openSAP Implementation of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud

Week 1 Unit 1

00:00:10 Hello, and welcome to the course "The Implementation of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud".My name is Mark Burke, and I am with the Scale, Enablement, and Transformation group of SAP Labs in Palo Alto, California. 00:00:25 I want to welcome you to this course.In this session, which is Week 1 Unit 1, we're going to be introducing you to the course, 00:00:32 and also to the product called SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.Let's cover one naming convention item before we start the course. 00:00:41 SAP BusinessObjects Cloud is the new name for a product that was originally released as SAP Cloud for Analytics.So in this course and going forward, SAP will refer to this as SAP BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:00:54 Be aware that in some of the demonstrations and links that we show you, there may still be references to SAP Cloud for Analytics, but that is the same thing as SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, and that's the name of the product going forward. 00:01:07 I wanted to cover that with you before we start the course.So let's go ahead and get started. 00:01:12 First of all, what can you expect over the next three weeks in this course? First of all, we're going to go through an introduction to the course and also the product. 00:01:21 In Unit 2, we're going to cover where to find help and support, and Units 3 and 4 will be dedicated to model development and maintenance.In Week 2, we'll be covering integration topics. 00:01:32 I'll be joined by my colleague Sreedhar, who'll go through master data, transaction data, and be showing you some demonstrations of how to integrate data from different systems. 00:01:42 In Week 3, we'll cover all the other implementation essentials, including security, stories, and all the other features.Through each week and each unit, we'll usually be showing you best practices in each of these areas, 00:01:55 so that you can really understand how to implement SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.And again in Week 3, we'll recap some of the key best practices that you should follow 00:02:04 as an implementation consultant or partner, or as a customer.Be aware that at the end of each week we have a weekly assignment 00:02:14 that will actually be required if you want to gain the certificate of achievement.Now how do you get that certificate? 00:02:20 You complete the assignments at the end of each week, which are a set of questions that will test your understanding of the concepts covered in that week. 00:02:31 At the end of Week 3, we will open up for about another week a final exam that will also be a recap of your understanding of the 3-week coverage of the material. 00:02:43 If you correctly complete at least 50% of both the weekly assignments and the final exam together, you will get a certificate of achievement. 00:02:51 You could actually use this in the market to say that you have this certificate for implementing SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.One thing before we move on: There are deadlines to meet in order to get to the certificate of achievement. 00:03:08 So watch out for when things are due each week, and of course, the final exam has an end date, too.And you must complete the weekly assignments and the final exam in a timely fashion based on the timelines 00:03:19 in order to get that certificate of achievement.Now let's go through the audience assumptions to make sure that you're on the right course,

1 00:03:27 and to make sure that this course is exactly as you expected.You're going to find that SAP BusinessObjects Cloud has a set of 40-plus videos out on YouTube which are 100% demonstrations. 00:03:39 Those videos that are already on the market and are free and available on YouTube are really set up for customers ready to review SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, 00:03:49 maybe users who are ready to dive in and start using it, and then partners or consultants who want to become aware of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:03:59 So from there, you're going to be able to review the power of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, and understand the functionality and capabilities. 00:04:06 In this course, we're taking a step back from that and introducing a course for an audience of customers, partners, and consultants who are ready to implement BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:04:18 Maybe you've already looked at some of the YouTube videos or had a demonstration, but now you're looking to implement – so that's the audience for this course. 00:04:27 And in this course, we'll talk to you about what it takes to implement SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, understand options and scenarios that you will encounter and need to make decisions on, 00:04:39 and we'll start talking to you about factors that will impact some of your scoping estimates.So if you're a partner or a consultant giving an estimate to a customer, 00:04:48 you'll understand what some of the factors are, about what will take time and how much time it will take.The way that we're setting this up, therefore, is that we're going to leverage the YouTube videos, 00:04:59 but we can become a prerequisite for those, so we're going to give you a context for some of this, and then the YouTube videos will be used to support that. 00:05:07 We'll also go through that here on the next slide.So let's think about that. 00:05:11 Out there in the market today are YouTube videos delivered by SAP that are 100% demonstration – there are 40-plus of those – and they show product features, user demonstrations, and so on. 00:05:24 And in this openSAP course, we're now going to break it up into these three weeks, and we're going to cover modeling, and we're going to break up the videos and point you to those videos that deal with modeling. 00:05:36 Integration – the same thing.Security – we'll carve out the videos that have to do with security.

00:05:42 And then we'll also cover stories, which is your report writing, and then all the other features.And in this course, you're going to learn about: What questions do I ask my customer to make sure that I have the right set of requirements? 00:05:53 What implementation steps should I follow? And also best practices along the way. 00:05:58 So best practices for modeling, integration, security, story deployment, those types of things.So where you really have to think about this course and the way it's set up is that 00:06:07 the mandatory part of this course is the openSAP content.We're going to be showing you videos supported by materials, and we'll be covering some slides and so on, 00:06:17 and for about 30–40% of the time, we'll be in demonstrations – that's the mandatory part of this course.The optional part of this course is for you, because we'll now give you a pointer to these videos that are available in the public domain 00:06:30 and you can use those videos to further your knowledge.In fact, we ask that you actually go through the YouTube videos after listening to the openSAP. 00:06:41 Then it'll be a very easy transition because, for instance, in the modeling area, we'll talk to you about modeling and some of the concepts that have to do with implementation, 00:06:49 we'll give you a browse around and show you inside the tool what it means, but then you can turn around and watch detailed videos on really how to model 00:06:59 and what modeling means within SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.So you have this opportunity here in those 2–3 hours of the week that we ask you to set aside 00:07:07 to leverage both the openSAP content, to learn about the context of implementation, and then to step into a user type of role and really see a 100% demo end to end – 00:07:18 these short videos – on how to build a report, create a KPI, and actually create an analytical model.And so between the two of these, you're going to have the knowledge to not only understand 00:07:30 what the product can do, but how to implement So that's the value of our course. 00:07:35 Now be aware of a couple of things here.Our videos that we show you on the openSAP site last about 15 minutes each. 00:07:42 So you have this opportunity to listen to modeling, for instance, for about 15 minutes, and then go through and watch 2–3 videos that have to do with modeling to get some demonstration.

00:07:54 And we've set up the course to make the transition very easy for you as you go from openSAP into YouTube.So hopefully that helps you understand who this course is for and how to really leverage it. 00:08:09 A big question we have is about access to a hands-on system.A hands-on system is not required for this course. 00:08:16 There are really three different areas in what we've given you here: Customers request hands- on access by requesting a demo, and then from there, 00:08:25 you work with your account manager on gaining access to SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.Partners go through PartnerEdge. 00:08:32 And consultants: If you're an internal employee, you can go through a link we have here to an internal Jam site.So those three areas are not required as part of this course, but if you start that process now, 00:08:41 it can eventually lead to hands-on access to the SAP BusinessObjects Cloud environment.So that covers our course logistics. Let's now go through SAP BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:08:58 The first thing is, it's all analytics. One user, a unified product. It covers analytics, it can cover areas of planning.We have predictive, with GRC and other exciting things into the future.

