The introduction of Hyperion 11.1.2 has some fantastic improvements.  Many of these have been long awaited.  The next few articles on In2Hyperion will describe some of the enhancements to Hyperion Planning, Hyperion Essbase, and Hyperion SmartView. 

XREF Background

If you have been developing Planning applications, you are probably very familiar with the XREF function.  This function is used in business rules, calculation scripts, and member formulas.  It provides a method to move data from one plan type (Essbase database) to another plan type.  It is executed from the target database and pulls the data from the source.  XWRITE was actually introduced in later versions of 11.1.1.x, but is very stable in 11.1.2.x.  XWRITE is executed from the source and pushes data to the target.  This function is a huge improvement over XREF.  More...

I would like to introduce a networking opportunity for all you infrastructure groupies, or those interested in the technical side of the Hyperion suite.  Follow Rob Donahue on twitter - @EPMTechTips.  

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Although implied shares can improve performance by not storing the same data multiple times, it has many negative impacts. For example, implied shares cause problems in Hyperion Planning at the load level (level 0).  A parent with a storage property of Stored that has one child (or only one child that consolidates) will create an implied share.  This results in level 0 members being locked, preventing web form data entry.  In Essbase/Planning, the storage method of any parent with one child has to be changed to Never Share to allow user input.

For those of you who have been snake bitten by this, you will welcome a relatively unknown Essbase configuration setting in the Essbase configuration file (essbase.cfg).  More...

Game on!  A record number of abstracts were submitted for Kscpoe12, and here are 3 presentations you will want to check out. 

Session 1: Financial Reporting

Josh Forrest is the best FR person I have ever worked with.  He is presenting “Simplify report development utilizing best-practice methodologies with Hyperion Financial Reporting.”  He is going to cover the benefits and drawbacks of using shared objects, among other things. 

Title:  Simplify report development utilizing best-practice methodologies with Hyperion Financial Reporting
Date:  June 27th
Time:  3:00 PM-4:00 PM

Session 2: Infrastructure

Rob Donahue is one of the most talented architecture resources you will ever find.  The Kscope team thinks so highly of him that they have asked him to be involved, have given him a time slot, and are going to determine the topic at a future date.  Whatever the topic, if you want to learn something about the infrastructure side, make sure you attend.

Date: June 25th
Time:  8:30 AM-9:30 AM

Session 3: Hyperion Planning

I will be presenting a Hyperion Planning solution that provides a great way to give users the ability to spread data at a finite level on any spread method defined.  If you are looking to create, or enhance, your budgeting process, you won’t want to miss how we solved this problem. 

Title:  Create Unlimited Custom Spreads for Driver Based Planning
Date:  June 25th
Time:  11:30 AM-12:30 PM

We will always be asked to do more with less. Finance is asked to produce more and better analytics with less people. Sales people are asked to produce more in a weakening economy with less marketing dollars, and yes, groups that manage Essbase environments are asked to produce and manage more data/applications with shrinking resources.

Back in the Day

In a prior life, I used to manage a group responsible for managing the Essbase environment used to produce all the reporting for the group. It generated about 70% of the revenue for Bank One (now Chase). We delivered all the reporting, budgeting, and forecasting applications. It included nearly 2 TB of data (pre ASO) on four servers that included more than 50 databases. All the typical technologies were employed. A large number of filters existed to maintain security. Many of the applications were linked together with several types of partitions. Data was loaded daily, weekly, and monthly. SQL Server was used for all the ETL processes, and we completed the development and performed all the maintenance with four people. 

The only way the group could be effective in developing and enhancing applications, was to eliminate our effort spent on typical production activities. With the number of applications and the frequency they were updated (daily, weekly, or monthly), communicating this information to the more than 250 users was also a large time commitment.

The Solution

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