Cool Xcelsius Dashboards and Where to Find Them

They’ve Got Style

I continue to be amazed by the dashboards being developed by our customers and partners to meet on going business needs.  Across every industry and every organization, regardless of size, companies are able to consolidate information into a single, interactive dashboard view.  Customers constantly ask me for examples of what other organizations have done, so I decided it was time to assemble a list of the best Xcelsius websites with samples.

Some of my Favorites

1. My absolute favorite site is Inverra.  They are constantly updating their site with unique KPI centric examples.
   http://www.inverra.com/Dashboards/demos.htm
2. Analysis Factory.  Very professional graphics.  Their supply chain example is tops.
   http://www.analysisfactory.com/gallery.html
3. MyXcelsius Showcase.
   http://myxcelsius.com/showcase/
4. Everything Xcelsius
   http://everythingxcelsius.com/showcase
5. SAP SDN Xcelsius Samples. These samples are either from SAP or have been uploaded from customers.
   https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/boc/xcelsius-samples
   

Dashboarding Ideas

Need to keep you finger on the pulse of the dashboarding scene?  Looking for great ideas around dashboards in general?  There is one website above all others that has great information about creating dashboards with both Xcelsius and non-Xcelsius based technologies.  The website is Dashboard Spy and I highly recommend you give it a look.
http://dashboardspy.com/

They also have a great list of dashboard screenshots that’s worth a look:
http://dashboardspy.com/screenshots.html

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Business Intelligence Business Requirements and the BI Portfolio

Memorial Day was a great day to reflect on the sacrifices of so many for the freedoms and liberties will all enjoy. Thank you veterans!!

After attending a local Memorial Day Rememberance and Celebration, I spent some time cleaning my office and I came across an excellent article which I wanted to pass along.  So often when I talk to organizations about Business Intelligence, I ask them about their business requirements so that I can understand their current business pain.  All to often what follows is feature function laundry list of capabilities they are sure they can’t live without.  Time after time, the BI requirements given to software vendors are not tied to a specific business problem. This is a recipe for disaster.

The following article is an article from DM Review entitled, Business Requirements for BI and the BI Portfolio: How to Get it Right:
http://www.b-eye-network.com/print/6887

This article does a great job at pointing out the weaknesses of generic BI requirements and why functional requirements are not enough.  If you have BI requirements and are evaluating BI tools, I highly recommend you take a few minutes to read this article.

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Some controls on this presentation can’t be activated – Xcelsius! Help!

At SAP BusinessObjects I work in the role of a Solution Advisor and I have a collection of Xcelsius dashboard examples.  I also receive new Xcelsius models from my colleagues from time to time.  Several months ago I ran across a strange problem with my Xcelsius powerpoints.  When I moved documents from one machine to another I began having problems openning these powerpoints and viewing my Xcelsius models.

Can’t be Activated in Aggravating

When opening powerpoint, I would see the following Windows error:

Some Controls on the Presentation can't be activated. They might not be registered on this computer.

I was left wondering if this was a problem with the new Powerpoint 2007, so an incompatibility between Xcelsius 4.5 and 2008.  After some research and an excellent article from the Xcelsius Journal, I was relieved to find out it was neither.  It was all about the flash viewer within Powerpoint.

Solving This Devilish Problem

Although I had long since upgraded my flash player within my Firefox browser, Powerpoint continued to hold on to the old flash version.  Although I upgraded my flash player within Internet Explorer, Powerpoint didn’t seem to see it.  Instead it was still using an old flash player and therefore I continued to get the message:  Some controls on this presentation can’t be activated.  They might not be registered on this computer.   It was so frustrating.  Eventually I was forced to manually perform a flash uninstall and a fresh reinstall.

