Creating Universes Using SAP BusinessObjects IDT(Fast Track)
SAP BsuienssObjects is one of the BI leader software in the market as per Gartner report. SAP BO provides many BI modules like Web intelligence, crystal reports, Dashboards, Lumira …etc. Each module target a specific set of users based on the nature of their daily use for BI. All these modules are based on SAP BO semantics layer which known as Universe. SAP Universe is a translation layer between physical data-base and business model.
In this course we will have a fast track course focusing on the most important features that can help you to start building this layer and then consume it in your BI documents. A separate detailed advanced course will be published to cover all details and help you to be advanced user.
Getting Started
In this lecture we will introduce our course.
SAP is one of the leading IT companies in the market. SAP BusinessObjects is a powerful Business Intelligence tool that help you to discover hidden insight in your data. SAP BO has many modules for reporting like SAP BO web intellignece, crystal reports, dashboards, design studio and lumira. ALL these tools access data sources through SAP BO semantic layer known as Universe. Universes is the core part of the SAP BO BI portfolio and it is essential to learn how to design Universes if you interested to know about SAP BO.
In this lecture we will learn the following:
- What is Business Intelligence (BI)? Why it is important and why we need it?
- What is the relation between BI and Data Warehouse (DWH)?
- What is BI software tools? Where is the location of SAP BusinessObjects (BO)?
- What is the main components of SAP BO?
- What is semantic layer (Universe) ?
- Introduction to SAP BO universe.
In this section we will try to be more familiar with SAP BusienssObjects information Design Tool. In this section we will have a brief overview on different menus, tool bars and windows that we have. We will cover these topics in more details in the Full track version of this course. for now let's just focus on the basics that you need to start building Universes and to start being productive. Here we aim to let you understand the basics and main essential functionalities.
In this lecture; Students will learn how to start Information Design Tool (IDT
This Quiz will test your understanding for section # 1
Information Design Tool interface
Welcome screen is the first screen that you will see when you open SAP BusinessObjects Information Design Tool. This screen will be your close friend if you are a newbie to Universe design. from this screen you can access the most important features that you need while design a Universe like creating a new Universe using "Create New universe Wizard" or "Cheat sheets". You can also access official SAP tutorials and online documentation to seek for more help. There is a menu also to access the most recent projects or Universe resources.
Note that you will see this screen every time you open SAP BO IDT; but still you can disable this. You can access it later on from IDT menus.
In this lecture; we will talk about welcome screen and about the main featuers that we can access from like:
- Create new Project.
- Create new Universe resources:
- Data Connection
- Data Foundation
- Buisness layer.
- Open recent project or resources.
- seeking for help from official SAP tutorials, Product documentation and Cheat sheets.
Local Project Window which also know as work-space is your first stop while creating a new Universe. We can use this window to create a new local project which will hold all Universe resources that we are going to create later on.
In this lecture; We will learn about the main functionality of "Local Projects" window which also know as "work space". We will learn:
- What is the difference between local project and shared project?
- What is the main use of Local project Window?
- How to create a new local project?
- How to use other functions in local project window like search and resource type filter?
In the older version of this tool; there was no feature that can support multi-user development environment. Only one Universe designer can make changes to the universe at a time. In SAP BusinessObjects Information design tool. you can share a project on the server with other Universe designers. you can also synchronize your local version of the project with the shared one. This is a very new addition to IDT. Here we will take about the main idea of this featuer while we will cover it in details in the full track version of this course.
In this lecture; We will learn how to access Project synchronization window. This window mainly used to access shared projects and synchronize local version project with one shared on the server.
Repository Resources window used to access resources on SAP BO Server. You can see published connections and Universes. From this window; you can:
- create folders on SAP BO server to organize your resources.
- create new connection directly on the server.
- delete resources from the BO server
Security is one of the most important aspects when it come to availing information for business users. The main idea of business Intelligence (BI) solution is to avail information on the right format in the right time for the right people and so security role can be highlighted.