00:09:10 Think about this – it's cloud-based, so it's very different than other tools.Everything exists in the cloud – you go in there, you can do your analysis, your planning, your predictive. 00:09:20 All these different things in one product.That combination of everything leads to a lot of synergies within your organization. 00:09:29 Users will learn one product, learn how to graft things.They'll actually learn how to run tables. 00:09:34 They can do a lot of their analytics right within that single product, and they can expand that across multiple data sources, multiple scenarios, including Analytics, Planning, Predictive, and so on. 00:09:47 This is being worked into the SAP landscape, where we can pull data from cloud sources or on-premise sources.We can connect directly to data, or we can decouple and bring the data forward 00:10:00 and put it into a standalone model inside of BusinessObjects Cloud.A topper on that is that we have a product called SAP Digital Boardroom, which is a way for you to present information to executives, 00:10:13 and run a boardroom process using this product line, including SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.Now what are the types of things you'll see in Analytics? 00:10:24 The ability to, first of all, take in data and "massage" it if you need to before you actually start building visualizations.You'll be able to do deep-dives into product and create a kind of drilldown path. 00:10:36 You'll be able to link different types of data.You'll be able to put a generic filter on them, so as you filter, different graphics move, and a lot of the power of capabilities and the analytics. 00:10:48 And a lot of those powers will come through on the YouTube videos we're going to point you to, because those are really detailed and they're really good at the user level. 00:10:55 But first we're going to show you what it takes to implement these and what some of the considerations are that you have to think about.Ultimately, because this analytic capability is now within one product, you can now share it. 00:11:07 A planning user can share his plan with the rest of the users.Or if you have a sales analysis that's a quarter over quarter or maybe a month over month, 00:11:15 you can now share that with your colleagues, and they can go into the same product and do all this without ever leaving the product. 00:11:22 Actually, collaboration is also available.The planning capabilities are a great enhancement. 00:11:29 Now you're in a planning tool that has a lot of data in it, and you can use that data to start setting up your plan.It helps you simplify because now you have data that's maybe been used for Analytics and you're now going to plan from. 00:11:40 The experience is nice because you can put in a lot of visualizations.So, for example, you can see your cost trend before you actually submit your plan. 00:11:49 And then the trust of it, because you can actually connect the data sources, a wide set of users can be looking at it, and you can now have this one source of the truth as you go into your planning process. 00:11:59 And you can also trust the plan that's been put together because so many eyes are on it in one product.Then some of the new capabilities are being released just as this course is coming out, as part of Sapphire in May 2016. 00:12:12 You'll see the Predictive capabilities are going to really add a whole new dimension to this type of product, where now you can actually start doing your predictive to support both your Planning and your Analytics. 00:12:25 We talked about SAP Digital Boardroom, I touched on it.But this is your transparent to your organization. 00:12:30 Thinking about... you're in a boardroom, maybe you have a few different monitors.And you as an analyst, or a planning manager, or whatever your role is, 00:12:39 like in a corporate organization that is actually supporting FP&A (Financial Planning and Analysis), you're going to actually support your organization, and you're going to look at your digital boardroom, 00:12:52 and you're going to actually show them graphics, maybe what's going on with sales, do a drill through, drill down into the next level of details, 00:13:01 and SAP Digital Boardroom will allow you to do that.So the SAP BusinessObjects Cloud implementation guide – let's think about this. 00:13:11 This is how this course is set up.In Week 1, we're going to cover modeling. 00:13:18 After we introduce the product to you now and go through help and support, we're going to talk to you about modeling.One of the key peaks on this triangle here is the model itself. 00:13:29 In Week 2, we're going to cover integration.Again, my colleague Sreedhar will come in and talk about how you connect these models to data either directly, or how you take them, 00:13:37 decouple them, bring the data in, and do some manipulation of the data so that you can use it for planning or analysis.And also security, this is a key thing. 00:13:49 One of the key things we want to drive into people thinking about implementation is that the modeling decisions you make impact the integration decisions you make. 00:13:58 The integration decisions you make will actually impact the security.And as you go through this, by the end of this course, you're going to learn how a model impacts integration, 00:14:08 how integration impacts security, and just the loop around here, and that those decisions will be key.If you're an Analytics consultant coming into this, you really should hear things about the 00:14:19 different types of model, both Planning, Analytics, what we call the "integrated" or "connected" model, or what we call the "manual" or "standalone" model. 00:14:29 You should hear about all these different options.Because based on a scenario given to you by your customer, 00:14:34 you're going to have to make some decisions on what type of model to deliver to your customer.And so those are going to be really important. 00:14:41 So this is a very important starting point in the course.You're going to see this triangle throughout it, we're going to end with it in Week 3, 00:14:50 and we'll recap some of the findings around this.Of course, in the course we also cover stories – and we're going to do that in Week 3 – 00:14:57 and that's really the visualization layer that happens inside of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.We also have collaboration – and we'll talk about this in Week 3 – which is your ability to

00:15:07 communicate and say, "Hey, Mary, what's going on with sales in the first quarter?", and you can have a discussion right within the product even from your mobile device. 00:15:15 You can also talk about events, especially for Planning, where you maybe want to schedule a planning process.And then also files, where you can actually put supporting files into SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, 00:15:25 which will allow you, for instance, in Analytics to maybe publish a quarter-over-quarter written summary, or in a Planning process, maybe a justification for a plan. 00:15:35 This is the end of the unit and we're going to go onto the next unit soon, but before we do so, I want to just give you a quick browse-through on the system. 00:15:46 So here I am at the login screen – remember this is a cloud-based system so you don't have to install anything, and I'm now logged into a link that's pointing to my BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:15:58 I'm going to put in my authorized user ID... and my password...Let me do that again, sorry. 00:16:10 And I'll log on.Now this is cloud-based so there's nothing to install on your desktop, and you're going to see a lot of this. 00:16:16 Remember, we're going to show you some demonstrations in openSAP that will always point you to additional demonstrations on YouTube, and we ask you to take both. 00:16:26 Although remember that only the openSAP content is what will be tested as part of the certificate of achievement.So here I am, I'm logged in. 00:16:34 You're going to see "Welcome to SAP Cloud for Analytics".Down the road, SAP is rebranding this and you'll see SAP BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:16:42 But here I am, I'm logged in.I have the ability to go directly and connect to data. 00:16:47 I can actually connect to models and so on.I could also come back here – I just want to show you some of these options. 00:16:56 I can plan my business – this is a kind of wizard to start up a headcount plan, to start up a generic financial plan.I can import data directly into the reporting engine without creating a model. 00:17:07 And then I can actually just take existing data and explore from it.As I log in, you're going to see a tenant number up here. 00:17:13 The way that your data is protected is that you'll get your own tenant, and that's how you'll have your own data, even though it's in the cloud, and you'll have your own access to it so that it'll be private to your company but available in the cloud. 00:17:28 So just be aware of that.Then you'll see things like the collaboration here. 00:17:33 This collaboration allows me to open up discussions, the help, which we'll talk about in Unit 2 of Week 1, and then other things, which include alerts, so you'll have alerts here, or on any type of device, for instance, on your mobile phone. 00:17:47 So a very simple interface that's really meant to be used without a lot of training.So users can go around here and explore, and as they come over here to the menus, 00:17:56 they'll see things like the Modeler, which we'll be covering in Week 1 Units 3 and 4.You'll see different types of model here: a Planning model and an Analytic model. 00:18:06 As a consultant ready to implement this, you really need to understand the difference between a Planning and an Analytic model.And underlying this, for instance, this is "STORE_SALES". 00:18:15 This is what's called a "connected" model.This is connected directly for analysis to a HANA source, 00:18:20 which means that it's live to the source and you can run visualizations on it.You need to understand that type of model versus the other type of model, let's say, "USA_Distribution". 00:18:29 That's one where we import it from the source.It's a standalone model inside of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:18:37 And that type of model is now separate from the other.So you have it decoupled from the source and now you can manipulate it more 00:18:46 and do a lot of "what if", and it can be used, for instance, for Planning.So by the end of this course, you're going to understand the difference between a Planning and an Analytic model.

00:18:54 You're also going to understand the difference between a "connected" and a "standalone" or "manual" model.In Week 2, we'll go through the integration topics. 00:19:05 You're going to see a lot on integration – integration shows up throughout the tool.There's the ability here to import directly from sources, 00:19:12 whether it's to help you create a model the first time, or to incrementally add data to one of those models that's been made standalone or manual. 00:19:20 And you're going to cover that in Week 2.Again in Week 3, we go through Stories, which is where the reports reside. 00:19:27 We also go through Security, we'll talk about Users, Teams, Roles, and how to set up security.Then we'll have all the other features, which are a lot of the more detailed user-level features 00:19:37 that are available inside of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.And we will also cover things like collaboration, events, and alerts. 00:19:44 On this course, with an average of about 15 minutes per unit – there's one unit of about 30 minutes, which is on model development – but with 15 minutes per unit, you're going to go through about an hour of videos for openSAP, 00:20:02 and then you have the option – and we really do recommend this – to click over to the YouTube links that we're going to supply you with, and that's also just to see more demonstrations of things that really are of interest to you. 00:20:14 So that's our introduction to the course "Implementation of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud" and also our introduction to the product.In our next unit, we're going to cover where to find help and support. 00:20:29 I look forward to seeing you there.Please join in the next unit, which is a really valuable one because if you're going to be implementing this product, 00:20:35 you're now going to understand all the channels that are available to you for help and support.My name is Mark Burke. Thank you for joining me today. I'll see you in the next unit. 00:20:43 Thank you.

