Changing the Essbase Query Timeout Setting

If you're receiving an error along the lines of the following, it is likely because your query governor setting is too low --

Error executing query Error internal JAPI

Error:[Cannot perform cube view operation ESSbase Error(1024016): Request [xxxx] from user [xxxx] was terminated since it exceeded the time limit

Moving Calculation Rules with LCM

Life Cycle Management (LCM) is a wonderful tool for archiving, migrating and just plain managing artifacts -- such as outlines, forms, reports, etc. This post isn't a tutorial on how to use LCM (I'll leave that for another day). But it is a keep-this-in-mind post for when you're using LCM to deal with calculation rules.

Calculation Manager

The methodology for manipulating data within a planning application is to use the Calculation Manager(1) found within the Hyperion Workspace. The navigation path to access the manager is:

Navigate->Administer->Calculation Manager

References

(1) The Oracle-published administrator's guide for the Calculation Manager is Oracle Hyperion Calculation Manager Designer's Guide.

Moving Data - EBS Target Requirements

Often one of the primary purposes for creating a planning application in Hyperion is to transfer the budget information back into the organization's ERP system(s). One such system is Oracle's eBusiness Suite (EBS). While there are integration tools designed to help streamline the process of connecting the ERP and EPM systems, it can be very helpful to understand the process from the ground-up before wrapping it with a pretty user interface.

This series of posts will start at the target system and investigate how data is imported into the system manually. Then we will build upon that understanding to see how the layers of integration work to map the connection between the Hyperion planning application and the ERP system, allowing an automated integration between the two system. We will use the EBS ERP system for our study, but the process is the same regardless of the ERP system.

ERPI - Overview

What is ERPI?

Oracle provides a nice wrapper layer called ERPI (ERP Integrator) designed to allow easy access to low-level utilities such as ODI for the specific purpose of importing and exporting data into and out of Hyperion. It is predicated on having the low-level layer configured and, as such, does not replace the need for the utilities at that layer. But it does do a nice job of consolidating the functionality into one user interface.

Oracle's documentation for ERPI states the following as the intended use of the product -

• Integrate metadata and data from an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) source system into an Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) target application.
• Drill through from the EPM target application and view data in the ERP source system.
• Write-back budget data to the source system from any Oracle Hyperion Planning, Oracle Essbase ASO, or Essbase BSO application.

How Is It Accessed?

ERPI is part of the Hyperion Workspace and can be accessed by traversing the following menu path:

Navigate->Administer->ERP Integrator

More Reading

Full documentation on the ERPI product is available from Oracle here for version 11.1.2.1 and 11.1.2.2.

Clearing Blocks in a Reporting Application

One thing I'm learning about Hyperion is there seems to always be options on how to accomplish a task. But there is also usually a "best" choice that emerges. Sometimes, what appear to be options won't actually work given your setup. So, experimentation is the name of the game.

Since I am new to Hyperion, what you read in these posts may or may not be the best way to go about tackling a given problem. I will do my best to circle back and update posts if I find a better way of performing a given task. But the only way to get started is to pick a path and give it a whirl. So, here we go!

Our Development Train is Off the Tracks. Now What? (Part One)

About the Environment

Our organization is relatively new to the Hyperion world and we are still figuring out how all the dials and levers work. Our implementation consists of two environments -- one for development/experimentation and one for production. We are running version 11.1.2.1 of Hyperion on Windows 2008 servers as the Essbase hosts, accessing Oracle RDBMS on Linux servers for the relational components of Hyperion.

It All Goes Wrong

A while back I wanted to create a new application in our development environment to do some experimentation. I made a crucial mistake when establishing the data source that has caused our development environment to be broken ever since. I did not realize that each data source must have a unique schema in the Oracle repository. "Sharing" a schema (user) with another application will hopelessly confuse Hyperion and all sorts of erratic behavior will result!

And so, having clobbered the development repository, I have been trying several different actions to recover the environment. Being a non-production environment, we do not have regularly-scheduled backups for me to roll back to. Not knowing I was clobbering anything with this data source setup step, I also did not initiate a backup. And so, here I sit, with a broken-down environment. Woe is me.

Up Next

In part two of this saga, I'll delve a little into what has been done so far to try to recover from this mess.