Tips and Tricks for Oracle Business Intelligence Application Implementations

Shyam Varan Nath

OBIEE Architect, IBM President BIWA SIG May 2011

Agenda
BI Reporting Landscape OBIEE and BI Applications What is new? Sneak Peak to 7.9.6.3 Relational and Multi-Dimensional Reporting OBIA 7.9.6.x tips and tricks Real life issues Wrap Up

About Me!
A BI/DW professional with IBM GBS (Oracle Practice) OCP since 1998 on 4 different DB versions President/Founder of BIWA SIG an IOUG SIG for BI, DW and Advanced Analytics professionals Regular speaker at Oracle Open World (since 03), Collaborate (since 05), ODTUG-KScope (since 08), BIWA Summit and RUG s (NY/RM/SF/NO etc.) Bachelor s from IIT-India, MBA and MS from Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton, FL

IBM and Oracle

BI Platforms =>
<=BI/EPM Service providers

IBM & ORCL Analytics Over last 1 yr

Shyam

OBIA OTN Forum

Top Expert in the BI Apps Forum

Why De-Mystify OBIEE?

"Surveyed customers continue to indicate that OBIEE, for the developer role, is more difficult to use, on average, than other BI platforms Gartner Magic Quadrant Jan 2010

Gartner Magic Quadrant Jan 2011

What are the new features in OBIEE 11.1.1.5 !!!

Traditional Circular Join

OBIEE Star (Logical/Physical

BI Apps Other Extreme

Why the Data Warehouse?

ERP Systems Data warehouse/OBIEE leverages ERP data for analysis

Data warehouse also gathers data from multiple systems: Legacy, Demantra, etc.

ERP s like Oracle EBS are excellent in capturing business data

Should you point OBIEE to source systems or not?

Ideal Information Architecture

Orchestration
CRM Apps SCM Apps Operations Websites

Applications

Data Warehouse

Data Marts Reporting

DW
Financials Distribution ERP Apps HCM Apps

(OLAP)
EAI

Essbase
ETL

Business Intelligence

OBIEE Positioning

Some Recent Development

OBIEE 11.1.1.5 released for download on May 6, 2011 OBI Apps 7.9.6.3 released same day! First time BI platform and BI apps are insync Last release 7.9.6.2 came after OBIEE 11.1.1.3 but was supported not certified Focus on Mobile computing and Time-Ten

recent
BI Apps 7.9.6.3 requires
New BI platform 11.1.1.5 New Informatica platform 9.0.1 New DAC (not 11g yet) but hot fixed version 10.1.3.4.1

Campaign Performance Dashboard on iPad

Provides iPad/iPhone support out of box

BI Apps on iPhone

General Direction 7.9.6.3

In 7.9.6.3 focus was on making the rpd, web cat and security model 11g ready. Oracle switched to role based security from group based Some fixes in the rpd to satisfy the stricter consistency checking in 11g Leveraged some new Presentation capabilities in the reports and dashboards (such as presentation hierarchies). OBIEE 11g now allows BI apps to unlock a bunch of new capabilities such as mobile/iPad, better systems management, scorecards, etc. No real new core functionality, ETL adapters for Oracle ERP s added (EBS R12.1.3 nominal support)

BI Apps Roadmap

General Challenges with BI Projects

Users often want one

place / tool for Operational and Analytical reporting Degree of details in warehouse Right time data need for intra-day ETL Highly Formatted reports Security model across BI and Source Systems.

Case Studies
Family owned, 50 yrs old, $1b+ manufacturing company in Atlanta Several manufacturing plants using systems like JD Edwards, Demantra, EPM/Planning and Legacy/Main frame systems ODS/Crystal Reports foorprint First formal DW initiative OBIEE, ODI and BIP as tech stack Need for Manufacturing, Plant Shop floor analytics, job profitability and Sales Analytics in first go EPM-Workspace Integration Highly formatted and complex BI Publisher reports Energy Services Company publicly traded, ~$2b in Houston, TX New EBS R12 implementation in 4 divisions, HFM, Planning, one div replacing SAP First formal DW initiative OBIEE and BI Applications purchased Need for HR, SCM/Procurement, Finance Analytics Go-live in Phases such as HR, Fin and SCM Other Energy industry specific applications in use Some SQL Server/Crystal Reports

Why OBIEE v/s BI Apps?