Week 1 Unit 2

00:00:11 Okay, welcome back to our openSAP course, "The Implementation of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud". My name is Mark Burke, with SAP Labs. 00:00:19 We are in Unit 2 of Week 1.By now, you've covered Unit 1, where we talked about the introduction to SAP BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:00:27 And here in Unit 2, we'll be talking about where to find help and support.So let's go ahead and get started. Thank you. 00:00:37 So the first place you're going to be able to find help and support for SAP BusinessObjects Cloud is within the application itself.There are three items – "Page Tips", "Help", and "Send Feedback". 00:00:48 What I'm going to do is dive into the application to show you how these work.So here I am now in SAP BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:00:57 I'm sitting in what's called the "Modeler" menu.And if you look in this upper right-hand corner, here is the "Help" icon. 00:01:05 If I click the "Help" icon, the first thing you'll see are "Page Tips".If I turn on "Page Tips", you'll see a little check mark there, I'll come back to that. 00:01:15 So with "Page Tips" turned on, what happens is that as you navigate through the system, you get these little dropdown cartoon boxes that will help you understand what it is you're supposed to do in this context. 00:01:26 And so you'll see... for instance in "Currency Conversion" it says: "Maintain multiple currency conversion tables to easily convert currencies of the data used in models", as an example.

00:01:37 So our advice is, as part of your early days of your implementation, for both you as an implementer and your users, is that you turn on "Page Tips", which will really help you get through the early navigation of the system in a very easy way. 00:01:51 Once you've completed that – and this is user by user – you can go ahead and turn that off.Now the next option you have is actually a "Help" menu. This works like any other help menu that brings up context-sensitive help. 00:02:03 Here I am in the "Dimensions" menu, so it's "Explore Dimensions".I could also jump to another topic, let's say "allocations", and I'll get to "allocations". 00:02:11 And one of the nice features inside of "Help" besides the context-sensitive help, besides being able to search it, is that you can use this little wise owl here and activate context-sensitive mode. So I can go ahead and click that. 00:02:23 Now as I click on different menus and items, I will actually get context-sensitive help based on what I'm pointing at.So you can turn this on, especially in the early days of your implementation, 00:02:35 and you can go ahead and use this to understand what the menu items are, which goes beyond even what's available in "Page Tips". So there are lots of different ways to get help here. 00:02:45 Now the final way within the application is to send feedback.This is your ability to rate your experience. Maybe you had a five-star experience. 00:02:52 You can type in what you like about the tool.What could we improve? 00:02:56 And that will be sent off to SAP for use as feedback in future releases of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.So that's what's available to you inside of the application. 00:03:10 Let's talk about the ecosystem of support and help that you have available to you from SAP and from partners. So SAP has an entire ecosystem. 00:03:19 And the one way that you can... just trying to give you a little tip to access the ecosystem... is to remember one Web site address: service.sap.com 00:03:29 If you memorize that and bookmark "service.sap.com", you'll have all these other areas we're going to talk about available to you, including Support, Help, the "SAP Community Network", Training, Web site, and also partner addresses from SAP partners. 00:03:46 I'll go ahead and introduce you to "service.sap.com", and you'll see how that becomes a jumping point to all these other areas. 00:03:53 So here we have... and just be aware that inside of "service.sap.com" you also have an option to a "Road Map", and I've given you a direct link to the SAP BusinessObjects Cloud Road Map here. 00:04:05 And I'll show you that here.But let's go into here, to "SAP Service Marketplace". 00:04:10 Be aware that to use SAP Service Marketplace, you need an "SID" from SAP, and any SAP customer can have this, 00:04:19 and then your SID administrator within your customer landscape will actually be able to set up other users, so you can request one from your SAP administrator if you don't have one already. 00:04:30 Okay? But in the SAP Service Marketplace, this actually holds content, but also, like we talked about, becomes that jumping-off place where you could say: 00:04:39 Well I'm on SAP Service Marketplace, I got there by going to service.sap.com, and now I have the Support Portal available to me, I have the Help Portal, PartnerEdge, the Community Network, the Training & Certification Shop. 00:04:53 These are all the different sites that become this jumping-off point.So it all starts with SAP Service Marketplace. 00:05:00 And what kind of content is on Service Marketplace? As you browse around there, you'll see things like a knowledge base, 00:05:06 you'll also see incremental software downloads, which is more for on-premise solutions.But you'll also see some notes and other things like that which will help you with your implementation. 00:05:20 One of the examples of something that's on Service Marketplace, and I have a direct link to is a page that has SAP Road Maps for products. 00:05:27 So if you want to know what's coming up in the solution, we've given you a link here.You see the Solution Road Maps, Product Road Maps. 00:05:32 At the top here of "Product Road Maps" is "SAP Cloud for Analytics", which is now going to be named "BusinessObjects Cloud".You'll probably see that the next time you log in to here. 00:05:42 And then you have a Road Map here. You click on that, and you now have a full presentation on the Road Map for the product, so that you can go ahead and look at that, and it's great to have that in mind as you start advising customers on implementations. 00:05:57 So that's your use of SAP Service Marketplace.So then from Service Marketplace, you can now jump into "support.sap.com". 00:06:06 Now what is "support.sap.com"? Let's bring this That's a place where you can actually log tickets, incidents, or any issue that's going on. 00:06:15 It's really your Support Portal for any of your SAP products, including SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.Now this Support Portal is available to you via link, and you'll actually also have an ID for that. 00:06:29 And when you go to actually log a ticket, there are some instructions that you ought to follow to get the best level of support.So we've included that in this deck here. 00:06:39 We have a link to the launchpad, but also we have a link to a guide here on incident management, on how to log a ticket with SAP. 00:06:48 Then also some of the components used to actually log your ticket, so these are specific to the product line.So when you want to log a ticket against BusinessObjects Cloud, these are the components you will use. 00:06:58 You can actually use this as a kind of starting point.This means that you log a ticket with SAP, saying "This type of feature doesn't seem to be working, here's my workaround". 00:07:08 Then SAP will get back to you either with a confirmed solution, or they will say "That's an issue, and we'll fix that in the next release." So it's your way to help the product, help SAP, and for SAP to give you support for questions that you have around the product itself. 00:07:22 And so using support.sap.com is a very important part of your SAP experience.Now we'll come back. The next thing that's going to be helpful after seeing "support.sap.com" is "help.sap.com". 00:07:36 That's actually a really extensive set of "Help" information around the product.So I come into "help.sap.com", and I click "Analytics". 00:07:48 For now, I'll go under the old name, based on when I recorded this.Again, this will say "SAP BusinessObjects Cloud". 00:07:55 Now I'm here, and I can go ahead and select "English".And I've now navigated to the "Help" file. 00:08:03 I have this in English at the top, where I can see "HTML" or "PDF" format if I want to take it offline.There's also a "Glossary" we recommend you take a look at, 00:08:11 if you want to get familiar with some of the terminology from SAP and the SAP BusinessObjects Cloud product line.You also have these user guides available in different languages, as you can see here. 00:08:25 A very important feature before we jump into the "Help" file is also the release notes – although they are also available to you on Service Marketplace, you can also come in here, 00:08:34 and there's a nice organization of the latest release notes in order here.Be aware that SAP BusinessObjects Cloud is releasing every two weeks, so when you click on these latest ones, 00:08:46 you're going to get the release notes and the support notes for everything to do with SAP BusinessObjects Cloud right here, in a nice, easy way to consume. 00:08:54 You can go here and you can see that they're announcing a new release, and these are the types of new capabilities available. 00:09:02 Okay, so that's an important part of understanding what's going on in the system during an implementation.But now the use of the "Help" file itself, as I go into the HTML version of it here... 00:09:15 Now you have a full menu here of all the different types of help.So you can come in here and say "Hey, how do I create a chart?" 00:09:23 And you come in here, and it has step-by-step instructions on how to create a chart, how to link analysis, how to upload and publish files, whatever you need here. 00:09:31 This is searchable here, you can actually search, then you have this.What we advise as part of the implementation is that with releases coming out every two weeks, you can go to this "Help" file, 00:09:40 keep an eye on the latest releases by looking at the notes.But also let's say there's a new integration point, you can come in here and find it, find the documentation on that, 00:09:48 and really learn about how to integrate that new source of information into BusinessObjects Cloud, because now BusinessObjects Cloud supports that. 00:09:55 So it's really important to understand that this "Help" file's available to you for really detailed help.And you can also turn this over to your users. 00:10:05 Okay, so that's the use of the "Help" file.After "Support" and "Help", we also have available to you the "SAP Community Network". 00:10:15 This is where partners, customers, and consultants from SAP collaborate worldwide on SAP solutions.So you'll see the SAP Community Network here, and this is available for almost all product lines for SAP, 00:10:31 and here we have now a place where, for instance, there's a forum to ask questions. You can say: "How do you run an allocation if you want to go across two different dimensions?" 00:10:40 Or "How do I change a chart text title?" or those types of things.If you're not able to figure that out, you could actually put it out there, 00:10:49 and you'll get not only SAP consultants weighing in, but customers and other partners that are in this space.You also get announcements on all featured news, for instance an event calendar here of all current and expected training coming out, 00:11:03 a lot of different links, and then you'll actually see a leader board for some of the top content experts around the world.So you really understand who is being active with this product. 00:11:12 You get rewards too, and points for every time you go into...This is a free service, you have to create an ID on a one-time basis. Then you have it, you're greeted by name, 00:11:22 and you now have a presence on this forum – primarily for just collaborating with worldwide users.So this is a very important part of your experience with SAP – 00:11:32 not only for SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, but for all SAP products. Next in this tree is "training.sap.com". 00:11:41 We don't have paid training available as of this date in SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.We're offering all this for free, there's openSAP as one channel, which you're participating in today.

