Oracle Business Intelligence

Publisher
Author: Niket Chitre
Date : 11/10/2008
Key Words : BI Publisher, Publisher
Declaration :I/We hereby declare that this document is based
on my/our personal experiences and/or experiences of my/our
project members. To the best of my/our knowledge, this
document does not contain any material that infringes the
copyrights of any other individual or organization including the
customers of Infosys.

The PPT serves as a training material for trainings conducted by/for Oracle BI Team. It gives a step-by-step
procedure to be followed for developing, viewing and scheduling reports in BI Publisher

What is Oracle BI Publisher?

Oracle BI Publisher is a tool which enables the users to create,

schedule and deliver pre canned or pre build reports. It uses
templates which are designed in the required format to render the
reports required by the user.

Oracle BI publisher is a versatile reporting tool, as it supports

various commonly accepted output formats like Word document,
PDF file and an excel sheet.

It can connect to different types of data sources to get the report

data.

What is Oracle BI Publisher? Contd

It supports all the databases, flat file formats like CSV and XLS.
It also supports XML.
Oracle BI Publisher can be used as a stand-alone reporting product
or integrated with the Oracle Business Intelligence Suite Enterprise
Edition. Thus, it has a exclusive connectivity to Oracle BI where it
can fetch the data directly out of an oracle BI Answers query.

Logging In to Oracle BI Publisher

Depending on the type of installation you have done, you can
invoke BI Publisher as follows:

If you have installed BI Publisher along with Oracle BI

Enterprise Edition, then you can select All Programs > Oracle
Business Intelligence > BI Publisher from the Start menu.

If you have installed BI Publisher in stand-alone mode, then

select All Programs > Oracle - Oracle Home > BI Publisher
Server from the Start menu.
OracleHome - refers to Oracle Home name, where you installed Oracle BI
Publisher.

Logging In to Oracle BI Publisher Contd

This displays the Welcome screen for BI Publisher.

Logging In to Oracle BI Publisher Contd

As you have logged in as the Administrator, the welcome page

displays the Reports, Schedules, and Admin tabs.

For the users who do not have administrator privileges, the

Admin tab is not displayed.

Setting Preferences in BI Publisher

By clicking on the Preferences link, a new window with General

Preferences and Account tabs is opened.

The Account tab is used to change the password of your

administrator account. (If you have installed BI Publisher along with
Oracle BI Enterprise Edition, for the integration between these to
work, for any given user account , you should set the same
password in BI Administration Tool and in BI Publisher.)

Setting Preferences in BI Publisher Contd

The Accounts tab screen:-

Setting Preferences in BI Publisher Contd

The General Preferences screen:-

Setting Preferences in BI Publisher Contd

On the above page you can:

Set the appropriate options for UI Language, Reports Locale,

Reports Time Zone according to your requirements.

You can also enable the accessibility option.

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BI Publisher The Admin Tab

The admin tab screen is as follows:

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BI Publisher The Admin Tab Contd

Create a BI Publisher data source

Before creating a query on the database, you need to define

connection details in the Admin tab.
Go to Admin > Data Source

You can then choose any of the given options and proceed.

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BI Publisher The Admin Tab Contd

After clicking on your desired data source link, a screen as the

following is displayed.

You can choose to edit a given data source by clicking on its

name or you can also add a new data source.

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BI Publisher The Admin Tab Contd

You can make the required changes in the update data source that you are editing.

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BI Publisher The Admin Tab Contd

Before clicking on Apply after making the changes, click Test

Connection.

When the confirmation message saying that connection is

successfully established, click Apply.

In case of file data source, specify a name for your data source and
put in the path of your storage drive where your data files are located.

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab

The reports tab screen is as follows:

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

On the reports page, click on the folder in which you want to

create a new report.

On the left hand side pane click on Create a new report link

Enter the report name that you want to create. A report will be
created as shown below.

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

Click on edit link below the report to open the report in the edit
mode.

Set the options that appear in the general settings page.

Give a brief description about the report in the description

option.

Set the default data source as Oracle BIEE or Demo. Also

check the properties as per the requirements.

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

The general properties page:

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

Next click on the Data Model and click new to define a data
source for this report.

Select the type and data source for the new data set.

You can also choose to cache the results by checking the

cache results checkbox.

