SAP BusinessObjects Report Conversion Tool Guide

■ SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0

2010-08-23

© 2010 SAP AG. All rights reserved.SAP, R/3, SAP NetWeaver, Duet, PartnerEdge, ByDesign, SAP Business ByDesign, and other SAP products and services mentioned herein as well as their respective logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP AG in Germany and other countries. Business Objects and the Business Objects logo, BusinessObjects, Crystal Reports, Crystal Decisions, Web Intelligence, Xcelsius, and other Business Objects products and services mentioned herein as well as their respective logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of Business Objects S.A. in the United States and in other countries. Business Objects is an SAP company.All other product and service names mentioned are the trademarks of their respective companies. Data contained in this document serves informational purposes only. National product specifications may vary.These materials are subject to change without notice. These materials are provided by SAP AG and its affiliated companies ("SAP Group") for informational purposes only, without representation or warranty of any kind, and SAP Group shall not be liable for errors or omissions with respect to the materials. The only warranties for SAP Group products and services are those that are set forth in the express warranty statements accompanying such products and services, if any. Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an additional warranty.

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Report Conversion Tool Overview..........................................................................................5Chapter 1

1.1

1.2

2.1

2.2

3.1

3.2

3.3

3.3.1

3.3.2

3.4

3.4.1

3.4.2

3.4.3

3.4.4

3.4.5

3.4.6

3.4.7

3.4.8

3.4.9

3.5

3.5.1

3.5.2

3.6

3.6.1

3.6.2

What is the Report Conversion Tool?.......................................................................................6

New features supported for conversion to Interactive analysis.................................................6

Report Conversion Tool working modes.................................................................................9Chapter 2

Report Conversion Tool Connected mode...............................................................................9

Report Conversion Tool Standalone mode...............................................................................9

Using the Report Conversion Tool........................................................................................11Chapter 3

Installing the Report Conversion Tool.....................................................................................11

Editing user settings for the Report Conversion Tool..............................................................11

Launching the Report Conversion Tool...................................................................................11

To launch the Report Conversion Tool in Connected mode....................................................11

To launch the Report Conversion Tool in Standalone mode....................................................12

Selecting reports....................................................................................................................12

To explore the repository.......................................................................................................13

To search for reports with the Report Conversion Tool..........................................................13

To select individual reports for conversion..............................................................................13

To select reports by folder for conversion..............................................................................13

To select reports by category for conversion.........................................................................14

To save and open lists of reports for conversion....................................................................14

To convert reports.................................................................................................................14

Report conversion status icons..............................................................................................15

Limitations in converting a report containing free-hand SQL or stored procedures.................16

Viewing conversion results and selecting the audit database..................................................17

To create an audit connection and assign it to the Report Conversion Tool............................17

To view the audit report for the Report Conversion Tool........................................................18

Publishing converted reports..................................................................................................18

To publish converted reports..................................................................................................19

To compare fully converted reports........................................................................................19

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Contents

Desktop Intelligence feature conversion...............................................................................23Chapter 4

4.1

4.2

Index 33

SAP BusinessObjects Desktop Intelligence feature conversion status...................................23

Formula conversion in the Report Conversion Tool................................................................29

More Information...................................................................................................................31Appendix A

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Report Conversion Tool Overview

You use the Report Conversion Tool to convert SAP BusinessObjects Desktop Intelligence XI R2 and XI 3.0 reports to Interactive Analysis XI 4.0 format in the SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0 platform.

Before you can convert your Desktop Intelligence reports, you first need to install and configure SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0 client tools.

Note:

Desktop Intelligence reports are no longer supported in SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0. To access your data from a Desktop Intelligence report in SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0, you must convert the Desktop Intelligence report to an Interactive Analysis report using Report Conversion Tool.