00:11:51 We also have the YouTube tutorials, and I've shown you two different ways to get to those.One, through the SCN channel, which is advertising the use of the YouTube channel for some free user training. 00:12:02 And then also, because we don't have "training.sap.com", because we don't have paid training, I just gave you a direct link to YouTube, so you can use this in lieu of that, and utilize some free training. 00:12:14 We also point you to these YouTube videos throughout this course, you'll see, because that way you'll have a way to actually look into some real deep-dive, user-level training besides the implementation topics. 00:12:27 Now finally, what's on this page is "PartnerEdge", which is available to our SAP partners.It is a paid subscription and then you have an 00:12:36 You come into PartnerEdge, and you'll now...This is a place where you'll be able to sign up for test and demo licenses for the product. 00:12:43 And you'll also be able to go in and look at some partners maybe selling BusinessObjects Cloud licensing, or they may be selling services, and this is where you'll get some customer- facing materials. 00:12:53 So this is available to you through the SAP PartnerEdge portal, which our SAP partners will be aware of as they join the SAP ecosystem. 00:13:06 Now, as a summary, I just want to kind of wrap You have all these sites out there, and you might want to try and bookmark them all. 00:13:12 My advice is: best practice – bookmark "service.sap.com".You'll have access to Support, Help, SCN, Training, and PartnerEdge. 00:13:22 From each of these, you'll also have access to things like YouTube videos, or the Glossary.You'll also have access to a Road Map. 00:13:31 There's also "sapcloudanalytics.com" – that's the original name, we may see a new name evolve in the market during May and June.And then we have "sap.com" – that's our general corporate Web site. 00:13:44 But then there's also "open.sap.com".But if you remember "service.sap.com", that's really going to be your jumping-off point. 00:13:50 Bookmark that today and you'll be ready to support, help, all the things you need for BusinessObjects Cloud.We look forward to seeing you in the next unit, where we'll talk about models. 00:14:03 And my name is Mark Burke, thank you for joining today, and have a good day, bye.