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

CASE 1: Type- SQL Query
Now click on the query builder to create the SQL Query if you
specified the type as SQL Query.

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

Query Builder:

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

You can drag and drop the tables you want to use in your
query.
Check the columns you want to be displayed. Joins can be
made by selecting the common columns between the tables.
Conditions can be specified as below. Sort order, group by
clause can also be specified.

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

You can view the generated SQL in the SQL tab.

The results can be viewed in the Results tab as shown below.

Click on Save to save the query.

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

Click on save to save the changes made to the report.

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

CASE 2 : Type- File

If the Type specified is File:

In the details section, select the data source from the drop down and
put in the name of the file which you want to be used as the report
data source.

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

Click on Save to save the changes made to the report.

After saving click on View to see if XML data is loaded

successfully.

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BI Publisher The Reports Tab Contd

CASE 3: Type-Oracle BI Answers

Else in case of Oracle BI Answers as the specified type, you can

browse and select from the options available.

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List Of Values and Parameters

List of Values : We can create a list of values in the BI Publisher

report which can be used to filter certain set of values from the
report.
(This feature is better supported for relational database connections,
as we can have flexible list of values which can be dynamically
modified.)

Parameter: Parameters along with the list of values allows the user
to limit the number of reports at the output.

For Oracle BI Answers, the list of values and parameters are disabled.

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Creating a Report with Parameters and List of Values

Click the Parameters node in the Report pane and click New to
create a parameter.

Enter the values for identifier, data type, default value,

parameter type and display label.

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Creating a Report with Parameters and List of Values

When you save and view the report, the report will be
displayed according to the parameter value specified as
default.

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Creating a Report with Parameters and List of Values

Select the Parameter Type:

Text - this type allows the user to enter a text entry
to pass as the parameter.
Menu - this type presents an LOV. Enter the Display Label
and select from the LOVs you defined in the previous step. You
may also enable the following options:
1)Multiple Selection - allows the user to select
multiple entries from the list.
2) Can select all - inserts an "All" option in the list.
3) Refresh other parameters on change - performs a
partial page refresh to refresh any other parameters
whose values are dependent on the value of this one.

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Creating a Report with Parameters and List of Values

Date - passes a date parameter. If you select a
Parameter Type of Date, the Data Type automatically
defaults to Date. Enter the following:
1)Display Label and Text Field Size in characters.
2) Date Format String
3) Date From and Date To
Hidden - select this option to pass the default value
always, without allowing the user to see or change it.

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Creating a Report with Parameters and List of Values

Using List Of Values

Click List of Values, and click New to create a new list of

values.

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Creating a Report with Parameters and List of Values

Enter a Name for the list and select a Type: SQL Query or Fixed Data.
If you select SQL Query:
Select a Connection from the data source list.
Select Cache Result if you want the results of the
query cached for the report session.
Enter the SQL query or use the Query Builder.

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Creating a Report with Parameters and List of Values

If you select Fixed Data:

Select the Add link to add the Label and Value pairs
the LOV.

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for

Creating a Report with Parameters and List of Values

The List Of Values come as a drop down list as shown.

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Adding Layouts to the Report Definition

BI Publisher offers various designing templates for your

reports as follows
Rich Text Format(RTF)

Uses MS Word to design the template

Portable Document Format(PDF)

PDF templates are used primarily for using predefined forms as templates for
your reports

Microsoft Excel(XLS)

MS Excel is used to design the template

XSL Stylesheet

XSL formatting language is used for creating a template

eText

Specialized RTF templates

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Adding Layouts to the Report Definition

Defining layouts consists of 2 steps:

Upload a template file
Assign the template file to a Layout definition

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Adding Layouts to the Report Definition(Steps)

From the BI Publisher Report Editor, select Layouts

Use the Browse button to locate the template file in your local
system and then select Upload

The Template will now appear in the Manage Template Files

Section. Multiple Templates can be uploaded for one report

Select the New icon to create the Layout Definition for the
template/templates uploaded

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Adding Layouts to the Report Definition(Steps)

Enter a Name for the layout definition. This name will appear in the Template list on the View report page.
Select the Template file from the list of uploaded templates to correspond to this layout definition.
Select the appropriate template type you are uploading: RTF, PDF, Excel, XSL or eText.
Select the Output Format types to allow for this layout.
If the template type is RTF, you can either select All Formats or limit the allowed formats by selecting only those
desired.