OBIEE Need to integrate JD Edwards data with legacy mainframe data as manufacturing plants are in transition In 2009 time frame BI apps for JDE Edwards have no coverage for manufacturing, shop floor production data and job profitability Cost allocation engine needed for job costing and profitability OBIEE, ODI and BIP as tech stack, shop trying to stay as Oracle tech/apps shop Security with EPM-Workspace needed as Essbase/Planning in use since V7 Resulted in 4 subject areas BI Apps New ERP implementation provides opportunities packaged analytics for rapid deployment as the starter DW One manufacturing division replacing SAP, so challenges in replacing existing SAP - Easy Access functionality EBS Versions sliding from R12.1.1 to R12.1.3 No coverage for Oracle Process Manufacturing, HR Advanced Benefits etc in BI Apps today HFM being used for consolidation and Eliminations Resulted in HR, SCM/Ps and Fin analytics as starters

Custom Data Warehouse / OBIEE

Sales Data Models Developed for Company s Need!

Job Cost
Associate Dimension

PDS
Fiscal Day Dimension Work Order Dimension

Production Data Summary Fact

Operation Reference Dimension

Workcenter Dimension

Plant Dimension

Developing the Data Model

Star Schemas, Two Time Dimensions Internationalization - Multi currency, multi UOM support Skill Sets Enterprise Data Modeler

Information Flow from JD Edwards (E1) & Legacy

E1 PD files

SQL Programs load PRS staging

PRS staging files

SQL Programs load Dims & Fact Tables

ODI

Legacy files

Programs load PRS staging

Dimension Tables

Sales Fact Table

Prod Trans Fact Table

Security: Shared Services and OBIEE

EPM to OBIEE

How do we set it up?

Login in to the OBI Administrator Tool in Online mode. From the Menu tool bar click on Manage > Security. Select Custom Authenticators Right Click on the Custom Authenticator that appears in the right pane and choose properties Specify the following path /OracleBI/web/bin64/libsawobisauthenticatorproxy643r.so Close the Security Window Click on File > Save Click on Yes when prompted to Check in Changes Click on File > Close Restart the EPM environment Restart OBIEE

Install Process BI Apps Route

End user machines requires no software, browser based assess Windows boxes required for client software and for transferring some server software (A and B) Co-location of Informatica PowerCenter Services and DAC Server C Clients can be installed on multiple Windows boxes

OBIEE v/s Packaged BI Application

Sales Service and Contact Center Marketing

Procurement and Spend

Supply Chain and Order Management

Financials

CRM ANALYTICS
Price

ERP ANALYTICS
Projects

Loyalty

Human Resources

ORACLE BI ENTERPRISE EDITION (OBIEE)

AND OTHER OPERATIONAL AND ANALYTIC SOURCES

High Level Data Flow

Source eBS (Raw Data) ETL Extraction Transform and Load (Informatica PowerCenter or ODI) OBAW - Business Analytics Warehouse OBIEE Metadata OBIEE Content Reports and Dashboards

OBIEE From Surface to Plumbing

What s Below the Surface?

Supporting Infrastructure Informatica and DAC

BI Apps Customers to 11g

Two approaches: Upgrade to BI Applications 7.9.6.3
Certifies 11.1.1.5, out of the box support for 11g capabilities Recommended choice for net new implementations and existing BI Apps customers needing 11.1.1.5 capabilities alike

Platform-only upgrade for existing BI Apps deployments

Fully supported with OBIEE 11.1.1.5 but not without challenges Good option for heavily customized deployments with strong need for 11.1.1.5 features Case Study of 7.9.6.2 customer

Case Studies - II
Offshore Petroleum Services Company TX
PeopleSoft and BI Apps

Financial Services Company for Retirement Planning NC

PeopleSoft, BI Apps and Financial Services Vertical App (OFSAA)

2011 Q1 go-live with 7.9.6.2 and OBIEE 11.1.1.3, Platform update Challenges resolved manually For BI Apps 7.9.6.3 intake OBIEE needs to be upgraded too

HR Analytics live on 7.9.6.2 Fin Analytics to go-live OFSAA and related BI uses OBIEE 10g and Essbase Complex hierarchies DRM/Essbase

Lessons Learnt 7.9.6.2 with OBIEE 11.1.1.3 Categories:

RPD and Presentation LDAP and Security Write Back etc.