Week 1 Unit 3

00:00:10 OK, hi everyone. Welcome back to our openSAP course "The Implementation of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud".My name is Mark Burke, with SAP Labs. 00:00:20 I want to welcome you to Unit 3 of Week 1.By now you've covered the introduction to SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, 00:00:28 and also where to find help and support.And today we're going to be talking about model development inside of BusinessObjects Cloud, and how to get a model started. 00:00:36 So let's go ahead and get started.We set up our course here for implementations of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud by three key ideas: 00:00:47 Number one – what are the questions that implementers should ask customers? You'll then see slides on what some of the key implementation steps are, 00:00:56 and then we'll always wrap up with best practices.In between, we're going to show you some concepts, but also show you some system demonstrations. 00:01:03 So let's go ahead and get started with the questions implementers should ask customers.So when it comes to modeling and your first day with the customer, 00:01:11 you'll want to set up a workshop and go through things like: Is this an ad-hoc model that'll be thrown away, or are you going to sustain it and continue to use it? 00:01:21 What is the model type for planning needs or analytical needs, or is there potentially some type of hybrid need? Single currency, multi-currency? What are the key items to do with master data? 00:01:31 Any formulas or variables needed to be generated? What are your sources of data? Are you loading data from actuals? Are loading a plan? Or both? 00:01:40 Is there any variance analysis going on? How many data sources do you expect that you can actually... you'll connect live to a data source? 00:01:48 Or do you feel that you'll import data from one or more sources and kind of wrangle it together? Other things will be around the time horizons, and specifically maybe the planning horizon, 00:01:59 which will be read and write.And also the number of users, the security requirements, 00:02:05 and then ultimately the reports and stories, and what the overall visualizations will look like.You need to have that workshop, get that all worked out, and that will lead to steps for an implementation that looks something like this. 00:02:17 Getting those questions answered, documenting them, whiteboarding them, discovering and testing inside of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, blueprinting your design recommendations, then developing and getting those signed off, 00:02:29 developing the solution, testing it, and of course train and roll it out, then document and monitor.So the most important step there, we think, based on the flexibility of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud is number four here: 00:02:41 discovering and testing the solution on your own, deciding on what type of model to develop, what to deliver to the customer, and you're going to know a lot more about that at the end of this three-week course. 00:02:55 So let's get into some real specifics here. So now when you get into thinking about BusinessObjects Cloud, you're going to talk about analytics models, planning models, manual models, connected models, all these different terms. 00:03:08 What you have to understand is that the model type you select during your implementation will dictate security and integration, that's why we cover the course this way. 00:03:17 In Week 1, we're going to cover models, in Week 2 integration, in Week 3 we'll cover security and all the visualizations.Those visualizations are called "stories" by the way, so you'll see Stories here in the middle. 00:03:28 You're going to need to really understand what type of model to select, because that will then dictate security and integration requirements.So always think about these three together as you make decisions on your implementation. 00:03:39 If you do that, you'll then have success in your implementation, because you'll have understood the downstream impacts of the model type on these other two areas, 00:03:49 and then knowing that stories can run on any model type.So that's important to understand. 00:03:55 Let's go through that now.We're going to start introducing concepts to you now that we're going to use throughout the course. 00:04:01 The concept of a manual model versus a connected model.I think if you're an analytics user, the connected model will make more sense to you in that you just take BusinessObjects Cloud, 00:04:12 we connect it to an underlying source like HANA, and we actually just perform visualizations on that data.That's a slam-dunk. 00:04:18 To give you an analogy for that, it's kind of like a car with an automatic transmission, where you jump in the car, you put it in drive, and you just go. 00:04:28 That analytics model, if it's connected to the underlying source, then it doesn't replicate any data, it takes the security from the source, there's not a lot to do with it, you don't have to make a lot of modifications to it, 00:04:41 you don't need to make a lot of modifications to it, and you just run with it, and you're able to visualize the data using the power of BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:04:48 On the other hand, up here in a manual model it's actually a little bit different.Its primary role might be for planning, but there are some uses for analytics, 00:04:56 but that's when you want to replicate data from a source system in the BusinessObjects Cloud.You want to maintain security in BusinessObjects Cloud, 00:05:03 and you want to actually use that data, and maybe make some "what if", suggest a new hierarchy that doesn't exist at the source.Maybe you want to wrangle more than one data source together because it doesn't exist in any of the underlying layers. 00:05:20 And so you're actually going to do some data manipulation inside of this manual model.One of those pieces of data manipulation might be planning data that the user submits, 00:05:29 but it also might just be wrangling data together for the use in analytics.And so the distinction between a manual model and a connected model... 00:05:36 They're both available to you. It's important for you as an implementer to understand both so that you can make the right decision.Plus, a reminder that when you make that decision, it will have impacts on the type of integration you can go ahead with, 00:05:51 and also what type of security model you will deploy. You have to understand all three.Our course here is set up to help you succeed in making the right decision, 00:06:01 and that will help you succeed in your BusinessObjects Cloud implementation.Be aware, for most implementations you may not build just one type of model. 00:06:10 You might actually have some models that are connected and some models that are manual, and then you'll see the value of each as we go through this. 00:06:17 Some of the key decisions around "When do you go with the connected model?" and "When do you go with the manual model?" 00:06:22 For the connected model, it's really an analytics model only looking at visualizations.Then you actually have to sit in a supported source. 00:06:31 Right now, HANA is a model that is supported by BusinessObjects Cloud to be connected to.There are others coming in the future. 00:06:41 But if you want to connect to a model that is not yet supported, you might be forced to use your manual model until that's supported.Also, if you're going to connect to an underlying model as a connected model, 00:06:55 you're going to actually leverage security from the source, so you have to make sure that the security's appropriate there.You need to make sure that the underlying data that's in that model supports the analytical requirement. 00:07:06 If there's data missing or some type of merging of sources together, you might need to move over to another type of model, or enhance your underlying source. 00:07:16 And then that leads to the customer saying that if the customer wants to make changes to data and structures, they don't do that in BusinessObjects Cloud. If they're working in a connected model, you'll actually have to do that in the source system, 00:07:29 which is likely in HANA in this case.Now, manual model, immediately when your customer says "I want to do planning", you're going to be driven towards a manual model, 00:07:38 because that's what's supported in BusinessObjects Cloud. You will also be driven to a manual model if the data source is not yet supported for connection. 00:07:46 Also, if the customer says: "There's not enough security in my underlying source, I need to maintain some level of security inside of BusinessObjects Cloud", 00:07:55 that might drive you to a manual model.If you need to wrangle more than one source of data, you might go towards a manual model and move some data round, 00:08:04 or combine dimensions, those types of things.And if the customer wishes to make a lot of modifications to an underlying transaction source, for instance, 00:08:13 whether it's planning or analytics, then they might be driven towards this manual model.So here's an example of a transaction source that we kind of mapped out, 00:08:23 and we haven't said whether we can connect to it or not, but you can take a look at this, and this is really sales transactions across, by customer, by material, and by sales department and person. 00:08:34 This is kind of how the underlying source data looks.So first of all, based on the questions that we asked, 00:08:40 we did this with the customer, we sat down and defined the entities and how they relate to each other.So boom, we have this. 00:08:46 You want to take a look at this and say: For either my analytics or my planning need, how can I simplify this model for use in BusinessObjects Cloud? 00:08:55 A general simplification might be something like: Well, color is not really important in the analytics that we're supporting, or in the planning, 00:09:04 so we might just hide or ignore that in our SAP BusinessObjects Cloud model – just as a very simple example.As you look at this data, you'll also want to talk to the customer about their time horizon, 00:09:15 meaning that if they have 10 years of transaction data in this system with this type of setup, how much do we really need to bring into BusinessObjects Cloud? So you want to talk to them about that. 00:09:25 And then finally, you then need to decide: Are we going to go with a connected model, or do we build a manual model and import data? 00:09:32 Now, if it's a connected model, for right now, it would need to sit in HANA, then we have HANA as a supported source, and we could pull this in and run our visualizations on this. 00:09:42 If it's any other source that's not yet supported by BusinessObjects Cloud to be connected, then it might drive you to a manual model.Or you make some investment in that staging layer of HANA to actually bring it together inside the underlying HANA platform. 00:10:01 So, that type of model, if you're going to bring that into BusinessObjects Cloud, we would say import the model from HANA, we'd connect to it, 00:10:08 and we'd pretty much immediately be able to use it as-is in our BusinessObjects Cloud visualizations.There are some options to enhance connected models in BusinessObjects Cloud – things like adding a location dimension to this, for geospatial analysis, if that's relevant. 00:10:27 You could also add calculations, either as a KPI inside of stories, or into the "account dimension" to say: I've brought in revenue, I've brought in quantity. Let me go ahead and define price as revenue divided by quantity. You can do that. 00:10:41 So there are some limited enhancements you can make to the model right in BusinessObjects Cloud.If there's any other major enhancement that you need, 00:10:51 then you need to go back to the HANA source, and you need to make the change there, and that will be reflected in BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:10:58 That's the power of the connected model, but it's also one of the limitations of the connected model, so just be aware of that.Now, that same sales transaction data may be used, let's say, for either an analytic sense or for planning in BusinessObjects Cloud, 00:11:12 you might do the following. Number one, you might consolidate the material group and the materials into a single dimension and create a parent/child relationship. 00:11:21 That will kind of create one standard dimension inside of BusinessObjects Cloud for consumption by the users.You might remove the sales person detail out of the sales... 00:11:33 Yes, sales department number is important, but I don't need all these "by-persons", or to know who the salesperson is, that's not important for this analytics or this planning project. 00:11:41 You'll definitely create an account dimension, and similarly to the HANA connected model, you would actually then add a price calculation as revenue divided by quantity. 00:11:52 Then you would also leverage a time dimension, and you would map sales by day to the month.So for instance, if this is daily sales, you might map it to a month, just bring it into a month. 00:12:01 Again, the simplification in a planning process or in an analytics process, I might not want to work with daily sales, I could if I wanted to but in this case I'm going to bring it in by month and simplify the experience, 00:12:12 because it's really monthly analysis that's more important than daily sales analysis.And finally, if it's a planning model, 00:12:18 I'll have the option to map a category so I can actually keep track of the difference between "actual" and "plan", and really set myself up possibly for some analytics on a variance analysis between "actual" and "plan". 00:12:32 A key thing you need to understand here as you go into a BusinessObjects Cloud model is that your key figure model from a source system like an SAP ERP will actually be flipped into an account-based model 00:12:44 in SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.As we get into dimensions, and we start creating manual models, especially, 00:12:54 you'll need to understand the dimensionality, what a dimension means, and what it can drive.I've outlined them here for you. You can go through this, you'll see some of the videos at the end, how these actually apply. 00:13:05 Some of the important ones are that you have, for instance, a time dimension in both analytics and planning.For analytics, the time dimension is optional, you don't need to have it,

00:13:16 but then you wouldn't have a category dimension to separate actual and planned analytics.You could if you wanted to, but normally you wouldn't. 00:13:23 In "Currency", you might do your analytics all in one currency, your planning in multiple currencies, but then if you needed to actually do some analytics in multiple currencies, you would likely set it up as a manual model, 00:13:35 and then that would drive you to do that.And then "Pool"... 00:13:39 A "Pool" dimension as an example would be used for planning only, so that's available for you to set up into a planning model.The key here is I want to make sure there's a distinction that we have manual models and connected models. 00:13:51 And then within a manual model we have planning and analytics. So that's the key distinction. A connected model is primarily used just for analytics, but a manual model can be used for both planning and analytics. 00:14:05 Other considerations within these model preferences that we've outlined in here are things like: Do we need security on the analytics model? Do we need security on the planning model? 00:14:14 And we kind of make some generalizations here.But you can pick and choose. If you want currency conversion on an analytics model, 00:14:23 you're likely going to have to set it up as a planning model, and then that will give you the capability to do some currency conversion.Let me talk to you real quick about a hybrid model.

00:14:35 A hybrid model is... during your design, if you find that there's a model that's used for analytics and a model used for planning that share the same data, for instance pricing, maybe the analytics user wants to do pricing analysis, 00:14:48 but the planning user wants to see that same pricing as part of their planning process, then you might be driven towards thinking about a hybrid model, which is a planning model that then is used for analytics for the analytics user, 00:15:01 but is used for planning for the planning user, but keeping it in one model. Why? So you have less to maintain as a customer.And so really thinking about how to leverage the best use that you have, minimize the number of models out there, minimize the maintenance. 00:15:14 If you're going to have to maintain a pricing model for planning, then why not leverage that for analytics, rather than creating a whole one-off analytics pricing model. 00:15:27 And then some notes here on the time horizon.For a time horizon it's very important to understand that if you have 10 years of data in your data warehouse, 00:15:35 maybe just bringing in two years is enough – that's your model horizon – and then you have to think about a subset of that, which would potentially, if it's for planning use... 00:15:44 The planning horizon is a shorter subset that's also identified, so that's where you can write data during the planning.So that's kind of your forward-looking period where you can actually write data. 00:15:55 And we have an example here that you can take a look at to kind of walk you through that.Now another thing is, as you set up a manual model, you're going to have the choice to set it up either as analytics or planning. 00:16:06 Whether it's analytics or planning, you're going to have that time horizon, the time granularity, whether it's day, month, quarter, or year, you'll be able to set that up. 00:16:17 Once you've clicked the checkbox, which I'll show you here in a moment, to make it "planning", then you'll have categories available to you which let you separate "Actual", "Budget", and "Planning". 00:16:27 So let me go ahead and jump into the system now...I am now in the "Modeler" of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud, and I'm just going to give you a tour here. 00:16:37 So, looking at a model here, we can see the "planning" type and the "analytics" type.Here's a model "STORE_SALES" that actually came from an underlying HANA source, which is a connected source. 00:16:49 So let me just go ahead and delete that...and then I will just add it back, showing you how quickly you can connect to an underlying HANA model using a connected source. 00:17:01 We'll cover a lot of the steps for doing this in Week 2.But just very quickly here, I can say import a model from HANA, 00:17:09 I already have a connector set up, and I'll show you how to do that in Week 2.I go ahead and select "STORE_SALES", and I say "OK", and that model "STORE_SALES" has been created.