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Adding Layouts to the Report Definition(Steps)

Select Save. The Layout will now appear as an available

template when you run the report.

Select a Default Template. The Default Template will be used

by default by the online viewer and the scheduler unless the
user selects another.

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Creating an RTF Template

Download Template Builder from the BI Publisher Folder and

Report Tasks Region

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Creating an RTF Template

The toolbar and the menu provide two methods of performing

many of the same functions, including:
Insert data fields into your RTF templates
Insert tables, forms, charts, and crosstabs
Preview your template in multiple outputs
Browse and update the content of form fields
Validate your template
Perform calculations on fields within the template
Connect to the Oracle BI Publisher server or the Oracle BI server to
retrieve data to build your template
Publish your template to the Oracle BI Publisher server

2 methods :
Connected Mode
Disconnected Mode

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Connected Mode

Open Microsoft Word, from the Oracle BI Publisher menu, select Log On.
Enter your BI Publisher credentials and the URL for the BI Publisher server.
(Contact your system administrator if you do not know the URL.)
The Open Template dialog presents the same folder structure as your BI
Publisher
Reports home page. Select the report for which you want to build a template.
Select Open Report to load the data to the Template Builder; or double-click
<New> in the Layout Templates pane.
Create the Template by inserting fields, tables, charts etc. according to the
requirements.
To upload your template to the BI Publisher server and add it to your report
definition, select Publish Template As from the Oracle BI Publisher menu.
Enter a name for your template in the Upload as New dialog. Note that this
is the name that appears under Layouts in the Report Editor
(Optional) Limit the output formats for this template.

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46

Disconnected Mode

Generate a sample data file.

From the Report Editor or from the Reports page, select View. If no
layouts are defined for your report, then the output type will default to
xml, otherwise, choose data for the output type. Select Export. Save the
results as an XML file to a local directory.
Open Microsoft Word with the Template Builder installed.
From the Oracle BI Publisher menu select Data and then select Load
Sample XML Data. Locate your sample data file in your local directory
and select Open. A pop up message will indicate your data has loaded
successfully.
Create the Template by inserting fields, tables, charts etc. according to
the requirements
Upload your layout template file as explained in the above section.

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Enabling Bursting

Using BI Publisher's bursting feature you can split a single

report based on a key in the report data and deliver the report
based on a second key in the report data.

Driven by the delivery key, you can apply a different template,

output format, delivery method, and locale to each split
segment of your report.

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Enabling Bursting Contd

Example implementations include:

Invoice generation and delivery based on customer-specific

layouts and delivery preference.

Financial reporting to generate a master report of all cost

centers, bursting out individual cost center reports to the
appropriate manager.

Generation of pay slips to all employees based on one extract

and delivered via e-mail.

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Enabling Bursting Contd

The report data must contain an element by which the report will
be split and an element by which the report will be delivered.
Enabling a report for bursting consists of the following steps:

Open the report in Edit mode.

Select Bursting under the report definition.

Select the Enable Bursting check box.

Select the Split By and Deliver By elements.

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Enabling Bursting Contd

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Enabling Bursting Contd

The Split By element is the data element from the report file
that you wish to split the report by.

The Deliver By element is the data element from the report

file by which to determine the delivery method.

Select the data source for the delivery XML.

The delivery XML can be sourced from the same data source as
the main data set, or it can be generated from a different data
source.

Enter the SQL query to build the delivery XML.

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Enabling Bursting Contd

Based on the SQL query that you provide on the Bursting

criteria page of the Report Editor, BI Publisher will build the
delivery XML data set.

The delivery XML data set contains the information to deliver

your burst report appropriately to each recipient.

The delivery data in this XML document is used as a mapping

table for each Deliver By element.

