Building cockpits and dashboards: Shortcuts, design best practices, and

Building cockpits and
dashboards: Shortcuts,
design best practices, and
guidelines to ensure you pick
the right SAP NetWeaver BI
tool for the job
Dr. Bjarne Berg
© 2008 Wellesley Information Services. All rights reserved.
What We’ll Cover …
• Background, terminology, and examples
• Tool options
• What makes a good cockpit?
• Which tool is right for me?
• Wrap-up
1
Background and Terminology
Purpose
Usage
Updates
Data
Measures
Context
Source
Dashboard
Displays performance
Scorecard
Displays progress
Cockpits
Displays status and events
Performance monitoring
Performance management
Performance management
Real-time feeds
Monthly snapshots
Daily snapshots
Events
Summaries
Summaries and events
Metrics
KPIs
Metrics & KPIs
Exceptions/alerts
Targets and thresholds
Trends
Linked to systems
Linked to plans
Linked to BI systems
Sources: Wayne Eckerson, 2005;
Bjarne Berg 2006
2008
Many companies and people confuse the concepts of dashboards,
scorecards, and cockpits. They vary in terms of purpose, usage,
source, data, etc.
Most BI systems fall in to the cockpits category
These are typical parameters, and some may be slightly different
(e.g., some metrics in a cockpit may only be updated monthly).
However, such deviations should be exceptions.
2
Typical Components of a Cockpit: SEM Example
• Higher-
level
navigation
between
views
• External
data
• Graphical
displays
Comparative/
benchmarking
Logical grouping of
similar information
3
SEM Management Cockpit
Customized navigation
menus and buttons
Illustrate best
practices, benchmarks,
or target performance
4
Navigations Linked to Multiple Views
Central navigation can
change multiple views
Link more
documentation
Make multiple
measures available
Source: SAP AG, 2005
5
What We’ll Cover …
• Background, terminology, and examples
• Tool options
• What makes a good cockpit?
• Which tool is right for me?
• Wrap-up
6
Tool Options
• SEM CPM
• Web Application Designer (Web AD)
• SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer
• Publishing to the portal
• Custom cockpits (BI Java SDK)
• Third-party cockpits
7
Strategy Management and Performance Measurement – CPM
The presentation layer in SAP
Management cockpits has
four layers:
•Cockpit
•Wall
•Logical view
•Frame
High-level overview (consists of walls)
A logical grouping of measures
The display level of the cockpit; consists of frames
Lowest level of individual measure display
These presentation layer objects are already Webenabled and integrated with the Portal. They also
provide built-in drill-downs and navigation, based
on how you constructed your measures.
8
What is SEM – CPM?
The Corporate Performance Monitor (SEM-CPM) is part of the Strategic
Enterprise Management BI tool suite. It consists of the Performance
Measurement (PM) area and the Strategy management area (SM).
The Performance Management area consists of four distinct areas:
1. Management Cockpit
2. Measure Builder
3. Benchmarking
4. Delivery of business content
The Strategy Management consists also of four areas
1. Balanced Scorecard
Strategy
2. Strategy modeling
3. Value Driver Tree
4. Risk Management
Measure
Value Driver Tree
Objective
Initiative
Source: J. Lombard, 2006
Risk
9
SEM – CPM Walls
Walls are the highest level of the SEM-CPM Cockpit. Research has
shown that more than 7 walls are hard to read and comprehend. Ideal
numbers are 3, 5 or 7.
Major consideration!!
Humans have a hard
time remembering,
organizing, and retain
information that is
asymmetrical.
This is true for
hearing, seeing,
tasting, feeling and
smelling.
Read more about the cognitive revolution and the article that
started it all: Newell and Simon “The magic number 7” (1956)
10
Rules for Graphs and Real Estate
• Try to avoid empty spaces, but don’t force unrelated measures
into the cockpit — it confuses users
• Don’t use as many types of graphs as possible,
and never mix more than 3 types of graphs. If you
use more, users have to interpret the pictures as well as the data.
• Missing data
points add
irritation
11
SEM-CPM Rules for Graphs and Real Estate (cont.)
There is nothing wrong with using the same type of graphs
on a cockpit (e.g., tachometers or line charts). Users adapt
quickly and can absorb the information faster.
