @dapvalue('N', DP0.D093, MAX) That is to find the MAX value from the first query, and use it to create a filter in the second query.

User defined objectsDeski In Deski, the use case is for power users to effectively add variables to universe objects (reusable variables across reports). With the feature, you may alter the way to use objects brought from the universe, e.g.: add text string to output from database, change universe definition from Dimension to Measure or Detail.

Webi Document with User defined objects can not be converted. You may create same objects in the underlying universe, and replace the user objects in Deski, then do the conversion. To accomplish similar functionalities, in Webi: 1. you can create variables for a given dimension that change its qualification to dimension, detail, measure 2. You can filter on source data with variables. 3. You can also simply copy paste formula for a variable from one document to another.

Save option with protection passwordDeski In Deski, you can set protection password and write reservation password in save option panel.

Webi Webi doesnt support this kind of protection, instead, the protection of Webi is based on the authentication with CMS. The Deski documents with protection password or write reservation password would fail to be converted. You may manually remove the password from the document prior to the conversion.

Besides, when a Deski document contains variable that references another variable that cannot be converted, then the document cannot be converted. You need to manually modify the variable accordingly prior to the conversion.2. Features which are partially convertedSome features in Deski can be partially converted, as Webi doesn't have the equivalent feature and need to make it in different way in Webi. In this section, we give a list of these features and describe the difference between Deski and Webi.

Automatic refresh settingDeski Deski documents can have the Automatic refresh setting at the document level.

Webi Webi relies on the BI Launch Pad(Infoview) to schedule the refresh, during coversion the refresh setting is removed. After conversion, you can schedule the refresh on the BI Launch Pad.

Scope of analysis with filter on a measureDeski In Deski, when the query contains both "scope of analysis" and "aggregate filter", the dimension of analysis scope participates in the Having filter, see below example: SELECT sum(TEST2.CODE), TEST2.CODE, TEST2.NUMBER, TEST2.PRICE FROM TEST2 GROUP BY TEST2.CODE, TEST2.NUMBER, TEST2.PRICE HAVING ( sum(TEST2.CODE) > 0 )

Webi Webi generates the query in a different way: SELECT sum(TEST2.CODE), TEST2.CODE, TEST2.NUMBER, TEST2.PRICE FROM TEST2 WHERE CHAR(TEST2.CODE) ||' '|| CHAR(TEST2.NUMBER) In ( SELECT CHAR(TEST2.CODE) ||' '|| CHAR(TEST2.NUMBER) FROM TEST2 GROUP BY CHAR(TEST2.CODE) ||' '|| CHAR(TEST2.NUMBER) HAVING sum(TEST2.CODE) > 0 ) GROUP BY TEST2.CODE, TEST2.NUMBER, TEST2.PRICE

When converting the document with Report conversion tool, the query is changed to Webi's way. The query from Webi is actually based on most use cases, since the query in Deski somehow doesn't return data which is desired for users.

Context operatorDeski In Deski, you may leverage context operators in a formula such as Where, In

Webi The document is partially converted, and the variables contains context operator are deleted during conversion. Anyway in Webi, most of the context operators are available, and users can re-create these variables, except the operator "In Currentpage". Besides, in Webi the "Where" clause can support more operators such as Inlist, > and