Bypass Obiee Log On Screen

If you want to bypass log on screen when you first time access obiee page through launch url i.e. http://localhost/analytics then here is solution.

Locate analytics virtual folder (C:\OracleBI\web\app\) in this folder replace default.asp page with following.

I am assuming you have anonymous user exists and particular user role has assigned some dashboards.

##%@ LANGUAGE="JScript" %##

##%Response.Redirect("saw.dll?Dashboard?NQUser=Anonymous_user&NQPassword=Anonymous_user");%##

Replace default.jsp contents with following

##% response.sendRedirect("saw.dll?Dashboard?NQUser=Anonymous_user&NQPassword=Anonymous_user");%##

Please replace ## with < 'or' > respectively as shown in following figure

When ever users access obiee launch url , it bypasses logon screen and redirect to dashboard.

--Coming soon with new stuff

Information on Request XML

Today i would like to give some information on Report XML.

Every request internally stored as xml. i.e Request XML, you can view request xml in two ways, goto request’s advanced tab, under Request XML segment you can view this xml or Using Catalog Manager – locate report— on report right click – choose properties –click on Edit XML button—pops window with xml.

Here is through catalog manager.

In general creating a new request throughUI consists of criteria, results, prompts same thing with xml file, it compromise of three main divisions criteria, views, prompts under root node report.

Every request consists of common xml namespace (identified with uniquely named elements and attributes) attributes i.e xmlns

Then next part is criteria (report — criteria)

Criteria element again divided into two major elements Columns, Filters same as UI web construction.

Here is an example with namespaces and all available columns in report.

If you expand column, it internally composed from column related elements and attributes, here is a sample.

Then second large part in criteria is Filters, as show like below

Then next part in report is Views (report –views), in this section consists of all available views for corresponding report.

Last section in report is prompts, here all propmpt related things will be defined in xml, like caption, on which column, control etc

Following chart consist of some of basic elements or attributes and why they are used.

Element	Possible Attributes/Child Elements	Description
saw:report		Is a root element
saw:report	xmlns:saw="com.siebel.analytics.web/report/v1" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:sawx="com.siebel.analytics.web/expression/v1"	Possible namespace
saw:report	xmlVersion="200705140"	Version of xml
saw:criteria		It’s a saw:report child node. Consist of all columns and filter related stuff in this section
saw:criteria	subjectArea="Paint"	Defines subject area
saw:criteria	saw:columns	Consist of all report related columns
saw:columns	saw:column	To define column related properties
saw:column	Formula	Defines which column it refer to in presentation layer
saw:column	ColumnID	To identify uniquely across referring report
saw:column	saw:displayFormat exp:	To display cell display properties
saw:column	saw:dataFormat	To display column display properties
saw:column	saw:condition Exp: sawx:expr xsi:type="sawx:comparison" op="equal"> ALBANY	To display conditional display
saw:column	saw:navigation	To control drill downs or navigation to other reports
saw:navigation	saw:navTarget	To define navigation target and path
saw:navTargets	Caption	To display Caption
saw:column	saw:columnHeading exp: Market	To define header name
saw:filter	subjectArea	To define referring subject area
saw:filter	sawx:expr	To define expression type Possible expression categories
sawx:expr	xsi:type	To define logical conditions types Comparison sqlExpression savedFilter string etc.
sawx:expr	op	Operator
saw:views		Is child node of report sibling of criteria element used to customize report layout formats i.e. pivot,table,static view etc
saw:views	currentView	Is one among several display layouts
saw:views	saw:view	To displayor customize particular view
saw:view	xsi:type	To define which view we needed Here all possible views saw:titleView saw:tableView saw:staticchart saw:pivotTableView saw:filtersView saw:htmlview saw:narrativeView saw:sqlview saw:segmentview saw:targetlistview saw:colFilterPrompt
saw:view	saw:cvTable	Compound layout can consist many views ..they are defined as table
saw:cvTable	saw:cvRow	Each view as row
saw:view	autoPreview="true"	Decides whether to display automatically results or not when we access view
saw:prompts		Is a sibling of criteria, view elements or child of report element Which is used to define prompts
saw:prompts	xsi:type="saw:colFilterPrompt"	To define type of prompt
saw:prompts	Formula	To define presentation column
saw:prompts	subjectArea	To define which subject area
saw:prompts	Op	Operator
saw:prompts	controlType	To set control exp dropdown or edit box or multi selector
saw:prompts	saw:promptCaption	To set caption of prompt

There are few more advanced option which have not mentioned in above chart.

If you have any problem in viewing description in above chart, please find doc file here.

If you need my refernced Request XML file composed on top of paint, then please find here.

--Hope you got something.

Tip of the Day on Saved Filters

For each dash board prompt, create corresponding saved filter and use this filter across all reports.