Summarizing the Pre-11.1.15 Release for BI Apps Platform Upgrade

Tips and Tricks from the Field

Real World BI/DW Projects

Custom OBIEE Development

Example of ERP systems like Oracle EBS as source of data Knowledge of different Schemas domain/functional knowledge Naming conventions source side Security of Objects

EBS Object Names

Object Name _ALL _B _TL Function of the object Underlying table with all the values Base of underlying table, same as _ALL Language translation table with translation of descriptive fields in different languages View based on translation table View on top of the Basic table Descriptive Flex Field related view, it will have the defined values as Column names instead of generic attribute 1, ..2 Key Flex Field views contain the concatenated fields as it would be displayed to the user. For e.g. A field may consist of Division, Department and Account fields and the KFV will have the concatenated values. OKE_K_Deliverables_VL E.g. PO_DISTRIBUTIONS_ALL RA_TERMS_B

_VL _BASIC_V _DFV

_KFV

EBS Naming Conventions

All objects accessed by EBS application have synonym in APPS schema, e.g.OKE.OKE_K_LINES has synonym APPS.OKE_K_LINES EBS Forms fetch data from a user friendly view with name ending is _V or _VL (e.g. OKE_K_Deliverables_VL). Views have descriptive value as opposed to the numeric ids fields stored in the base table making it human-readable for reports. Views also implement security and restrictions to the data in various forms such as restrict values by language, org_id etc These variables are set by EBS (session context) when the user accesses data via the EBS application.

Some EBS Schema Names

AP - Oracle Payables AR - Oracle Receivables GL - Oracle General Ledger INV - Oracle Inventory MRP - Oracle Master Scheduling/MRP PA - Oracle Projects PAY - Oracle Payroll PER - Oracle Human Resources PJM - Oracle Project Manufacturing WIP - Oracle Work in Process WMS - Oracle Warehouse Management System WSH - Oracle Shipping WSM - Shop Floor Management

Some EBS Related Tips

Take help from EBS users
Help >Record History (table, views) Help > Examine (column) Involve the users to develop MD50, MD70

Sometimes users can point to an Oracle Report that has similar data source
The SQL from Oracle Report can help to jumpstart Create views that OBIEE can use

JD Edwards Tables
The JD Edwards table names are quite cryptic This shows that that for building custom OBIEE solutions, deep ERP knowledge is required Need for data modeler, ETL/OBIEE architect and developers

Naming Standards!
Shyam Shally Sanya Sanat
BI Apps Naming Std

Case Study of Media Company

Complex hierarchies for GL, Cost Center etc Hierarchies maintained in Essbase outline not in Oracle EBS EBS 11.5.10 and OBIA Fin in use Hyperion Strategic Finance in use

Solution Overview Planning and Reporting

New Functionality
Source Systems Market

Planning & Reporting Overview

Financial Data Consolidation Applications User Information
Dashboard View Standard Reports Drill Down Custom Reports Bloomberg Internet Other External Market Data Drill back to GL and sub-ledgers detail Actuals; GL / Marketing Historical Data Manual Data Push Infomatica Ad Sales Operations AR AR / Ad Sales Data Manual Data Push

Process
Reporting Process Routine Analysis & Strategic Analysis Processes

Finance Reporting Platform

K-Gen

Ledger & Sub-ledger, HR Data

Essbase
View Standard Reports

External Reporting Mgmt Reporting

Forecast & Plan Snapshot Data Automated Data Push/Pull

GL AP EBS FA PR HRMS ETL

Data Repository (Warehouse)

OBIA
Financial Reporting

Forecasting & Modeling Tool

Driver Models LRP Modeling

Monthly Outlook Process Budget Process Business Planning Process

Historical Reporting Data To Be Retired

HSF

44

DATA FLOW
Data

EBS Load Data Extract data DIM

Actual Cube Essbase

OBAW/DW Schema Drill through table Franchise cost center map

Generate franchise Map

PeopleSoft - BI Apps
Unlike Oracle EBS, Siebel and JD Edwards, all of PeopleSoft is not in same database HCM and Finance (FSCM) are in two different PeopleSoft Instances, hence two different OLTP DB s Additionally, complete HR Analytics requires some financial fact tables, HR related Financial metrics How do you create the Execution Plan for same?

Execution Plan HCM + FSCM

Create a custom container called PeopleSoft 9.0 HCM from the existing container PeopleSoft 9.0 . From DAC menu, use File New Source System Container . Similarly, create another new custom container called PeopleSoft 9.0 FSCM from the existing container PeopleSoft 9.0 .


In PeopleSoft 9.0 FSCM, inactivate the 3 tasks
SDE_PSFT_GEOCountryDimension SIL_DayDimension_GenerateSeed SIL_DayDimension_CleanSeed


Now create a new Execution plan called Human Resources with GL PeopleSoft 9.0 . Choose subject areas as follows:


On the Parameters tab in the bottom pane, generate one copy of parameters (for each container). Then set the values of the parameters as follows:


Build this Execution Plan. In the Set up Physical Data Sources tab, configure the connections for the physical data sources DataWarehouse , PSFT_9_0_HCM , PSFT_9_0_ELM (if you used Learning) and PSFT_9_0_FINSCM . Execute the newly created EP Human Resources with GL PeopleSoft 9.0 .