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Scheduling BI Publisher Reports

Enables you to schedule long-running reports, to be run at a

specified time and date

Enables you to select a time and date at which the load on the
system is low, to run your daily/weekly and/or monthly reports

Two main components of the BI Publisher Scheduler are as

follows:
Configuring the BI Publisher Scheduler
Scheduling and Viewing Saved Output

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Configuring the BI Publisher Scheduler(Steps)

Log in to the BI Publisher as Administrator

(Password: Administrator)

In the Admin tab, click on the Scheduler Configuration Link

in the System Maintenance section

In the Scheduler Configuration sub-tab:

Select Oracle 10g from the Database Type drop-down list.
Enter Connection String in the format: jdbc:oracle:thin:@<Host name>:
<Port>:<SID>
Enter Username and Password
Ensure that oracle.jdbc.driver.OracleDriver is selected as Database
Driver Class
Click Test Connection

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Configuring the BI Publisher Scheduler(Steps)

Click Install Schema to install the required tables and restart

the BI Publisher Server or OC4J service after this
configuration

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Scheduling and Viewing Saved Reports(Steps)

Login to BI Publisher and go to the Reports tab

Select a report that you want to schedule and click on the

Schedule option
Select the Report Parameters such as Template and Output Format to be
used
Set the Job Properties which include :

Job Name
Report Formatting Locale
Report Formatting Time Zone
Report Formatting Calendar
Public - select this check box to make this job available to all users with access
to the report.
Save Data for Republish - select this check box if you want the XML data from
the report run saved.
Save Output - select this check box if you want the report output saved
Use Unicode

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Scheduling and Viewing Saved Reports(Steps)

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Scheduling and Viewing Saved Reports(Steps)

In the Time section, set the date and time when the report has
to be run

If you select Run Once, select the Run Date and Run Time.
If you select Run Daily/Weekly select the days of the week, the Run Time,
Active Start Date to begin the recurring job and the Active End Date to end
the recurring schedule.
If you select Run Monthly, select the month, the day of the month to run the
report, the Run Time, the Active Start Date to begin running the report and
the Active End Date. To select multiple days of the month to run the report,
enter each day separated by a comma (example: 1,15,28).

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Scheduling and Viewing Saved Reports(Steps)

You can now see the Scheduled Report in the Schedules tab
You can suspend, resume or delete a report that has been
scheduled

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Scheduling and Viewing Saved Reports(Steps)

Click the History tab to view the report history
Click the icon in the Document column to view the saved
report

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Viewing BI Publisher Reports

Using Online Analyzer

Allows you to create a pivot table of your data
Analyses the report data by dragging and dropping the different fields into
row, column and summary positions
Allows you to filter the report data displayed in the pivot table by using
page-level data items
Drag and drop the desired field to the Page item area and then choose
from the values that immediately populate the list

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Viewing BI Publisher Reports

After selecting all the data items for the table, choose whether to view the Sum, Average, or Count of the data items

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Viewing BI Publisher Reports

Using Analyzer for Excel enables you to

Export the results of the report query to an Excel spreadsheet
Log in to BI Publisher Enterprise from Excel to refresh your data, apply
new parameters, and apply a template to the report data
Create Excel templates and upload them to the BI Publisher server
Access and run your reports from an Excel session

Select the Excel Analyzer button from the View report page.
You will be prompted to Save or Open the report .xls file.

When you open the file, select Enable Macros from the Excel
dialog.

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Viewing BI Publisher Reports

BI Publisher Menu in Excel

Login allows you to log in to the BI Publisher server
Show Report Parameters displays the updateable parameters
and available templates for the report in a toolbar
Analyzer for Excel Toolbar
To update the data, select a new parameter value then select
Refresh Data to refresh the data in the current sheet.
To apply a template, select the template, then select Refresh
Formatted Data. This will download the report as HTML into a new
worksheet. Select the new worksheet to see the data with the new
template applied.
To change the parameters from this worksheet, select the new
values, then select Refresh Data, then select Refresh Formatted
Data.

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Viewing BI Publisher Reports

Update Excel Template - If you used the Open Template dialog to download a template from the BI Publisher
server, use this option to upload the updated layout back to the server.

Add as a New Excel Template

- Use this option to upload modifications to an existing template under a different

name.

View Report Online Launches the View report page

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Viewing BI Publisher Reports

Open Layout Template - Downloads and opens the selected
template in the Template Builder and loads the XML data. To start a new
template, select <New> from the list of templates then select Open
Layout Template; or double-click <New>.

Open Report - Loads the XML data of the selected report to the
Template Builder

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Thank You

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