SAP BO Information design tool (IDT) provide a security editor which can be used to create security profiles and then assign them to users and groups. The main idea of the security editor to restrict specific users rather than granting them privileges. we will have a complete section to cover this part in the Full track version of this course. I will publish also a mini course to cover this topic only.
In this lecture we will have a brief on Security Editor. security editor can be used to do the following functions:
- Create data profiles
- Create business profiles.
- assign profiles to users or groups.
- navigate profiles by Universe.
- navigate profiles by user.
Testing a Universe before publishing it is one of the most important aspects that we need to consider while creating a Universe. we will have a complete section on Universe testing in the full track version of this course. for now we will have an overview on check integrity window and what is the main functionality of this feature.
Check integrity window will display the list of errors and warnings raised from running the check integrity wizard. Check integrity wizard will run a set of checks against the Universe to test it is integrity. it is preferred to run this wizard before publishing a Universe and make it available for end users.
This is an optional lecture; you can skip it if you already have access to a database that we can use through this course. if you are interested; then you still can learn how to create an ODBC connection if you don't.
In this lecture you will learn:
- How to create ODBC connection based on MS Access database file.
Note: The Northwind MS access database is an open source template provided by Microsoft that you can use in any educational purpose. The file is attached to the lecture resources as well as the referance external links.
This quiz to test your understanding for IDT interface section
Building your first Universe
Data connection is the first resource type that we need to create as part of the universe creation process. data connection will enable us to connect to a data source (normally database) like oracle, teradata, DB2 and so on. we can also the "preview connection" new feature to explore tables and do initial data analysis. we have 2 types of connections:
- Relational connection.
- OLAP connection.
In this lecture; we will learn the following:
- How to create a data connection.
- What is Middle wear drivers
- How to use show values feature
Data foundation is the physical data model. we will insert our physical tables in data foundation and create joins between them. the main purpose of data foundation is to isolate technical part of our Universe from targeted end users. anything related to physical layer of our universe will be implemented here.
In this lecture; the student will learn the following:
- How to create single source data foundation?
- How to insert tables to data foundation?
- how to insert joins between tables?
- How to create Alias table?
Business layer is the final output of our Universe and it will be the interface that we are going to expose to end users. End user will use business layer to access information, create their own reports and dashboards and do their on the fly analysis. Universe will be build on top of the data foundation and it will use the common business terms that end users can easily understand. We will use folders to group information in a business logical way rather than how these information stored in the database.
In this lecture; the student will learn the following:
- How to create folders?
- How to create dimensions, measures and attributes?
- How to create Filters?
The final step of creating universes is to publish them. Publishing a Universe will make it available to be used by end users. we need to make sure that Universe is tested and approved before publishing it.
In this lecture; the student will learn the following:
- How to publish data connection to a BO repository?
- How to re-direct data foundation to the secured published connection?
- How to publish your Universe?
As a newbie you will need to get some help while building a Universe in the first few week. There are tow main method that you can use to get help that we will describe in the lecture.
In this lecture; we will learn how to learn the follwoing featuers to get help while creating a Universe:
- Universe creation wizard.
- Cheat Sheets.
This Quiz will test student understanding of this section
Using our Universe
Students will learn how to use our Universe to build a simple Webi report
Students will learn how to use our Universe in Lumira
The following topics are covered in this lecture:
- Introduction to the the full track course
- Dealing with shared projects.
- Dealing with security editor.
- Testing a Universe - Check integrity wizard.
- SQL Design traps (fan trap, chasm trap and loops)
- Data foundation advanced topics
- Business layer advanced topics:
- List of values
- navigation paths - hierarchies.
- aggregate awareness.
- Index awareness.
- multi lingual universes.
- What is new in SAP BO BI 4.2 release.
- Introduction to "Creating Universes with SAP BusinessObjects" Book
Test your understanding to section # 4