Are you thinking why?

Suppose you have so many pages on dashboard with common dash board prompt across all pages and each page has one report, each report has drilldown to detail reports.

In these situations many people will create filters on each and every report from scratch, even though dashboard prompts (filters) are common across all the main pages and detailed pages. In these situations using of saved filters will be more powerful, its just one time creation and reusing it in all reports.

Even it is more useful, if requirement changes frequently on dash board prompts, its just matter of changing corresponding saved filter that’s all. How cool it is :)

Here is step by step to create Saved Filter and using it in reports.

1) Go to Answers and Click on create saved filter button

2) Choose subject area

3) Choose columns and corresponding condition i.e. all dashboard prompts.

4) Save

After save look like this

5) Create a report and add this saved filter.

6) Save report.

7) Link this report and dash board prompt in Dash Board page.

8) Browse the page.

Hope you will follow this as development standard, going forward in your development.

Sawping

Sawping is BI server ping tool comes along BI installation, it has following otions.

sawping [-p port] [-s host] [-v (verbose mode)] [-q (quiet mode)] [-h]

Here is an example on ping local machine which has BI server services down

C:\OracleBI\web\bin>sawping -v

Unable to connect to server. The server may be down or may be too busy to accept additional connections.

An error occurred during execution of "connect". No connection could be made because the target machine actively refused it.

[Socket:1864]

Error Codes: ETI2U8FA

Suppose server is running on remote machine

C:\OracleBI\web\bin>sawping –v –s servername

Server alive and well.

Custom logos/template in Office Add-ins

Default office excel report will be populated with oracle logos and footage, if you want to have customization as per your company, then here is a solution.

All these information is stored in template files, which are located at C:\Program Files\Oracle\BIOfficeExcel\Template\ on disk with file names as OBIReport.xlt, OBIReport.xls modify these files by remove oracle logos, add your logos, header, footer, back ground logo etc and save. Upon logon to office add-ins you will be able to see reports with your template.

Helpful articles,

1) Step by step on Using Office Add-ins with OBIEE in Oracle tech web

2) Customizing Excel defaults with templates

Purge BI Server Cache from Dash Board

One of colleague asked me, is it possible delete server cache from dash board? So started working on it, finally got solution how to do that.

I have created a script using C# on top of obiee-webservices, built a web page and embedded it on Dashboard, as of now I have incorporated Purge All, Purge by Database and they are working cool.

I have refered following resource,

Thanks John, for a very good article on cache purge.

Oracle technical resource on cache purging.

Oracle technical guide on Web Services.

I am thinking to make it as handy tool and available to every one.

All Resource files at one place

Many times I have confused to use fmap :)

For suppose I have placed html file in images folder (OracleBI\web\app\res\s_oracle10\images) and tried accessing using ‘fmap: images/help.html’ this was pointing me to wrong url http://localhost/analytics/Missing_images/help.html suppose to be http://localhost/analytics/images/help.html.

Then I have realized each and every resource folder has specific purpose in context to fmap usage i.e. if you want to place any image file then you need place it in only images folder.

If you want to place any help files we need to place these in “help” folder, by default help folder will not be there so create a help folder under OracleBI\web\app\res\s_oracle10 then keep what ever web file need.

But suppose you want to refer doc file as help file, then this is not possible using “fmap:help/help.doc”

If suppose you have dev, test, prod servers and you are doing an incremental releases then you need to look for all resource folders for any change at each release migrating from one server to other server.

To avoid all above problems its better to manage all resource files in one folder (virtual directory) local to BI server and access resource files from that url.

How to do that?

This method works well with IIS.

Create a virtual directory; this can be in three ways

Way 1:

1) start – run—inetmegr

2) locate analytics web folder

3) Right click – new – select virtual directory

4) Follow GUI

5) Alias as “ObieeResourcesFiles” or what ever name --next

6) Choose a folder to place all resources

7) Say next next

8) In 6th step folder place all resource files needed.

Way 2:

1) Go to C:\inetpub\wwwroot

2) Create a folder “ObieeResourcesFiles”

3) Restart iis services.

4) Place your resource files into this folder

Way 3:

1) Create a folder “ObieeResourcesFiles”

2) Right click folder select properties

3) Goto web sharing tab select bullet Share this folder.

4) Say okay, place all resource files here.

Now goto IIS manager you will be able to see your resource files in folder “ObieeResourcesFiles” in this directory locate any file – right click—select Browse, corresponding file will be opened in internet explorer copy that url paste it in where ever required in report.

Url look like http://localhost/virtualdirectory/resourcefile

Sample: http://localhost/ObieeResourcesFiles/Help.htm

Following image shows how it works.

Hope it helped you.