You use the Report Conversion Tool to convert the following types of report to Interactive Analysis XI

4.0 (WID) format:

• Desktop Intelligence reports whose dependencies are migrated to the XI 4.0 CMS using Upgrade

Manager. Dependencies include folders and objects, other application objects, and the universes. It is recommended to use Upgrade Manager before you convert your Desktop Intelligence report to Interactive Analysis report using Report Conversion Tool. If you do not use Upgrade Manager for your Desktop Intelligence report, then you may not be able to refresh your Interactive Analysis report due to:

• Unavailability of the source folder structure in the destination for your Interactive analysis report.

Note:

If you convert your Desktop Intelligence report to Interactive analysis report, by default, your report will be saved to Public folder\Report conversion tool\Report conversion tool documents in the destination CMS. However, you can also save it in a different location. Manually creating a folder with the same source folder name will not refresh your Interactive analysis report, as the folders are recognized by the application through their individual IDs known as CUID and not folder names.

• Unavailability of other application objects and the universes.

• Desktop Intelligence reports created directly in SAP BusinessObjects Desktop Intelligence and

based on the data providers as follows:

• a Business Objects universe

• a Microsoft Excel document

• an ASCII file (formats ASC, PRN, CSV and TXT)

• free-hand SQL and stored procedures

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Report Conversion Tool Overview

Note:

• Desktop Intelligence is the new name of the product formerly called BusinessObjects. It was first

shipped under this new name in the BusinessObjects Enterprise XI release.

• Interactive analysis is the new name of the product formerly called Web Intelligence.

1.1 What is the Report Conversion Tool?

The Report Conversion Tool converts SAP BusinessObjects Desktop Intelligence XI R2 and XI 3.0 reports to Interactive Analysis XI 4.0 format and publishes the converted reports to the XI 4.0 CMS.

It retrieves reports from the source “Central Management Server” (CMS), into the “Public”, “Favorites”, or “Inbox” folders. Once converted, you can publish to the same folder as the original Desktop Intelligence report or to a different folder.

The tool does not convert all Desktop Intelligence features and reports. The level of conversion depends on the features in the original report. Some features prevent the report from being converted. Other features are modified, reimplemented, or removed by the tool during conversion.

The tool assigns one of three statuses to each report:

• “Fully Converted”

• “Partially Converted”

• “Not Converted”

The Report Conversion Tool also lets you audit your converted reports. This enables you to identify reports that cannot be fully converted by the Report Conversion Tool and helps you understand why.

Note:

For more information about Desktop Intelligence feature conversion, see

Conversion Tool Guide

SAP BusinessObjects Report

1.2 New features supported for conversion to Interactive analysis

Following are the new features that are fully converted using the Report Conversion Tool:

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Report Conversion Tool Overview

DescriptionFeature

Query on Query

Fold/Unfold

After conversion of your Desktop Intelligence report to Interactive analysis report using Report Conversion Tool, the Query on Query feature applied to your Desktop intelligence report will be reflected in the converted Interactive analysis report. The conversion status is Fully converted since Query on query feature is supported in Interactive analysis. Query on query in Interactive analysis supports the following operators:

• InList / NotInList

• EqualTo

• NotEqualTo

• GreaterThan

• GreaterThanOrEqualTo

• LessThan

• LessThanOrEqualTo

The other operators apart from the operators listed above, do not support Query on query in Interactive analysis.

You can view or apply the Fold or Unfold feature in Outline view.

After conversion of your Desktop Intelligence report to Interactive analysis report using Report Conversion Tool, the folded sections, tables, crosstabs, and breaks will be unfolded in Interactive analysis report. You can then fold them manually. The conversion status is Fully converted since Fold/Unfold feature is supported in Interactive analysis.

Show/Hide

Fit to page

Using the Show/ Hide feature, you can hide sections, tables, cross tables, charts, cells, dimensions, and measures to your Desktop Intelligence report. You can also hide these through conditions.

After conversion of your Desktop Intelligence report to Interactive analysis report using Report Conversion Tool, the objects that are hidden in your Desktop intelligence report will also be hidden in your Interactive analysis report. The conversion status is Fully converted since Show/Hide feature is supported in Interactive analysis.

