Business Objects-The Complete Reference

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Cindi Howson

McGraw-Hill/Osborne
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Business Objects: The Complete Reference

Copyright © 2003 by The McGraw-Hill Companies. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. Except as permitted under the Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of publisher, with the exception that the program listings may be entered, stored, and executed in a computer system, but they may not be reproduced for publication.

1234567890 CUS CUS 019876543

ISBN 0-07-222681-1

Publisher: Brandon A. Nordin
Vice President & Associate Publisher: Scott Rogers
Acquisitions Editor: Lisa McClain
Project Editor: Jennifer Malnick
Acquisitions Coordinator: Athena Honore
Technical Editor: Elizabeth Newbould
Copy Editor: Robert Campbell
Proofreader: Mike McGee
Indexer: Jack Lewis
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Illustrators: Lyssa Wald, Melinda Moore Lytle, Michael Mueller
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Wine ratings, Copyright 2002, The Wine Advocate

To Keith, Megan, and Samuel-
for teaching me everything about H.B., dragon flies,
front loaders, and unconditional love

About the Author

Cindi Howson is an independent consultant based in northern New Jersey, doing business as Analytic Solutions Know-How (ASK). She has worked with Fortune 500 companies, midsized, and small businesses to solve both technical and business application issues.

Cindi has 14 years' experience in information technology and has specialized in data warehousing and business intelligence tools for eight years. She has worked with BusinessObjects since 1994 and implemented it for thousands of users around the world. As an independent consultant, she writes for industry journals, speaks at user conferences, teaches for The Data Warehouse Institute, and consults with clients to select and optimize BI tools. Prior to working independently, she was a manager at Deloitte & Touche Management Solutions and Services, leading the Houston, TX, analytics practice.

With an MBA from Rice University in Houston, Texas, Cindi focuses on the business value of business intelligence. She was awarded Jones Scholar in 1999, an award to the top students in the school who have excelled in all aspects of business.

About the Technical Editor

Elizabeth Newbould is the director of Business Intelligence at Dataspace, Incorporated (www.dataspace.com), one of the U.S.'s foremost data warehousing consultancies. Elizabeth has more than 12 years' experience working with business intelligence and data warehousing solutions. Her e-mail address is [e-mail].

Acknowledgments

So many people helped make this book what it is and I thank them for their help, commitment, and patience. The team at McGraw-Hill/Osborne took this book from concept to print, starting with Ann Sellers, who bought the idea and convinced me to publish under the Complete Reference line. It's never easy to inherit someone else's project, yet Lisa McClain followed through with enthusiasm and coached me to completion. Thank you to Athena Honore for keeping track of everything, and Jenny Malnick for her sense of humor and attention to detail. Elizabeth Newbould of Dataspace caught my technical inaccuracies and helped bring clarity to each chapter. She went beyond what was expected to answer all my 'triple-check e-mails.'

Without Business Objects-the company-there would be no book. I think back to the days when Business Objects was a small, privately held firm. At the time, selecting their tool was a risky decision. Now I can only cheer that they have turned into both a great company and best-selling product. Many of the original people have come and gone, but still, Mark Hayem, wherever he may be, taught me so much and provided a sturdy foundation. Thank you, Bernard Liautaud, for not laughing at my attempt at speaking French during our first introduction. I'm indebted to Sherry Lowe, who got the ball rolling, and Danielle Dawson, whose undying commitment to follow through with so many product managers and technical folks ensured this book is as accurate and complete as possible. I need to thank the people in tech support who made sure my cases were genuine problems and not just my bad habits, especially Marlene for her follow up and Dale Briggs, without whose support I would have cut coverage of Universal Drill Through Service. And thanks to John Care and Andre Lopez for making sure coverage of version 6 made it into this book.

A number of people helped shape this book and answered specific content questions. I thank Ed Heuser for providing inspiration and opinions; Joel Fedorko, DBA extraordinaire, who answered every question about every database; as well as Walter Müllner, Melanie Hoy, Mark McBride, Dave Rathbun, Steve Krandel, Greg Reitz, Tom Carson, Dan Vesset, Chuck Piercey, Bryan Motteram, Laura Vega, and Darren Cunningham. Keith Jaslow at Informatica was invaluable in making sure my ETL coverage was correct. Without the commitment from Dan Everett at Hyperion, I never would have been able to address incorporating Essbase into a BusinessObjects deployment. Mark Braunstein at eRobertParker and Julian Berkin at WineAlert.com provided the interesting data used for Part III of this book.

I never would have embarked on my career in business intelligence if it were not for the business people at Dow Chemical, including Fernand Kaufman, Dik Hoijer, Bob Lee, and Eddie Wilson, who kept me focused on the business goals in everything IT. They took me from the days of spreadsheet reports to landing on the moon at the push of a button! The original Access Tools Team, especially Armin Pressler, introduced me to the formal field of business intelligence. Of course, none of this technology makes a hoot of difference until people actually use it. I thank Kathy Krupp, Martin Cameron, and Gregg Reitz, for showing me just how worthwhile it can be.

Thank you to my professors at the Jones School at Rice University who rekindled my passion for business intelligence from a new perspective. In so many ways, this book is a product of what I learned while doing my MBA. Without all you taught me about entrepreneurship, marketing, power and politics, consulting, and the independent BI project, I never would have embarked on this project. Wayne Eckerson showed me the power of writing to help companies find the sweet spot of business intelligence. My friends and colleagues at Deloitte & Touche broadened my knowledge of consulting and business intelligence, especially Buck Ogilvie for his support and enthusiasm, Jeff Goodwin and the data team for putting up with my rantings, Harvey Michaels for allowing me so many opportunities, and Jennifer Vaughn and Jami Blake for being friends and mentors. So when are any of you going to relocate to NJ?

Last, but certainly not least, is my family. Writing a book is something that could not be accomplished during the course of a normal workday. They have all made so many sacrifices to allow me to write this book. I thank Megan for waiting patiently for a book of her own and who, at the age of seven, offered to proofread everything just so I would be done already! I thank Sam for cheering whenever I finished a chapter, and Keith for all those late-night cups of tea, neck rubs, and for still being my favorite user!

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