Hi All,
I am presently working on a project where we have a we have to
convert an Access based system to a Cognos - Oracle 8i based solution.
Now this Access based reporting system was developed over a period of
time and like all "naturally evolving systems" is a mess today. But
that is not the real problem.

The MS -Access solution has a lot of code written in VB and can
provide extreme flexibility in terms of the user interaction. It has
standardized operational reports which allow the users to filter the
reports on several criteria. The final reports are in PDF and they
have several complex charts and tables combined in a single report.
When we try to reproduce this in Cognos we are constrained as
Impromptu where we can have prompts does not provide the rich graphing
capabilities that we need and VISUALIZER which provides the necessary
graphing capabilities does not have the facility for prompting the
user. Since our reports are not really reports where people need to
drill up or down even a cube does not seem feasible.

The clients want the reports to have the same look and feel as the
older ones, I am new to Cognos and as yet don't know the complete
suite of products. But I am made to understand that we cant use Cognos
script as these reports will have to be converted into IWR reports
later.

I would love to know if there is any piece in the COgnos puzzle that
fits my needs. Is there a way I can get the power of impromptu and
Visualizer in one place along with a way to write some code which
would work on the web. I have heard of powerprompts but I am not sure
they are what I am looking for. Any inputs from people having worked
in similar projects would be really appreciated.

regds
nullpointer

You could use cognosscript to develop macros in front of impromptu reports.
PowerPrompts is a web based solution which provides prompting for iwr
reports and is quite flexible. By the sounds of it with the current
products that you have, powerplay is the way to go. You could generate
prompted reports from the cubes and then they would automatically generate a
pdf.

However, ReportNet, Cognos' new offering is right up your ally. It provides
prompting, rich graphical interface and is pretty much 100% web based. I
have seen no other BI tools which even come close. If you are still in the
purchasing process, ask Cognos to demo ReportNet, you'll love it. Plus,
then there will be no second learning curve. Cheers.

ya




"nullpointer" <null_pointer (AT) rediffmail (DOT) com> wrote

Hi ya,
Thanks for your quick reply. Well I asked my customer and hes not too
willing to invest in yet another Cognos Product. So I guess I will
have to make do with the 3 oldies
Could you clarify a couple of points

"You could generate
are going to be deployed on the web and I have no way of knowing what
the user is going to ask beforehand.
Do powerprompts offer all the flexibility of a hand coded solution ?
Can I have something like the choice of one drop down used to populate
another ? eg select a state and the cities get populated ?

Besides my customers dont really want drillable reports they are more
interested in standard reports which show data at differeing levels of
granuality at the same time. The reports ususally have a couple of
graphs along with a list or two. The graphs are complex haveing
multiple line and bar graphs on the same axes.

I am not sure powerplay can do this .... Do correct me if I am wrong

regds
Dev






"ya" <john (AT) doe (DOT) com> wrote

"ya" <john (AT) doe (DOT) com> wrote


:-) :-) :-)

Only a Cognos user could make such a statement (hard handcoded stuff = flexible).

I guess its true for any tool. The Kind of functinality you can
achieve by coding is almost impossible in a tool. A tool takes several
years to mature until then being proficient in the tool means knowing
all the workarounds to the limitations.
Unfortuantely I dont know all of them yet

Any more inputs on my predicament would be appreciated.

Thx
null_pointer




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