12
Tool Options
• SEM CPM
• Web Application Designer (Web AD)
• SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer
• Publishing to the portal
• Custom cockpits (BI Java SDK)
• Third-party cockpits
13
Cockpits with Web AD 3.x and SAP NetWeaver 7.0
• Web Application Designer can create Web-based
cockpits using BW query data
14
Cockpits with SAP NetWeaver 7.0 Web AD
• New items include improved tab strip container in SAP NetWeaver 7.0
for designing BI Web applications
• Reduces the
amount of
custom
coding
required with
the help of
Command
wizards, Auto
complete, and
support for
HTML tags
15
SAP NetWeaver 7.0 Web AD New Features
• Web Items: Tab Pages, Button, Script Item (SAP NetWeaver 7.0
•
•
•
•
•
Support Package Stack 7)
Drag and drop using Analysis item
New chart types (heat map, Gantt, milestone trend analysis)
Export BI Web applications in PDF format
Command Wizard for generating Web
API commands
Integration with SAP NetWeaver 7.0 BEx Report Designer for
formatted reports
16
BI Web API Commands
• You can use BI Web API commands for carrying out
certain actions in BI Web Applications
 Export to Excel, PDF, etc.
 OLAP functions: Apply Filter values, remove drill downs
• Command Wizards guide you through the steps for
creating a BI Web API command
• Commands appear together
for easy access
 Data Provider
 Web Items
 Web Templates
Web cockpits developed by Web AD in SAP
NetWeaver 7.0 can be interactive, include
many data sources, and be very flexible
17
Command Wizard and JavaScript
•
Use Command Wizard for generating JavaScript code for the
Script Item to use in custom cockpit applications
This is a great feature for
building custom features into
your cockpits based on
18
standard JavaScript
More New Cockpit Options
• Personalize BI query variables
• Bookmark the navigational state of the BI Web application
• Perform multidimensional analysis of BI query data
• Allow users to create exceptions and conditions for BI query data
These features make it
easier to customize the
dataset that queries
return to the Web
cockpit
19
Web AD Cockpits in SAP Enterprise Portal
Directly publish BI Web cockpits to Portal Content Catalog using the
Publish option from Web AD
Portal and BI system connection should
be set up per SAP Note 917950
20
Broadcast Cockpit Views Using Web AD
In SAP NetWeaver 7.0, use Information Broadcaster to broadcast BI
Web applications (e.g., cockpit views) to Enterprise Portal KM folders
and via email in various formats (PDF, MHTML, HTML)
• Information Broadcaster/Reporting Agent (SAP BW 3.x) can
precalculate BI Web applications to enhance performance
•
21
Tool Options
• SEM CPM
• Web Application Designer (Web AD)
• SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer
• Publishing to the portal
• Custom cockpits (BI Java SDK)
• Third-party cockpits
22
Visual Composer
A Visual Composer is a tool to visualize the data. It is a browser-based
modeling and design tool for rapid application development & prototyping
in a code-free development environment.
23
Visual Composer is Easy for Power Users to Learn
Visual Composer is a power user tool that is simple to learn for
someone with a little bit of technical background (i.e. controllers,
report writers, analysts).
No coding required to
create great-looking
Web-based cockpits
Take advantage of prebuilt
analytic business packages
24
Source: SAP
Visual Composer for Complex cockpits
Modeling of BI applications using the BI kit of the Visual
Composer allows business users to create analytical content
for SAP portal. It offers the integration with BI InfoProviders,
views, BEx web applications, PDF and more via WEB API as
access to
other data
sources such
as OLAP and
relational data
sources) via
Java
connectors
25
Image source: Cubeserv
SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer DataProviders
• You can use BI queries and views as DataProviders for SAP
NetWeaver Visual Composer models
• You also can use BI query functionalities for exceptions and
variables along with SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer
models
• SAP NetWeaver
Visual Composer
allows access to BI
history, favorites,
and roles
26
Visual Composer Data Methods
• Can integrate data from multiple data sources, including
SAP and non-SAP systems, into one model
• Different options available for data access include:
 BI Extension Kit
 Remote Function Call (RFC)
 Web services
• BI Extension Kit allows access
to the following DataSources
 SAP NetWeaver 2004 BI
(BW 3.5 Support Package 14)
 SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0
 JDBC
 XMLA
27
Details about Visual Composer Cockpits
•Delivered as part of Enterprise Portal in SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 Usage
Type (SPS8 and higher)
•Different options available for rendering Visual Composer output
Flash
Web Dynpro (HTML)
•Flash provides high-end visualization of Visual Composer models
Since a cockpit may have
many different DataSources
(queries), it can take quite
some time to execute them
if the memory cache is not
used consistently
28
The future of Visual Composer
Source: SAP, July 2008
SAP July, 2008: Composition Environment including
Visual Composer continues to be the go-to product for
creating composite applications.