Other Case Studies - Tips

A very large Retailer BI Apps on Exadata V2 BI Apps on Teradata and Netezza?? (Terdata is supported for both OBIEE/OBIA, Netezza is supported for OBIEE and not for OBIA)

Teradata (TD) Considerations

NULL_VALUES_SORT_FIRST should be set to ON for TD Leverage function shipping Set the Nullable flag appropriately for join columns

BI Apps with Exadata

The Full Table Scan is no longer your enemy! FTS is very quick in Exadata but not in the regular 11g databases Hence, the performance configurations like indexes might not be required in the Exadata boxes in certain situations Drop the distinct key indexes and change stats method change in customsql.xml In certain situations we saw the performance bottleneck at the source system database as it was not able to feed the Exadata box at it's import capacity consider flat file extracts from sources

BI Apps on Exadata
On larger tables like - AP_AE_LINES_ALL, avoid PARALLEL query option, the difference in time observed was from 4 hours to 2 minutes. Disable or drop all indexes with distinct_keys = 1 (b-tree and bitmaps) reason being such indexes are ineffective, with one unique value. So it's highly unlikely that Optimizer would ever consider them in building any execution plans. Avoid query transformation into a union-all query and scanning all the big tables twice. Here we will need to find a workaround to avoid the union-all to scan the tables once or find a way to reduce full scanning of the tables (partitioning/ index etc). e.g table W_GL_ACCOUNT_D 8 mil rows getting scanned without any valid filtering Partitioned tables must have stats at both table and partition level

Query Predicate
Lets consider the example of full scan on W_GL_LINKAGE_INFORMATION_G if it's a huge table; it takes nearly five minutes. The predicate used in the report is filter ("T146781"."JOURNAL_LINE_INTEGRATION_ID"='169 8893~69290') in /shared/Financials/Payables/Invoice Details Query executes for 6 minutes. Suggestion: recreate index W_GL_LINKAGEINFORMATION_G_M1 (JOURNAL_LINE_INTEGRATION_ID, DATASOURCE_NUM_ID). This index is registered in DAC as ETL index hence it is normally dropped after ETL; we need to make it permanent. This index should help to lower this table scan time down to a few seconds.

BI Apps 7.9.6.3 Sneak Peak

Oracle BI Applications 7.9.6.3

11g Features
Master Detail Linking Chart Sliders & Zooming Hierarchical Columns View prompts Cascading Prompts

Procurement and Spend Analytics

Chart zooming

Supply Chain and Order Management Analytics

Supply Chain and Order Management Analytics

Playback option Graph Sliders

Supply Chain and Order Management Analytics

Master Detail Linking

Graph Sliders

Supply Chain and Order Management Analytics

Select 2009 Q4

Detail graph shows Trend by Month for the selected quarter

Project Analytics
In-place Drill using presentation hierarchies

Financial Analytics

Cascading Prompts Select Fiscal Year = 2008 Fiscal Quarter shows only 2008 values

In-place Drill using presentation hierarchies

Financial Analytics

Graph Sliders

Enhanced Visualizations

Playback option

Human Resources Analytics

Oracle Mobile for BI Apps

Native mobile apps with full Dashboard functionality and all BI content types Dashboard Drill/Navigate Catalog navigation Favorites Alerts Search Actions

Dashboards dynamically adjust to exploit the form-factor of the device

Device support iOS iPhone and iPad in 11.1.1.5 Android next Blackberry awaited??

Oracle BI Applications on Apple ipad

Example: Marketing Analytics

BI Apps Customers to 11g

Two approaches: Upgrade to BI Applications 7.9.6.3
Certifies 11.1.1.5, out of the box support for 11g capabilities Recommended choice for net new implementations and existing BI Apps customers needing 11.1.1.5 capabilities alike

Platform-only upgrade for existing BI Apps deployments

Fully supported with OBIEE 11.1.1.5 but not without challenges Good option for heavily customized deployments with strong need for 11.1.1.5 features Case Study of 7.9.6.2 customer

Summary / Questions
n n n n

Recap OBIEE Recap BI Applications Technical Details Questions Contact Information: ShyamVaran@Gmail.com Shyam.Nath@US.IBM.com