00:17:19 I now have a model that's connected off my HANA.It didn't ask me a lot of prompts about how to construct this model, all these different things. 00:17:26 Why? Because all of that is handled in the underlying source, and I'm directly connected to it now, so I'll see virtual real-time type of data. 00:17:36 Now, as I open up this model, you'll see that I have an account dimension.It has price and quantity, and the sales value. I could add in a calculation here if I needed to. 00:17:47 One thing I can do is enhance a connected model with account calculations, and I could do it here as a formula.I can also do it within my report stories, which is called a KPI, we'll talk about that in Week 3. 00:18:00 But inside here also, if I go to Dimension Settings, I've inherited all of these attributes and dimensions from the source.If, for some reason, I want to hide those, I can. 00:18:09 So I could say maybe hide "Latitude", not relevant right now. "Location" isn't a big deal to me right now.Then also the ability to group dimensions, where I can say: 00:18:19 Let me take "City" and "State" and put them into a region.And I could say here's a region including city, and here's a region including state. 00:18:29 So I just come here and say "region".And that's my ability to do some grouping. So those are some of the limited modifications you can make to a connected model. 00:18:39 But for the most part, remember that the connected model is like an automatic transition.You jump in, you connect to the model after setting up the connection, 00:18:46 and then it's yours to use and you can keep it.And when you come in the next day, it's always going to reflect the underlying source. 00:18:54 Now, on the other hand, with a manual, you're always going to start first with master data.We have this covered in Week 2. You're actually going to come here, and you're actually going to create a dimension. 00:19:04 I have types to select here: "Generic", "Organization", "Account".I can apply security to it if I need to or not. 00:19:12 And these dimension types are what are covered inside the deck I just showed you.And now creating a dimension... 00:19:17 Once I create that dimension, I'll just show you what that looks like.Here's one with Store IDs in it... 00:19:23 A relatively simple dimension. It has an ID, it has stores, and it has state. So this is the dimension.So you always start a manual model with master data. You need to have the master data set up. 00:19:34 And now this master data, once it's set up, is then maintained within BusinessObjects Cloud.Now, you have a set of dimensions here. Maybe you've set up all your dimensions. 00:19:46 In Week 2, we're going to show you some quick ways to set up these dimensions using integration techniques.But now that you have your dimensions, the next thing you would do is set up your models. 00:19:56 And before setting up a model, if I was going to be using currency conversion, I'd want to make sure I had a currency conversion table, which is kind of a master data table with a value in it,

00:20:07 I'd have that all set up before I did my model.So I've set up my master data, I've set up my currency. 00:20:12 Now one of the next things I'm going to do is go ahead and set up my model.So I come to "Models" here. 00:20:19 Here's my list of models. We suggest good naming conventions here so that your users know what they are.I'd go ahead and hit "+", and I could say: 00:20:30 Do I want to start with a blank model? Do I want to import it from a place? But if I just said "Start with a blank model", I could say "Test". This is an example. 00:20:40 And I could give it a description.Here's a toggle to enable planning or not enable planning. 00:20:44 So let's say if I don't enable planning, I'll say create.You'll see here now that it only talks about time granularity. Okay? 00:20:54 If I go into that same menu, and I'll just leave this...I just want to show you it has time – "Year", "Quarter", "Month", or "Day". 00:21:01 And time's the only thing it asks for because this is a non-planning... this is an analytics manual model.If I come out of there, and I set up the same model, and I say "Start with a blank model", and then I hit "test"... 00:21:17 and now I say "Create" with "Enable Planning" checked, now I get not only time, but I also get categories. 00:21:25 So that's one of the key differences at the beginning, that on a planning model you're going to have these categories set up.This also sets up the planning model, it sets up the ability to do read/write. 00:21:36 Now when you're inside of a model, you now have a dimension, and now you have the ability...And it always starts with "Time" and "Category". 00:21:45 Remember it would be "Time" and "Accounts" only for an analytics model. But then once I introduce planning, it becomes "Category". 00:21:51 Then I could add other dimensions here. I could either create a new one or I could select an existing one because master data can actually sit in more than one model, and so now you have that ability. 00:22:04 Now if I come into here, I also have Preferences.We're going to talk a lot about these, about data auditing, privacy, and whether to turn on currency conversion or not. 00:22:12 These are all toggle buttons.The Privacy button is a quick way to say whether others can see my model or not. 00:22:19 Then in the development stage, you probably would keep it private while you're working on it and then share it afterwards.Then also under "Variables"... this is the ability to put an assumption into the model that will be carried forward. 00:22:34 Then you'll also have "Data Access", which is your ability to say "Here's a dimension, I'm going to actually make it secure." And if you make it secure, it will get a read/write column into the dimension, 00:22:45 and that will allow you to maintain row-level security on rows that certain profit centers, for instance, can be written to by one user.Maybe Joe can write to these ten profit centers, and Sally to another ten profit centers. 00:22:57 We've covered that a lot in security.So that's kind of your manual way to build a model. You're creating a dimension, then you're actually combining those dimensions, 00:23:09 and whether you want to create a new one or select an existing one and say "I'm going to add Product Groups to this one." You now have "Product Groups" and "Accounts", and you can go ahead and add others. 00:23:19 Now once you're in here, just be aware that there is maintenance you can have, so here's a hierarchy.This is drag or drop, where I can actually move things around, and so you have that.

