Does anyone know how to schedule an Insight Profile task as suggested in this link http://wiki.scn.sap.com/wiki/pages/viewpage.action?pageId=318669651.

I've created the profile task but cannot see it at CMC.


Note, i dont want to schedule validation rule.

Many
thanks.

Hi Community,

I would like to ask how to create a warning rule in SAP IS.

I want to create a rule that doesn't fail validation but only executes a warning message.

Please advise.

Thank you.

Kind regards,

Roli

Hi,

We are currently on IS4.1 and planning to move the Info Steward repository from Oracle to DB2. What is the best practice of performing this activity.

ISRepositoryutility is the tool mentioned in the admin guide to change the configuration of the repository. But not sure, how it can be used to migrate an existing repository from one DB to another.

Thanks,

Sandeep

Hi ,

when I try to import the standard values for the cleansing package I am getting an error as

CPB_BE_00324: Data Cleanse ADD_UPDATE PHRASE_WORD failed with error SQLite step failed. Reason: database is locked. SQL statement: SELECT entryid, entry, genderid, domainid, C.classification, S.secondary, S.isalias, ST.type from ( SELECT PE.primaryentryid as entryid, PE.entry as entry, PE.genderid as genderid, PE.domainid as domainid FROM primaryentry AS PE WHERE PE.entry = 'ROLL/PK'  ) LEFT JOIN secondary AS S ON entryid = S.primaryentryid LEFT JOIN secondarytype AS ST ON S.secondarytypeid = ST.secondarytypeid INNER JOIN primclasslink AS PCL on entryid = PCL.primaryentryid INNER JOIN classification AS C on PCL.classificationid = C.classificationid ORDER BY entry ..

Initially I tried to import the standard values from excel file which has  23000 line items values but ended up with this error.

So I have split the values into multiple sheets of excel file and tried importing which helped in importing the values from sheet1, But when I tried to import the data from sheet2 I landed up with the same error.

I not sure is any limitation in terms of number of standard values but there is limitation of 3000 records max when we import the sample data.

Also error message says SQLite step failed. Reason: database is locked.

Kindly Advice.

Thanks & Regards,

Senthilnathan.K

One of the very good feature provided by SAP in Information Steward is Auto Documentation.

To use this feature follow below steps.

1. From the Metadata Management tab, double-click on the Data Integration Connection that contains the table for which you want to view the Auto Documentation.

2. Click the relevant table in Table section.

3. Click the column for which you want to view the Auto Documentation and select View Lineage/View Impact from the drop-down menu.

4. Display how the source data is mapped to the target in either of the following ways:

• In the Graphical view, move the pointer over the Relationship Attribute icon ().
• In the Tabular view, in the Mapping column, locate the data flow.

5. Click the hyperlinked data flow name to connect to the Auto Documentation report for this table. You connect in one of the following ways:

• If single sign-on is enabled, you connect directly to the Auto Documentation report.
• If single sign-on is not enabled, the log on screen to the Data Services Management Console will be displayed.

The Auto Documentation report is displayed in a separate window. Log on using your user name and password for the Data Services Management Console.

6. 3 Tabs would be available for Data Flow, Mapping Tree and Table Usage as follows.

    1. Data Flow

    2. Mapping Tree

    3. Table Usage

You can take the print of the document by clicking on 'Print' button available next to the DS Job name.

Report will look like as attached pdf.

Regards,

Chetan

Use the below steps to creating and using views.

Creating Views using multiple tables

1. Select the tables.

2. Click on Manager Views > Create View.

Output Schema columns for View

1. Select the columns from the multiple tables and insert it in Output Schema tab by clicking on ‘Add Columns’ Button.

2. Change the Data Type of the column by clicking on Data Type value of corresponding column.

3. It is the new feature available in IS 4.1.

Insert Join Conditions

1.      Click on Join Conditions tab.

2.      Click on ‘Add’ to add conditions.

3.      To add joins automatically based on Column names click on propose joins.

4. You can also add the Left Outer Join by selecting Join Type combo box.

5. Left Outer Join feature is provided from v4.1

Inserting Filter Condition

1.  Select the column and add it to the Filter Conditions tab by clicking on ‘Add Column’ button.

2. Select the required operator from Operator column.

3. Write the appropriate value.

4. Click on ‘Validate’ to check the correctness of the condition.

5. To write complex condition select the ‘Advanced Editor’ button.

Group By tab

1. Enables you to specify how the output records are grouped.

2. Only selected columns for Output Schema can be selected.

3. Group by columns can be added either by selecting and clicking on ‘Add Column’ or by clicking on ‘Propose Columns’ option available on Group By tab.

4. Click on ‘Validate’ to verify the correctness of the columns.

Please note that, in Group By tab it should have all the selected column of Output Schema or it should be blank. Otherwise, it will throw an error.

Adding Aggregate Function

1. Open Advance Expression Editor

2. Write the expression

3. Change the data type to Integer

Testing the View

1. In Workspace Home select the View

2. Expand it to check whether it contains the selected columns in ‘Output Schema’ tab.

3. Select the column and click on View Data

   4. Output window will appear showing the result based on selected condition

We always required to share scorecard to the end users and it is not always possible to provide give access Information Steward to view only scorecard.

