Passing date variable base on SAP BW user's profile within Dashboard

[Former Member]

Hello,

My environment: BO 4.1 with SSO between Windows/BO and SAP BW 7. I build dashboard using Dashboard. Because we have SSO so all users will use their own BW ids to run the Qaaws to get data for dashboard.

Right after we turning on SSO, I faced an issue: some users could run a dashboard and some users could not. Then I figured out it is because users' profile date settings are different:

     Some users have date format: mm/dd/yyyy

     Some users have date format: mm.dd.yyyy

     Some users have date format: dd/mm/yyyy

     Some users have date format: yyyy/mm/dd

Knowing the reason, I don't know how to fix it.

In short, I need pass September 2014 to a Fiscal Period variable to run the dashboard.

     If I pass in 09/2014 then users who have mm.dd.yyyy date setting could not run the dashboard.

     If I pass in 09.2014 then users who have mm/dd/yyyy date setting could not run the dashboard.

My question, if you use SAP BW and Dashboard, how do you pass in fiscal period variable to allow all users to run the dashboard.

Thanks!

George

[jennifer_jacob]

Hi George,

So I take it you have the following scenario:  a bex query > Universe > Qaaws > Dashboard

Is the fiscal year period a prompt defined in Qaaws or is it coming from Bex query?

What 'preferred viewing locale' has customer configured in Bi Launchpad > preferences > Locales and Time zone ? Is it the default 'use browser locale'? If user sets the same language as the format defined, does this work?

Regards,

jennifer

[Former Member]

Thanks Jennifer for taking the time to answer my question.

Yes, a bex query > Universe > Qaaws > Dashboard is exactly my case.

The fiscal period is defined in Bex query.

The 'perferred viewing locale' is 'use browser locale'.

I just tried your suggestions, it did not work:

A user who could run the dashboard, no matter what language he changes, dashboard is still working.

A user who could NOT run the dashboard, no matter what language he changes, dashboard is not working.

As soon as user changes SAP BW default Date format (in SAP frontend, go to System -> User Profile -> Own Data), the dashboard either works or breaks. So I think it is all driven by user's BW date format setting.

I am really interested to know how other companies did this.

Thank you!

George

[arijit_das]

Is it possible to have prompt on key ?

[Former Member]

Hi Arijit,

I could make it a prompt, but it is not an option for a couple resaons.

1) The dashboard has 5 variables, if we handle 4 by using combobox or user clicking and 1 use variable dialog, it is not consistent.

2) Most of our users don't use BW directly, so they don't know their BW date profile, when we prompt user to enter the key, they still have no idea what is the right format to enter. I have no idea either because I don't know the user's date format setting on BW side.

Thanks!

George