00:23:29 I would build my model.And going back to the PowerPoint, if you looked at that, you'd see I have a "Material" dimension, 00:23:38 I'm going to set up my "Sales" dimension, those types of things.And then your accounts would be editable, and so on. 00:23:47 So you've saved that and now you have your model.Now at any point here, you can come here and say where this dimension's being used, 00:23:55 it's being used in the "Operating income" model, and then now in my new model which is called "test" once I hit "Save".We're going to be showing you that. Now, there are some quicker techniques to getting data into BusinessObjects Cloud 00:24:09 when using a manual model.As an example, I want to show you back here... 00:24:14 We show you this in Week 2, but I just want to give you a little sneak peek here, is that you can actually import data right from a file to get your model up and running 00:24:21 so you're not sitting there building all these dimensions on your own.Now, a common transaction query might be here, 00:24:27 that has "Month", "Vendor, and "Stores", and then the number of delivered products and the number of requested products.This might be for analytical use, even... 00:24:35 If you wanted to get this into a manual model, you could import this, but then you'd be left without descriptions, you'd be left without key attributes, and all those things you ask the customer about. 00:24:44 So what we advise and we show you in Week 2 is that if you enhance your original query when creating this model for the first time, if you enhance, for instance, "Vendor ID" and include "Vendor Description", 00:24:57 if you enhance the "Store ID", and enhance it with the "Store Description" and the "State", and other key attributes, if you get those laid out, then you import this model, and we show you this end to end in Week 2, 00:25:09 then you'll actually get your model created, all your master data table and key attributes, and your transaction data all in one step.Then what we also show you in Week 2 is that you can incrementally load transaction data to that, into the future, 00:25:23 so you can get updates to both "Delivered" and "Requested" into the future.So a nice key best practice is to take this and make sure that you enhance your original query to the source system 00:25:35 to expand it out to include key attributes, and then use that in your import for the first day that you create a model, so that you're not sitting there doing a lot of manual maintenance work, which I was just showing you is to create conventions. 00:25:46 You can do it that way, but this is really going to save you a lot of time.Let's come back to the system now. 00:25:54 So again, "Models", "Dimensions", and "Currency Conversion" are the key to "Modeler".As a final thing before we go to best practices, 00:26:02 I want to show you on the front slide here that there are some ways to quickly get this up and running.You can connect to data through a nice interface. You can say "Import File". 00:26:11 You can go ahead and do all kinds of things here, you can use existing data, import a file, or connect to Google Drive.There's also the ability to import data directly to a story without creating a model, and that will save you some time, 00:26:24 and we'll show that in the stories in Week 3.The other thing here I wanted to show you is your ability here to also plan your business on the fly. 00:26:33 This is the way to create a model really quickly, and maybe your users use that in the field.They come here and they say they want to do a financial plan, a headcount plan, or a custom plan. 00:26:44 And it's kind of a wizard that walks you through, so I could say I want to do a headcount plan, I'll say "OK", and then I say what metrics I want to include, 00:26:52 what roles, what locations, what managers.It's a pre-delivered headcount model that then will create a model and you can use it to do your headcount planning. 00:27:00 Then you might come up with some result there for your total cost center, and then post that into some kind of model that might be the consolidated plan for the entire company. 00:27:09 This is your ability to create models really quickly and as a user.This might be a throwaway model that you get rid of after the planning process. 00:27:19 So let's look at some of the key things. There's the ability in stories as you begin to import data and run analytics and visualizations on data without ever having to actually stage a model at all, that's another capability. 00:27:32 So let's go back in here and wrap this up.So the key slide that we're going to have at the end of each of our sessions when we're starting to talk about best practices 00:27:41 is for model development one of the best practices.As we talked about the key consideration, that triangle that we talked about, 00:27:49 consider integration and security with all your modeling decisions.You have to know the downstream impact. 00:27:54 When you build a manual model, you're now committing to maintaining security inside of BusinessObjects Cloud.You're also limiting what... You're going to replicate the data, and you're going to bring that data in. 00:28:07 Then you're going to maintain the master data in BusinessObjects Cloud, with the opportunity to load new transaction data as needed.On the other hand, if you go to a connected source, that's that automatic transition, you'll be able to connect to it 00:28:20 and the security's going to come in from the source system, the integration's going to be limited to sources that support a connected model, and you're going to make your decisions for that. 00:28:33 So always remember the three points of the triangle when making any decisions.Overall focus on the planning and analytical needs. 00:28:42 Don't deliver complex models in here, it's just going to confuse your users.If you see that your customer has a lot of relationships and all these different things that they want to bring in,

00:28:52 everything like salesperson, and all that, ask them whether that's really required.See if you can hide that in a connected model or chop it up in a manual model so that you remove some of that complexity. 00:29:02 For manual models...We talked about this and we'll show you this in Week 2. 00:29:08 Use an expanded set of dimensions, attributes, and so on in that data file for the initial build so that you're not sitting there and having to update all these master data one by one. 00:29:17 If using currency conversion, create the currency conversion table first, we talked about that.In a planning process, roll out a central core model, 00:29:25 and then let users... if they also want to do some headcount planning or some specific... maybe it's relative to their segment and so on, they can actually create some of their own models, and then take that data and post it forward into that central model. 00:29:41 But be wary of how many models you actually roll out, because you're setting your customers up to maintain them.Consider hybrid models, we talked about that, a model that can support both planning and analytics needs, reducing maintenance. 00:29:54 Establish, document, communicate, and enforce naming conventions.When your customer logs in to here, they're going to want to be able to understand what a model is. 00:30:05 Make sure you have some documentation for that and make sure that there's a good name there.Limit the number of models that you're maintaining month to month. We've given you some ideas about how to consolidate models. 00:30:14 But also maybe using the privacy button to remove them if they're not really relevant today.Minimize the model time horizon, we talked about that. 00:30:23 If you have 10 years of data in your data warehouse, only bring in two if year-over-year analysis is required, so you don't have all that data sitting there and not being used. 00:30:33 This is not a data warehouse, it's an analytics tool.Finally, build a security model that really is going to support that. 00:30:40 Think about the security implications. It's very important.If you're looking at a downsizing plan or headcount data with salaries and so on, you're really going to need to work security 00:30:49 and invest a lot of time in your BusinessObjects Cloud design, because it will be important to make sure confidential or SEC data, those types of things, are not released before they need to be. 00:31:04 Now we end each segment here.It's important that you understand how we position this. 00:31:09 The slides that you've seen so far will be included in all the exercises, and in the quizzes, even in the final exam.These YouTube videos are supplementary, and not required, but we do advise you go through here. 00:31:19 These are 100% demo, they are from end to end, they show you how to do things inside of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.We request you follow these. 00:31:29 This is our longest segment of the course. The other ones are about 15 minutes, so be aware we had a lot to cover here.But I think you've got a good base now to go through the rest of the course. 00:31:42 That is the end of Unit 3 in Week 1.In Unit 4 we're going to talk about what it takes to maintain some of these models going forward. 00:31:49 Then we'll have some weekly exercises after the end of Unit 4.My name is Mark Burke. Thank you for joining me today. 00:31:57 We'll see you in the next unit when we'll talk about model maintenance, and what it means to actually maintain the models inside of BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:32:04 Thank you very much.

Week 1 Unit 4

00:00:10 Hi, welcome back to our course "The Implementation of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud". My name is Mark Burke.We are in Week 1 Unit 4. 00:00:19 We've already covered the introduction to BusinessObjects Cloud.We've also covered where to find help and support, the model development cycle process inside of BusinessObjects Cloud, 00:00:31 and now we're going to talk about model maintenance.Thank you for joining us. 00:00:38 In an implementation, it's very important when it comes to model maintenance that you really understand what kind of changes a customer may require to a given model inside of BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:00:49 And in the case of a connected model which is connected to a source, some of these will translate to: "What are the changes required at the source system 00:00:57 that do changes in the environment, the data, and so on?" So you sit down with your customer and you talk about things like a model archiving strategy. 00:01:06 For instance, are there models that need to be hidden from users or taken offline for purposes of just keeping our sanity about how many models we have? 00:01:16 In a planning process, how often do new versions of plans need to be created? What do we do with the older versions when we create them? 00:01:24 How often do key attributes change, whether from the source system in a connected model or inside of a manual model? Are there any manual or automated tasks that we need to schedule or perform on the models themselves? 00:01:39 When it comes to data sources, of course you're going to want to know how often we need to reload transaction data or master data.And maybe that's from the source system in a connected model, or maybe it's inside of BusinessObjects Cloud for a manual model. 00:01:53 And especially in a manual model, what do we do with existing data? Do we purge it? Do we append it? What do we 00:02:03 And finally, who are the people that will have the rights to change a model or update data? And also in a planning process, you're going to want to know who has the authorizations and 00:02:19 requirements to actually update global assumptions.So things like a benefits rate, or maybe there's a pricing update, or maybe there's a currency rate if you're going to be tracking currency – 00:02:31 then you need to actually have a currency rate, and somebody needs to keep that updated.Now as you go through that discussion with your customer, all these answers are going to lead to different kinds of solutions, 00:02:45 and different capabilities based on a type of model you selected, and we talked about that in the last unit.So first of all, in a manual model if you do that and you've decided to say "I'm going to replicate my data from a source system, 00:02:58 and I'm going to actually put into Cloud for Analytics and maintain it there and then maybe run my planning cycle from it", at that point you've decided to decouple from the source system.

00:03:07 So all of your maintenance tasks around data and so on really take place inside of SAP BusinessObjects Cloud.You'll still have the option to delete a model, but you'll also be able to clear out data. 00:03:18 Maybe you'll clear out an old version of a plan and replace it with a new version.You'll copy data within the model. Maybe you're going to seed your actuals into your planning version. 00:03:28 You're going to maybe make a model private.You're going to add a dimension or, more likely, you're going to be updating a dimension with new master data. 00:03:35 And we'll talk a lot about that in the integration topics in Week 2.And then you're also going to be importing new transaction data, which is also covered in Week 00:03:42 And then you have the opportunity to export or import a model, which is a way for you to take a model from one instance in the cloud, maybe for tests, 00:03:49 and move it forward to production, into a production instance.Now in a connected model, you've made a different choice. 00:03:56 You've said: "I'm going to actually keep all my data at the local cloud source or the remote on- premise source." And in a connected model, you're going to have a lot less maintenance required inside of BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:04:09 But some of the questions about loading data and the availability of master data and so on, are all now going to be transferred and executed down at the source layer, for instance, in HANA.

