Harnessing the Power of BI Publisher

1. Harnessing the Power of BI Publisher Presented By : Venkat Munukutla

2. The abstract for this presentation currently reads as follows: 'This Presentation is an introduction to the advanced features of BI Publisher and takes a deep dive to explore it's intricate features that could be harnessed to satisfy the reporting requirements for most organizations. Further, this presentation also discusses the road map of BI Publisher as it is ordained to work in conjunction with Release12. With this new reporting Paradigm being introduced with the Release 12 of Oracle ERP, this presentation discusses how BI Publisher could potentially encompass the entire gamut of the Organization’s reporting requirements and this is supported with examples. This presentation also fathoms the multi-dimensional features of this tool to explain how it's versatile enough to share reporting services across organization while keeping tabs on control , compliance and visibility of the reports.' Abstract

3. Venkat Munukutla Over 12 years of experience in Oracle and Technology. Worked in various technical, functional and management roles involving ERP and technology solutions (Extensive use of SOA and Oracle Fusion technologies). MS from University of Texas, Dallas Currently Working as Sr. Consultant for Oracle ERP and Technologies practice, Idhasoft (www.idhasoft.com), a $120 mil IT solutions provider Presenter

4. Topics BI Publisher • Why BI Publisher • BI Publisher Enhancements • BI Publisher for 11i Customers • 11i – R12 Reports Conversion Process • Advanced Features of BI Publisher in R12 • Implementing New Features – Technical Perspective • Applications • Question and Answer Session

5. Oracle BI Publisher (Formerly XML Publisher) is the next generation open standards tool for reporting. Enhanced Reporting Functionality : BI Publisher is a great reporting tool inside the E Business Suite but the greatest value is that offered by the products that use it and provide enhanced reporting functionality to their users. Tool of choice for eBusiness Suite (EBS) customers According to Oracle, the next release of EBS i.e. 12i has almost 80% reports that are BI Publisher (XML Publisher) based BI Publisher

6. Super Extracts with Related Information Data and Layout Abstraction Additional Templates Powerful Layout Editing Features Enhanced Reporting Options BI Publisher: What you have all been waiting for

7. Initial Versions 11i10 in HRMS, Purchasing, Contracts, Advanced Collections. In the case of Advanced Collections they jumped in a the deep end and based all of their reporting on XMLP including document delivery. R12 More teams taking advantage of the reporting gains XMLP E.g. The new Payments team are standardizing on a single extract and then providing you EFT formats (EText templates), Check formats (RTF Templates), The Global Financials teams have reduced the number of extracts they have and are shipping you layouts.  The number of out of the box templates now available, roughly 870 templates across 60 or so teams means that there is a high chance the product as now developed the template you are interested in. So it should be a simple case of getting their template, copying it, customizing it and then deploying it - done. BIP Customizing Templates

8. Well one of the carrots to come to R12 is the better reporting and the number of templates available. There are tentative plans to build a Template Bank on Metalink to allow you to download development delivered templates 11i customer what do I get?

9. Migrating Reports from 11i – R12 What of your own custom reports, how can you migrate those? Well in R12 there are a set of libraries to help you move your Oracle Reports to a data template (extract) plus a layout template (RTF) ...  The libraries are being used internally to convert the canned reports Migrating from 11i – R12

10. Oracle BI Publisher provides a utility for converting reports from Standard Oracle Reports to Oracle BI Publisher. Report Definition and Layout Templates In Oracle Reports, the data model (SQL query or extraction logic) and layout are contained in a single file. In Oracle BI Publisher the data model and the layout are separate objects. The conversion utility generates several files that will make up your report in Oracle BI Publisher. E.g.:PL/SQL specification and body containing the data for the report. The utility will generate a report definition file and a layout template file that will be uploaded to the Oracle BI Publisher repository. Converting Reports from Oracle Reports to Oracle BI Publisher

11. The overall flow for the conversion process is as follows: Run the conversion utility. Load the PL/SQL package into the database. Upload the report to the Oracle BI Publisher repository. Test the report and check the conversion log files to identify any manual modifications needed to complete the conversion. Conversion Process

12. 870 templates for more than 60 modules included with baseline R12 Oracle is current migrating the remaining reports to XML Publisher 2000 templates expected to be available Used across entire division from Financials to SCM to CRM. More than 450 templates will be translated for customers HRMS uses government form to a high degree Payments team uses XMLP for all payments Financial Applications consolidates many reports R12.x project to move remaining reports across BI Publisher is here to stay Release 12

13. •Data Extraction Engine •Bursting Engine •Consolidated Document Publishing •Template Enhancements •Delivery Manager : Distributed Delivery •Template Manager •Integration Overview: New and Enhanced Features for BI Publisher

14. Oracle BI Publisher 10.1.3.3 adds support for PowerPoint output. This enables you to get report data into your key business presentations. In this initial version of this functionality, the PowerPoint document generated is a simple export of the formatted data and charts to PowerPoint. In a future release, there will be more sophisticated integration that allows for direct embedding and refreshing from within PowerPoint. R12 Oracle BI Publisher PowerPoint Output

15. Support for Digital Signatures in PDF Documents Support for PostScript Printers Oracle BI Publisher Web Services Other New Features

16. In this release BI Publisher accepts Discoverer worksheets as report data sources. To facilitate building reports from the Discoverer worksheets, the Template Builder enables you to connect to Discoverer, browse worksheets, and load data to the Template Builder directly from Discoverer. Integration with Oracle BI Discoverer

17. Edit code in the form fields in a single window in the BI Publisher Properties dialog. Template Builder generates the code for you !! Sample Additional Dialogs simplifying insertion and editing : Data field Properties Repeating Groups Conditional Formatting Conditional Regions Editing Fields on Templates

18. Appying Adobe FLEX Templates This new feature enables report authors to develop Adobe FLEX templates that can be applied to BI Publisher reports to generate highly interactive Flash output documents.In this release, Oracle BI Publisher offers support for Adobe Corporation's new document format for building interactive forms and reports, called Flex. You can build Flex templates, test them on your desktop, and deploy them to the BI Publisher server to generate Flash output. Flash Templates for Oracle BI Publisher

19. Oracle Financials Oracle Payments Sample Applications for BI

20. Business Requirements •Generate High Fidelity Output •Allow end user customization •10000+ page output •No change for report consumers Implementation •RTF Templates •Scalable transformation •Concurrent Manager Integration Oracle Financials

21. Business Requirements •Generate Electronic Funds Transfer files •Support 160 formats Very large input data Deliver via FTP, HTTP Implementation •eText Templates •Delivery Manager Oracle Payments

22. Q & A