So very good feature by SAP is Scorecard Sharing. We can use the link of scorecards and share it in the SAP portals, BI Dashboards and also in WebI reports.

Follow the below steps to use and share the scorecard.

1.In Data Insight window, click on Project’s ‘Scorecard’ link instead of ‘Workspace’

2. Click on ‘Share’ button

3. Link will appear in a box.

4. This URL can be shared and embedded in other applications such as BI Dashboards and SAP Portals.

5. To showing demo I am using a WebI report. Open WebI report and use <A> tag to link the document with scorecard.

6. when end user will access the report, link will appear as follows.

7. Once the user will click on link he would be able to see the scorecard in the browser as follows.

Regards,

Chetan

To organize rules based on different attributes, we would first need to create Custom Attributes.

Follow the below steps to create Custom Attributes.

1. Choose Rules tab in Workspace

2. Click on Manage > Custom Attributes.

3. Click on ‘Add’ to add Custom Attribute.

4. To change the name click on the cell and type Ca.Country and provide the appropriate Lable and Description.

5. Change the data type if required.

6. Click on the cell of 'Valid Values' column to provide the appropriate value to attribute. Click on 'Add' to add values and 'Ok' to associate the values to attribute.

7. Click on ‘Apply to’ column’s cell for CA.Country to map the custom attribute with different components of Information Steward and the click on ‘OK’.

8. Select the different IS components where this custom attribute can be used.

9. Click on ‘Save and Close’ button to use the custom attribute for different components.

10. In Rules window, select the rule and click on ‘Edit’ to modify the rule.

11. Expand the Custom Attribute box.

12. Assign appropriate custom attribute value to the selected rule.

13. Collapse the Custom Attribute box and click on ‘Save and Close’.

Organizing the Rules

14. Select the rule in Rule workspace.

15. Click Modify rules group and custom attributes display button.

16. Select the Custom Attribute from left pane and add it either to 'Group By' or 'Show Custom attributes' block

17. Rules get sorted hierarchy according to Quality Dimension and then ‘Country’ custom attribute.

18. In hierarchy, there we can have many custom attributes.

Hello Experts,

I have requirement where I need to move cache folder or to NAS driver for security reason. So I will install IS on C drive but any caching should not be stored to C drive, it has to be stored on NAS drive. Where can I change the path for caching for IS?

Thanks,

Nis

Hello Gurus,

We are planning to install Information steward ( Have licenses for Metadata manager/Metapedia only) . we are planning to use this functionality with our existing BOBJ environment. However, we have no Data services licenses. can someone please advise how to perform this deployment.

As per Installing Information Steward without Data Services - Enterprise Information Management - SCN Wiki . we dont need Dataservices unless we are using Data insight ( We can install DS with same IS license key, if planning to use Data insight) . We are not planning to use Data insight, so do we really need Data services to be installed.

Can standalone Information steward installation (Primary) will be suffice to use Metadata manager and metapedia functionality .

With out DS Job server, will the IS repository be updated.

Thanks

K

Hi Experts,

                  Do we have a tool that could produce details of all the dimensions being used in reports inside the Public folder of BI 4.0? The expected information is the universe name, name and details of objects used from the universe for each report.

Thanks and Regards

Sandeep Chandran

Can we point multiple Business Objects environments to Information steward for lineage analysis ?

Hi,

Has anyone tried this installation combination yet?  I am trying to install IS in this scenario, and am getting a Critical pre-req check error about the BI4.1 version.

According to SAPNote 1740516, this combination is supported.

I have successfully installed Data Services 4.2 Sp1 on this box.

Am I missing something, or is this a product issue?

Thanks

Warwick

Hello, Is there a way to embed the scorecard that has been set in information steward into a MS power point presentation using Live Office? Any pointers on this is appreciated. Thanks

The Data Insight Module of Information Steward handles all the Data Profiling Activities ( Column, Address, Redundancy , Uniqueness and Dependency ) ,the creation and  validation of Business Rules to monitor the data Quality and the scorecard creation which  provides a high level data quality view of a key data domain based on business data quality objectives.

The Key factors that influence the Performance of this module are the volume of data on which profiling and rule validation happens , Data Characteristics and the type of profiling done , and also the number of users simultaneously executing the Profiling or rule tasks.

Few basic Performance Settings which will result in efficient processing are:

1)      Job Server Level: A BODS Job Server processes the data profiling and rule validation tasks in data insight. We can install the DS Job servers on multiple machines and make them part of the single job server group specified for IS. This will result in distribution of the profiling and rule tasks by the IS job server to the DS Job server group. If one server is busy the task can be processed by another server.  Hence multiple profiling and rule tasks can be executed simultaneously

2)     Repository Level:  IS repository which stores all the metadata collected and profiling and Rule Results should be on a separate DB Server. For the fast processing of flat files, store them on a high speed disk so that read performance is good. The reference data required for address profiling should be stored on a high speed and high capacity disk

3)     Performance Settings for Input Data : The best method is to process the required data only rather than the whole data whenever possible;

• Use the settings Max Input Size (The total amount of records you want to profile), Sampling rate (How you want the records chosen) ,  Max Sample Data Size(the maximum amount of records that will be stored in the repository)  and Ignore Null Fields options which will be enabled while executing the Rule tasks appropriately.

