Explorer on BW Only Possible?

[Former Member]

I have been asked to investigate if Business Object Explorer is supported on BW 7.3 and 7.4 and or there is a work around for BI 4.0 SP7 and or BI 4.1 SP3?  I have read the admin guide and it mentions that OLAP data sources are not supported.

When I recently spoke with a person from SAP, they said that they thought Explorer 4.0 was supported for BW.

I tried to clarify that we do not have BWA or Hana, just BW.  I have read where it might be possible to use Explorer on a BW DSO with a universe, but this is not very useful to us, unless we were to create DSOs out of calculated results from cube.

Can anyone clarify this?  Our CIO and CFO like the presentations they have seen on Explorer and do not understand why we cannot use it with SAP BW.

Lee Lewis

[former_member186824 · Accepted solution]

Lewis,

I have the same issues recently, and with company officials at the Sapphire conference, the SAP sales people are just lending to the confusion because they don't understand the technicals or support that is identified.

The platform compatiblity list for support, specifically states that OLAP universe are not supported.  BW and HANA are supported but BW is only supported through HANA or BWA.

Now I am an Admin/Engineer, not a developer or data architect; have been for 15+ years dating back to when this was SI 6.5 (Seagate Info) and Crystal Reports 6.5.  I have migrated and built systems through Crystal Enterprise to BusinessObjects XI and now BI 4.1.

I have tested on 4.1SP3; and yes, you can build a universe (unv or unx) on BW queries, but that is the definition of an OLAP universe, even though it is a relational connection.

I find that the BEX Queries the way most are written for BEX Reports are inadequate in design for exploration of the data.  Heirarchies don't work, and all you will get is the L00 and L01 dimensions, NO DETAIL OBJECTS. from the universe.

Again OLAP Universes are not supported for Explorer.  Test this by trying to convert a unv on BEX to a UNX through the IDT, and it will tell you it doesn't support conversion of OLAP Universes and to use BICs.  You must rebuild it with SAP Jco connection to the query, but then why rebuild if the design was to go to BICs?  The reason for that would be customized universes, that lay on top of an injected BEX statement.  Some places do that; requires more maintenance during refreshing the unvierses, but in those necessary cases that BEX/MDX will not let you do what you need in the query, you are only left with the universe or analysis document (RPT, WID, etc) to manipulate the data the way that is required for the task at hand.

There is documentation out there of using excel data from BW to drive the InfoSpace, and Exploration View set that you schedule for refresh.  This turns out to be a Rube Goldberg design approach to the issue, as you need to perform multiple steps for one InfoSpace/Exploration View.

1. Design and schedule the WebI or Crystal output to Excel.

2. Then use that excel for base of the Information Space

3. Then through CMC capture the actual location of the file in the FRS, used for InfoSpace,

4. Schedule the webi to export the results to that new location only over-writing itself.

5. Set the recurring schedule in both the infospace for indexing and the webI.

Voila! You have the most cumbersome design of getting supported BW data into Explorer without HANA, BWA, or Data Services pipiing into a datamart or other flattened RDBMS style source to get SAP to support it via their documentation.

The Biggest ERROR made by companies and Executive is thinking that SBOP is SAP.  SAP Owns it, but BusinessObjects remains BusinessObjects.  We provide Business Intelligence Solutions for everything the company can provide access to in the way of data, not just SAP, and not exclusively SAP.  BusinessObjects was originally designed for Relational Databases, OLAP was added for Voyager/Pioneer (now Analysis for OLAP).  The design driving force behind everything SAP is now HANA.

I have requests to look at InfiniteInsight, Predictive Analysis, Lumira, and other applications that are SAP and not SBOP, but like SBOP are acquired assests and not true SAP NW Applications.  90% of them will not work directly with BW like Crystal and WebI does for reports without going through another interface, layer, and/or appliance.

Calvin Shipman

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Thanks for your info Calvin.

I agree it should not be so hard!

At Sapphire Explorer will be superseded with Lumeria and is an additional licensing cost.  Bunk.

And BI OLAP for Analysis will not be developed further,Design Studio 1.3 has a template to use for Bex querys that will allow us to finally move away from bex web.

Confusion continues...

Lee Lewis

[Former Member]

Lee - We use explorer off of the following:

1. UNV (connects to a BEx query, thus keeping all of the user exit, key figure logic we've already created)
2. UNX (connects to BW cube, bypassing BEx query
3. UNX > SQL

We're on version 4.0 SP9, but I believe SP6 with 4.0 gets you all of this also.

BW 7.01 SP11

There are pro's and con's to UNV/UNX and to be honest, I evaluate at a case by case basis.  However, with new development, I always try to use UNX first.

Hope that helps...

-matt     

[Former Member]

Hi Lewis,

to add to Prabhith's reply you can also create an OLAP Universe on top of a BEx query and use that in Explorer as well.

This option is officially available as of Explorer 4.1.

George

[Prabhith]

HI ,

Please have a look at the note 1869560 for a comprehensive list of supported and unsupported BW elements.

Since you told that BIA and HANA options are not available, the only one remains is the relational universe on top of BW. I think you should be able to select a BW cube as a source for the universe.

(Multi sourced,JCO) --> create a Information space using Facets and Measures--> do indexing --> Show the required analyis in explorer.

BR

Prabhith