29
Tool Options
• SEM CPM
• Web Application Designer (Web AD)
• SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer
• Publishing to the portal
• Custom cockpits (BI Java SDK)
• Third-party cockpits
30
Web Cockpit in the Portal
Integrate queries and
Web applications into the
portal through
publishing, broadcasting,
or Web calls
The portal can either
receive designed pages
passively or actively
create communities, Web
pages, collaboration
rooms, or cockpits
Publishing
Broadcasting
31
Web Cockpit in the Portal (cont.)
• The SEM-CPM cockpits
are already part of the
portal, so you can access
them there
• iViews can build custom
portal cockpits with
iViews from many data
sources (Web AD, BW,
SEM, SAP R/3, Web) and
in many formats (graphs,
pictures, figures, tables)
• iViews can also be
interactive
32
SAP NetWeaver 7.0 Visual Composer Portal Publishing
• SAP NetWeaver Visual
Composer Design time
deploys Visual
Composer models
directly as iViews to
Portal Content Catalog
• You can then use Visual
Composer iViews in
portal pages, roles, etc.
33
Building a Web Cockpit in the Portal
The trick in developing custom Web
cockpits in the portal is to manage
the real estate carefully
Most pure iView-based cockpits are
cluttered and hard to read and
navigate
1. Start with logical groupings of
items (sales, finance, e.g.)
3. Share the same navigation menus
and tabs as the portal
2. Limit colors to complementary
formats (we will look at these
later)
4. Avoid running text, flashes,
animations, layering and scrolling
text (this is an absolute no-no)
34
Tool Options
• SEM CPM
• Web Application Designer (Web AD)
• SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer
• Publishing to the portal
• Custom cockpits (BI Java SDK)
• Third-party cockpits
35
BI Java SDK-Based Cockpits
BI Java SDK can be used for custom applications based on SAP BI
and non-SAP data.
• BI Java SDK provides access to relational and OLAP data sources
using JDBC, XMLA, ODBO etc.
• Access to 200+ data sources using the JDBC drivers.
•
Java programmers will
recognize the
Software Development
Kit (SDK) main
libraries such as the
abstract windowing
toolkit (AWT) and the
GUI-oriented Swing
object library as well
36
Source: SAP AG, 2005
BI Java SDK-Based Cockpits (cont.)
• SAP NetWeaver Developer Studio can develop BI Java SDK-based
applications
• Can use along with SAP Java Web Dynpro
Tip
Interested
developers should
familiarize
themselves with
SAP NetWeaver
Developer Studio
37
Tool Options
• SEM CPM
• Web Application Designer (Web AD)
• SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer
• Publishing to the portal
• Custom cockpits (BI Java SDK)
• Third-party cockpits
38
Third-Party Cockpits
• Some best-of-breed cockpit tools incorporate SAP BI as part
of a Web item provider, or more commonly through BW
queries fed by BAPIs or OLE DB for OLAP (ODBO) in BW
• Some even provide separate Multidimensional Online
Analytical Processing (MOLAP) solutions tightly connected to
SAP BW
 Hint: reading RS_ tables inside BW
Microsoft
Cognos
39
Third-Party Cockpits (cont.)
• Other BI and cockpit companies,
such as Corda, are actively
working on creating cockpit
tools for SAP NetWeaver BI
40
What We’ll Cover …
• Background, terminology, and examples
• Tool options
• What makes a good cockpit?
• Which tool is right for me?
• Wrap-up
41
War Rooms and External Access
1. Shared cockpits are most
useful
2. External access to information is more common.
Vendors and customers love it!
3. You can build war rooms for collaborative
decision making using cockpits
4. Cockpits require a true BI infrastructure.
Note
It is tempting to jump straight to the
cockpit development, but it is almost
impossible without a well-architected
BW system to support it.
42
A Good Cockpit Is Simple
The majority of usage of cockpits is in user segments 1 and 5.
You should use BI queries and OLAP for the other segments.
Segment 1: Trackers - 37%
Tracking - Characterized by low duration
overall.
Segment 4: Info Gatherers - 4%
Concentrated in information areas.
Rarely reach transaction areas.
Segment 2: Reservers - 3%
Low duration per page view.
Segment 5: Single-clickers - 32%
Visit homepage only.
Segment 3: Uncommitted - 10%
Characterized by long duration.
Complex decisions.
Segment 6: Wanderers - 15%
Very few, very random pages.
Few hits, but long duration per page
view.
Example source: Dr. Paul Strupp, Sun Microsystems
Note
The average manager navigates in no more than 7 dimensions and only 2 levels deep
(49 views). Therefore, the majority of users of cockpits need a few, simple, but highly
informative, views. The other user community is best served by OLAP queries.
43
The Need for Speed
• When cockpits bring together data from many sources
during runtime, it can be slow and cumbersome
 This is because when your system accesses the portal cockpit,
it may have to execute supporting cockpit queries
• Solution: You can present static images (i.e., static HTML
from BEx Broadcaster into a portal iView) or you can
cache queries results by using BEx Broadcaster in SAP
NetWeaver 7.0
44
The Need for Speed (cont.)