Uninstalling Your Flash Player

For additional details about uninstalling your flash player, I recommend you refer to this article: http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/141/tn_14157.html

As a shortcut to the files referred to in this article, I have provided references to the Windows Uninstall programs here:
http://download.macromedia.com/pub/flashplayer/current/uninstall_flash_player.exe

Next, you will need to launch Internet Explorer and go to the adobe website.
http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/

In some cases, you may want to manually download the installer for use offline.   Consider going to this site and downloading the flash player installer for manual installations.
http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/otherversions/

Back Flashy Presentations

Now that you’ve upgraded the flash player referenced by Powerpoint, you can get back to viewing those flashy Xcelsius presentations.  In the future I would expect Microsoft and Adobe to fix this problem.  I hope I never have to see this message again:  Some controls on this presentation can’t be activated.  They might not be registered on this computer.

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Crystal Reports and Web Services

Quick Tutorial

Service Oriented Architectures are amazing.  Now more than ever companies are leveraging freely available web services to add value to their internal data.  One of the most common ways on combining data today is via Google Maps. A great example of this is housingmaps.com.  Housingmaps combines the power of Google Maps and CraigsList to allow you to view available housing in your area together with the power of Google Map navigation.

Today, all tools from SAP BusinessObjects can consume web services.  The most popular reporting tool in the BusinessObjects platform is Crystal Reports.  With the report creation wizard, we can be consuming a web service is seconds.  Let’s walk through it step by step.  We will connect to a web service that will provide us driving directions from Point A to Point B.

Step by Step

1. Launch Crystal Reports 2008
2. From the Start Page, choose Report wizard, this will launch the Standard Report Creation
3. Next expand Create New Connection, and scroll down to XML and Web Services and expand the folder.
4. The XML and Web Services data source  dialog box will appear.  Choose Use Web Service Data Source and choose Next>.
5. In our case, we are going to use an HTTP Web Service, so choose Use HTTP(S) WSDL and type in:  http://www.ecubicle.net/driving.asmx?WSDL and choose Next>.
6. This Web Service does not require a UserID/Password, so choose Next>.
7. After a moment or two, the Web Service, Port and Method screen should appear.  You should see: driving, drivingSoap and GetDirections in the Service, Port and Method drop downs respectively.  (If this does not work, there may be a firewall issue at your location.  Check with your local IT.)  Choose Finish.
8. After choosing Finish, you will see a ResultSet box under the http://www.ecubicle.net/ data source.  (You may need to expand it).  Move the box over to the Selected Tables side by choosing the [>] button.   When you do, you will be prompted to enter some parameters.  So far so good.
9. There are four input parameters to this:
   fromAddress – the starting address, e.g. 3734 Elvis Presley Boulevard Memphis, TN 38186
   toAddress – the destination address, e.g. 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Washington, DC 20500
   distanceUnit – miles or km, default: miles
   expresswayEnabled – true or false, default:true
10. After entering the values choose OK.
11. Complete the Wizard by either choosing Finished or by walking through the remaining screens.
12. Once the fields are added to the report, you should the directs Elvis would need to take to drive to the White House.

Here is your finished report:

Leveraging Web Services from within SAP BusinessObjects couldn’t be easier.  If you are interested in seeing the same types of capabilities from within other BusinessObjects tools drop me a line and I’ll add it to the list.  Enjoy.

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Business Intelligence – Now More Than Ever!

I was at Sapphire 2009 last week and enjoyed getting a chance to talk with customers about their priorities in the new economic climate.  Everyone is hoping that things will turn around soon but in the meantime, there was a lot of interest around Business Intelligence and the best way to get all the information necessary to make the best business decisions.  Each day organizations are being forced to make hard choices and those choices need to be based on ALL the available  information available – not just hunches and best guesses.  More organizations have the information they need but they haven’t fully plugged into the power of Business Intelligence.

Market research shows two important two facts (previous reported by BusinessWeek):
• 43% of users say they’re not sure if internal information is accurate information
• 77% said bad decisions had been made because of lack of information

Now it the wrong time to make decisions on based gut feel, with inadequate information. Companies are looking to Business Intelligence tools to not only show them how to cut costs, but also how to model data for the future.  Regardless of what Business Intelligence platform you use, now is the time to leverage it to the fullest.

Here is a great follow-up article from BusinessWeek:
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/mar2009/tc2009032_101762.htm

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