Note:

Hiding Measure in Desktop Intelligence report will remove Measures from the Interactive analysis report after conversion using Report Conversion Tool. However, the object is available under the Data tab in the left pane of your Interactive analysis report and you can drag-drop this object to your report to view the values in the table.

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Report Conversion Tool Overview

DescriptionFeature

In the Page setup options, you can apply the Fit to page feature to your Interactive analysis report in Page layout mode.

If you apply Fit to page feature to your Desktop Intelligence report and convert it to Interactive analysis report using Report Conversion Tool, the report is fully converted and the Fit to page feature is available in your Interactive analysis report.

Note:

• If page size values entered is below 10 percent or above 400 percent, after

conversion, Report Conversion Tool will adjust the page size to 100 percent since the valid value for scaling in Interactive analysis is from 10 percent to 400 percent.

• If Fit to page and margins are applied to your Desktop Intelligence report, then,

during conversion, Report Conversion Tool will set the margin values to the default values in your Interactive analysis report.

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Report Conversion Tool working modes

You can work with the Report Conversion Tool in two modes: “Connected” or “Standalone”.

2.1 Report Conversion Tool Connected mode

In “Connected” mode, the Report Conversion Tool is connected to the source and the destination CMS.

• You can convert Desktop Intelligence documents that are stored in the source CMS to Interactive

Analysis format.

• You can publish converted documents to XI 4.0 CMS.

• If a universe needs to be created on-the-fly during the conversion session, it is created in the CMS.

Note:

If your Desktop Intelligence report was created on free-hand SQL or Stored Procedures, then Report conversion tool will create a universe on-the-fly as Interactive analysis does not support free-hand SQL or Stored Procedures.

Security in Connected mode

When you work in “Connected” mode, the security rights of your user account are applied by the CMS.

2.2 Report Conversion Tool Standalone mode

In “Standalone” mode, the Report Conversion Tool is not connected to a CMS and no security is enforced. You can work with local, unsecured documents and universes only. Local means saved to the computer's hard disk. This does not include network servers.

You cannot import documents to or export documents from a CMS when you are in “Standalone” mode.

The middleware required to create and refresh local, unsecured documents with local, unsecured universes must be installed on the computer with the Report Conversion Tool.

• You can convert Desktop Intelligence documents to Interactive Analysis.

• You can convert documents created with earlier versions of Desktop Intelligence and XI 3.0 to

Interactive Analysis XI 4.0 provided the universes they are based on have been copied to the local XI 4.0 universe folder and are unsecured (saved for all users).

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Report Conversion Tool working modes

• You cannot convert documents based on freehand SQL or stored procedures to Interactive Analysis

XI 4.0.

When to use Standalone mode

You use “Standalone” mode when you want to work with neither CMS security nor a CMS connection. This allows you to convert any number of locally stored, unsecured documents in a single operation without affecting CMS performance.

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Using the Report Conversion Tool

3.1 Installing the Report Conversion Tool

The Report Conversion Tool runs on Microsoft Windows platforms. It is installed by default when you run a Client installation of SAP BusinessObjects XI 4.0. When you run a “Custom” installation, you must select Report Conversion Tool to install it.

Note:

You must install Designer if you want to create an audit log or if you want to detect “Free-Hand SQL” and “Stored Procedure” reports.

3.2 Editing user settings for the Report Conversion Tool

By default, users in the “Administrators” group or the “Report Conversion Tool Users” group have the appropriate rights to use the Report Conversion Tool.

You can edit the user rights through the Central Management Console in the SAP Business Objects Enterprise Applications > Report Conversion Tool section.

3.3 Launching the Report Conversion Tool

You can launch the Report Conversion Tool in either of its working modes:

• “Connected”

• “Standalone”

3.3.1 To launch the Report Conversion Tool in “Connected” mode

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