00:04:19 So that HANA will need to be scheduled to actually pull data from the source system and so on.So all of those types of things will actually be activities planned in the source system. 00:04:29 So what will you be able to do inside of BusinessObjects Cloud? You'll still be able to delete a model. You'll still have some opportunity to tweak an account dimension or add a few features to it. 00:04:38 You'll be able to hide and group dimensions if you need to make it easier to consume inside of Cloud for Analytics.And you'll be able to export and import the model again to move it forward into a production instance. 00:04:49 The key thing here for a connected model is that all other maintenance tasks really take place at the source.And BusinessObjects Clouds is all a reflection of what you did at the source.

00:05:02 So let's go into the system and show you that.So now I'm logged into BusinessObjects Cloud – I'll go ahead and jump into the Modeler here. 00:05:11 I have four models here.I'm going to start with this third one called "STORE_SALES", which is a connected model to a HANA source. 00:05:18 So the underlying data management and this underlying result all take place in a HANA layer, and this model here is pretty much just a reflection of that. 00:05:30 I do have some opportunity here to add a few things.I don't know that I'd be doing this on a month-to- month basis, but during the implementation, 00:05:37 you could make some tweaks to the account dimension.We'll talk a bit about that in Week 2. 00:05:43 But you'll see here under "Preferences", there's not a lot of things you can do here.You don't have many options to change settings, so you're very limited. 00:05:50 Why? Because if you actually want to make changes to the model, to the types of dimensionality and so on, you're going to do that in the underlying source. 00:05:57 The one thing I can do is actually hide dimensions from users if I need to.But if I say "I want to load a new set of chains and put some type of filter on there", 00:06:06 I would actually do that in the source in HANA, rather than in BusinessObjects Cloud.So the maintenance is transferred to the source system. 00:06:16 Now coming out of there, I'll go ahead and go back to the Modeler, and now I'll select one of my, let's say, planning cubes here, which is actually a manual model. 00:06:26 Remember that the manual model probably originated from a source system and has now been disconnected, and I'm now maintaining these master data tables and the model itself right inside of BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:06:37 Now what can I do to this model? First of all, let's just go to "Preferences" here, 00:06:42 and I can see that I can do a thing like privacy.Right now, it's available to all users that have access because I've set "Privacy" to "OFF". 00:06:50 But if I put "Privacy" to "ON", that's my ability to hide that model.Maybe that's a simple archiving strategy you have, that when a model is no longer needed, 00:06:58 rather than delete it, rather than try to go offline, we'll just make it private.Then the administrator will have access to it, but it won't be in the realm of the users, so they won't be confused by it. 00:07:08 So one task you can do is configure the privacy settings.Now when we come into here, we can also see that we have these dimensions. 00:07:18 These dimensions – and we'll talk about this in Week 2 – can now be updated with, for instance, the regions, with properties, or in the case of Product Groups, we could come here and say: "Well, I actually want to 00:07:30 maintain and change some of these hierarchies." Maybe I want to create a new hierarchy. Maybe I want to drag and drop Cross-Trainers up to here. 00:07:37 You can do a lot of that, and that will now be reflected in the system.But that's your ability to maintain the master data inside of BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:07:45 That's available to you in the manual model, but not in a connected model.So let's just come back out to the Modeler... 00:07:54 Another type of task on this would be that you want to import new transaction data.You have a new set of actuals, or you're going to pull in a starting point plan from some source system. 00:08:04 We'll talk about this in the integration topic, but now I could actually go here and import data.So we'll cover that in Week 2. 00:08:10 But that's one of the activities you have here on a maintenance basis: You have to load new data into an existing model.Now if you want to load new data into the STORE_SALES, which is the HANA connected model, 00:08:21 you would actually go back to HANA and take care of that.This would then become a reflection of that, right in BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:08:27 So that's the key distinction.Now, you have the trash can here, 00:08:31 so maybe in your development cycle, you want to clean up and keep a nice clean slate, so you could just delete selected models. 00:08:40 On a manual model, inside of here you can also actually clear data in the selected model, and now I can actually take a point of view for a set of accounts. 00:08:52 Let's say I want to clear all revenue – maybe it's for my planned version for this cube and against some time period – I could select it and clear that data out. 00:09:01 Why would I do that? Well, because I'm starting a new planning cycle and I want to give them a blank slate.So those are the kinds of opportunities. 00:09:08 Now there's a whole thing about managing versions between actual and planned, and also being able to say planned version 1 to planned version 2, and all that. 00:09:16 So that's a really extensive kind of capability here, so we have a video of that at the end here that you can watch, which shows you about version management with your data inside of BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:09:26 So we encourage you to watch the video at the end of this.Okay? 00:09:33 Now, you also have your currencies, which we talked about.If you have currency rates to maintain, you're going to need somebody with the correct rights 00:09:39 and security to come in here and update these exchange rates across to the right.They have to understand what the rates are, and that's a maintenance task that you need to schedule. 00:09:49 And as an example, you shouldn't be starting your planning cycle until you actually have the rates all set to go so that people will see data in the currency that they need. 00:10:00 So that's an example of a maintenance task that you need to schedule.We think that scheduling is very important so that people understand their roles and responsibilities and when things are due, 00:10:09 and that you also enforce it.So coming back to the Modeler... 00:10:16 we see that we have...let's come back in here... we see that we have the four models. 00:10:24 Now we'll just go to "USA_Distribution".This is an analytical model that's actually been set up as a manual model. 00:10:30 And again, I just want to reiterate, we have the ability...now this time, it's not been set up as "planned" so we don't have category management, 00:10:38 but again, we now have these maintenance tasks available to us to update vendor IDs, store IDs, and even to create a hierarchy here if we needed it. 00:10:46 And that opens up.Going back to this slide – manual models: a lot of flexibility to make changes and maintain things right within BusinessObjects Cloud. 00:10:56 In a connected model, you do it back at the source.That leads us to best practices. 00:11:02 First of all, you want to establish, document, communicate, and enforce model maintenance procedures.This means that whether it's a manual model or a connected model, people need to understand 00:11:12 what they need to do, by when, and in what system, so you need to establish that.You're going to want users – and especially administrators – to log maintenance activities in a central location 00:11:21 so that you understand what the state of certain data is.If I'm interacting with a connected model, I'm going to want to understand what the underlying connected model is connected to, 00:11:33 what the status of that data is, and what's available to me.Especially in a planning cycle, you're going to want to think about creating a process flow for maintenance procedures. 00:11:45 As an example, our first step is to archive last month's plan – we put that somewhere.Then we clear it out, we load a new set of actuals, and now we can update a new forecast. 00:11:59 You might have something different where you say "Yes, we'll archive last year's plan, but we'll just update one month of actuals, but we'll keep last month's plan as a starting point", then you can just make incremental changes. 00:12:10 So that's another option.But you really need to have that process flow figured out so you can run a true planning process. 00:12:16 You're going to want to assign users to maintain currency rates and global assumptions.In a planning cycle particularly, if there's a global assumption, somebody needs to know when it needs to be updated, 00:12:25 we need to have the right security rights, and we need to know who that is.And you're going to want to assign a user – particularly a business admin rather than an IT admin – 00:12:36 to actively manage these models and categories in front of users.So whether they need to archive things or hide things – we talked about hiding dimensions – 00:12:46 somebody is actively doing that to make the user experience very clean.Because it's very easy to add things in BusinessObjects Cloud, but it's also very easy to make a plate that's just too full, 00:12:58 and you don't really understand what you're looking at.And finally, train the identified users on how to use and execute these maintenance procedures. 00:13:06 The person who's actually in charge of your connected models should really be a HANA administrator that likely can make a change back at the HANA layer, so the connected model can reflect that as new requirements come in. 00:13:18 We have a couple of videos here.One is on how to manage data category versions and also how to export or import objects. 00:13:24 Keep looking back here for other ones in the near future.These will help you understand some of these tasks in more detail. 00:13:31 Thank you for your time today, have a good day.This concludes Week 1 of our Implementation of BusinessObjects Cloud course. 00:13:41 Next week it's an exciting topic. My friend Sreedhar will be coming in for Week 2 in which we'll be talking about integration topics.We'll be talking to you about how to integrate data, what's required for a connected model, 00:13:53 what's required to get a manual model, and really what that involves.And we'll spend a whole week on integration. 00:13:59 Thank you very much for your time, have a good day, and talk to you later.

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