Ok so this is just my first thoughts as I watch a Cognos 10 demo. I have yet to get my hands on a demo to try it with some real data.
The Demo Theme: Think, Connect, Do
The focus is trying to remove barriers from what user wants to do with their data. Duh.
Unified Workspace
Adds, ‘Progressive Interaction’, ability to drill in for more information. Adds ability to link in data from a spreadsheet, local, or network share. One contractor in the room from Redlands BIDW uses Excel spreadsheets as a method for filtering reports for given departments, ie. a list of part numbers.
Dashboard
Cool new visual display options, provide improved user experience, easier to build new displays from existing reports. Dashboard includes over 40 user training videos
“Business Insight Advanced”
Dressed up version of PP web. Hopefully they did more than put lipstick on the pig. I will test it with a variety of cubes when I get a demo.
“Connect” – Collaboration Tools
Cognos 10 adds the ability to add notes at the cell level. I have been on many projects where this would have been a great functional addition.
Clicking the tool, opens separate side tab to look for existing discussions or add new ones. Clicking or starting a discussion opens a new page which just looks like a linked forum tool. Has ability to add attachments and supporting documentation
“Active Reports”
Offline file on laptop, contains summarized set of data for analysis anywhere without connectivity. Uses Browser to view, but data is static.
Quick response time. Variety of graphs and visualization available.
Mobile Device Support
They just showed a video, but I can’t find it anywhere on their website or any decent youtube vids. This might be my excuse to go buy a new iPad.
Platform Advances
They claim it is 3x faster than Cognos 8 on Query response. Yeah, I’ll believe it when I benchmark it myself.
Other stats mentioned in the demo, 80% faster on TM1, 50% faster on SPSS. Performance advances are made possible by DQM.
DQM – Dynamic Query Mode, basically cache’s data on the server based on your past queries in order to speed performance.
Next Fix Pack will include SQL data sources. WTF? they should have known that SQL would be important in the first version.
No More Migration Hell
Cognos claims to have actually heard the screams and agony from admins who made the survived the leap of death from Cognos 7 to Cognos 8.
Now they introduce ‘Lifecycle Manager’ a friendly tool to centralize and assist in process of moving to Cognos 10. It looks well planned and gives an overview screen of the environment, including a list of saved reports in the 8.x site. The Lifecycle Manager runs reports in 8 and 10, compares and looks for any differences. Clicking on any of the reports with differences allows you to visually compare the results side-by-side or overlay the two reports and adjust transparency. Once an Admin has viewed the reports, they can then either Accept or Reject the report for upgrading to Cognos 10.
The tool also shows differences in run times
|
Run time in seconds |
Ver. 8 | Ver. 10 |
|
My report |
9.3 | 1.38 |
Supported Environments
VM Ware, finally. Welcome to the 2000’s.
“Optimized business systems” engineers from IBM and Cognos will work together to design optimum solution for your business. I’m sure that’s not cheap.
Clouds are support, public or private.
Well I will have more details once I get a copy to test. More later…