• SAP NetWeaver 7.0 allows you to fill the resident memory of
your server with pre-run results (cache). This provides
faster response to the users, since the query result sets are
accessed from memory instead of re-executed on the
database side.
SAP BW 3.5
SAP NetWeaver 7.0
IMPORTANT: Old Reporting Agent scenarios still run in
SAP NetWeaver 7.0. However, Reporting Agent will not be
developed further and is removed from SAP NetWeaver
7.0 Workbench. In SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 you can only
reach it by transaction code REPORTING_AGENT
45
The Need for Speed - BI Accelerator
SAP
BW
Any
tool
The SAP BI
Accelerator makes
query response time
50-10,000 faster.
You use process
chains to maintain
the HPA engine after
each data load
HP, Sun and IBM have standard solutions ranging
from $32K to $250K+ that can be installed and
tested in as little as 2-4 weeks (+ SAP license fees)
Breaking news: 32 Gb Blades are
now certified by SAP (July 2008) 46
What We’ll Cover …
• Background, terminology, and examples
• Tool options
• What makes a good cockpit?
• Which tool is right for me?
• Wrap-up
47
What SAP Tool Should I Use?
BW 3.x
Web AD
SAP NetWeaver
2004s
Web AD
SAP
NetWeaver
Visual
Composer
SAP
SEMCPM
Thirdparty
cockpits
Multidimensional Analysis (full)
J
J
-
-
-
Portal integration
J
J
J
J
J
Information Broadcaster
J
J
-
J
-
-
-
-
J
J
J
J
J
J
-
J
J
J
Direct support for non-BW data
-
-
Simplicity to use and learn
-
-
Formatted reporting
Graphical options (delivered)
Automatic code generation
SAP integration
Java SDK
tools
Portal
iViews
-
J
-
-
-
J
J
J
J
J
-
J
-
J
J
-
-
-
J
There are many options and sometimes the choice is based on
what you are familiar with and whether you enjoy using new tools
J
J
-
48
New Tools Roadmap
Source SAP AG, June 2008
49
BOBJ capabilities – Dashboards and Reports
• Dashboards can be built using
Xcelsius.
• Xcelsius+ will be launched in 2009,
and will be “the flagship product for
data visualization & dashboards”
• BEx Web Application Designer will
not be enhanced further beyond
Release NW 7.1 in 2008.
Crystal Reports for pixel formatted
reports has been available with SAP
BI/BW since 2002. This tool can be
integrated into your tool portfolio using
existing SAP NetWeaver BI queries
(NOTE: Crystal & Crystal Light will be the core tools for
formatted reports starting 2010)
Source SAP AG,
June 2008
50
What We’ll Cover …
• Background, terminology, and examples
• Tool options
• What makes a good cockpit?
• Which tool is right for me?
• Wrap-up
51
Resources
•
COMERIT (Presentations, Articles and Accellerators)
http://csc-studentWeb.lrc.edu/swp/Berg/BB_index_main.htm
• SAP Online Help BW and EP Integration
 http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw04/helpdata/en/a3/7b583c2439e66fe1
0000000a114084/content.htm
• SDN BW How to Guides - How to integrate Visual Composer
Applications and BEx Web Templates
 https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/servlet/prt/portal/prtroot/docs/library/uui
d/ad182ac7-0a01-0010-4fb8-8a4d217b19c1
• BW Expert (www.BWExpertOnline.com)*
“Create Unparalleled Analytical Applications with SAP NetWeaver BI,
Visual Composer, and Macromedia Flex” by Moya Watson and Judy
Kestecher, SAP Labs, January 2006 issue
*
Requires access to credentials to view full article text
52
7 Key Points to Take Home
• There are many ways to build Web cockpits and SAP has
•
•
•
•
tools for them all
Look at in-house Web skills before you decide on
the tool
SAP Performance Management is a great tool for those
with limited Web skills, but requires consistency in
performance measures (roll-ups) and structured
navigation
SAP NetWeaver Visual Composer is great for complex
graphing
Web AD is the tool of choice by experienced Web
programmers who want total design freedom
53
7 Key Points to Take Home
• Third-party tools for Web cockpits are emerging and some
are quite advanced (Cognos, e.g.)
• While all these tools gives you a great deal of flexibility, it is
the use of the real estate, colors, graphs, and consistency
that is going to determine if your cockpit is successful:
Spend serious time designing instead of coding!
54
Your Turn!
How to contact me:
Dr. Bjarne Berg
[email protected]