• When using Information Steward Views, use the correct join and filter conditions so that you are pulling in only required rows.
• If lookup functions are used in rule processing, make sure that the tables on which lookup is performed are small. If not, SQL function can be used.
• Filter Condition : We can set the filter condition to process only the required rows for Profiling ; This holds the same filter condition syntax as “Advanced Editor “ used for Rules

4)      Scheduling Tasks : Profiling and Rule Tasks can be scheduled so that they run at different times and increase good performance ; Profiling Jobs are best to be scheduled in non-business hours and on a dedicated Job Server. The best practice is to Schedule them to run during non-business hours.

  Queuing tasks: Based on the user configuration for the Average Concurrent Tasks option available in CMC, and the number of Data Services Job Servers in the group, Information Steward calculates the total number of tasks allowed to run simultaneously at a given time. Only that many tasks are sent to the Data Services Job Server group for processing. The remaining tasks are queued. As soon as one of the running tasks finishes, the next task in the queue is processed

These are the few of the factors which we can consider for the better performance of this Module. Apart from this various other settings in CMC like Degree of Parallelism and File processing threads also contribute to the efficient processing.

I wanted to share an approach I have been using to simplify the creation of complex rules.Users new to SAP information Steward typically are quick to grasp the creation of simple rules, however when it comes to creating complex rules and using the Advanced Editor a number 'non coding' users are often overwhelmed and daunted by the prospect of creating a rule like the one below: 

So how can we create complex rules but avoid this complex scripting syntax (if/then/else/begin/end/return  etc……) ?

Creating Information Steward Views is a valid strategy to address the complexity,  though, we don't want to create these unnecessarily and therefore create a maintenance and a transparency issue. They should be part of a rules strategy, but shouldn't necessarily be first port of call. Pre-processing data outside of Information Steward should preferably be avoided as this creates a maintenance, IT dependency and transparency issue. So how can we make complex rule creation simpler and avoid complex coding constructs.

A Simplified Approach - Re-think as a decision table

Let me illustrate this approach with a worked example.

1) Identify columns to evaluate and validvalue combinations

2) Add the columns as parameters in the rule. The next step is to go into the advanced editor. I typically create a simple rule first and then select the advanced editor, this has the advantage the that Begin Return and End block are entered for you. You then replace the  simple rule condition with the multiple conditions  one for each valid combination row where the columns are separated by AND's and the Row separated with an ORs. There is no need to worry about if then else blocks and the rule is simple to read!

3) Identify potential filters to improve performance and add these as a simple OR condition - no need for Begin/Returns/End's in filters

4) Save the rule and create a test set of data based on the condition table and validate the expected results. The creation of a test data set is good practice, but is often skipped as it is seen as 'just an extra step'. I would also strongly encourage the testing of the rule independently first before binding to the source data and executing. Too often a user will complain that the rule isn't working when running the rule against their data and then frantically start to modify the rule, where in reality the rule was correct, it was just that the results were not what they expected (another example correct rule but incorrectly bound to the source).

An additional benefit of creating the test data set is that an approver can run this test before releasing a rule.

5) Finally Bind the rule to the columns in the table / view and calculate score.

After creating a few rules using this approach, even non-coders can quickly define even morecomplex rules.

This 'Decision table' approach can also be applied to more complex rules such as in the table below :

To reference another field in another table the 'Exist' and 'lookup' wizards can be used to create these functions. It should also be noted that it is possible to use these functions in the filter condition thereby restricting the data to process based on a reference to  another table/column. So as you can see this approach can be used to model very complex multi-source conditions.

It's fair to say that this 'Decision table' approach alone won't allow you to solve every complex rule and Information Steward views will certainly be used as well. You may need to adopt an alternative strategy if dealing with extremely high data volumes and you need to tune for performance.

However, what this approach does do is open up the ability to create complex rules to a much wider user base and make rule maintenance simpler.

Give it a go….

Hi,

Currently using SAP IS4.0 SP2 version for Data profiling activity and created many rules & Cleansing package builder.

I have 3 environments like DEV,QA and PROD and no option available for code promotion in Upgrade management tool.

Please provide your suggestions on code promotion for IS objects from DEV--> QA & QA-->PROD.

We are on 4.1 SP1 and trying to upgrade to SP2 but if IS 4.2 is available or will be available soon, we might go for it.

Hi,

I have IS installed on a Linux machine, unfortunately there is no GUI.

I have configured the job server in CMC and restarted the Job server and is able to make connection. So i guess everything is ok.

Now how will i access IS work space? Is there a command line syntax for it?

Thanks for your help.

Arun

Official Product Tutorials

The following tutorials have been developed to help you find answers to the most common questions about using SAP BusinessObjects Information Steward. New content is added as soon as it becomes available, so check back on a regular basis. Unless otherwise indicated, all tutorials apply to version 4.0.