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Working With Data from SAP BW


If you have access to data in an SAP BW system, you can use the SAP BW connector in Spotfire to connect to your OLAP cube.

When you configure a connection to an SAP BW cube, you can choose whether to analyze data indatabase or to import it into your analysis. Note that you need to install a driver on your computer to get access to the SAP BW connector. See the system requirements at http://support.spotfire.com/sr_spotfire_dataconnectors.asp to find the correct driver.

Note: The SAP BW connector does not support SAP BW network hierarchies.

InfoProviders

InfoProviders are the reportable entities in SAP BW, for example, InfoCubes and MultiProviders.

InfoCubes

InfoCubes are multidimensional models in SAP BW. In Spotfire, the InfoCubes become cubes (that is, data tables). Standard InfoCubes are self-contained data sets for particular business subjects or processes, such as sales, lost deals, and plans. They consist of dimensions, characteristics, key figures and navigational attributes.

MultiProviders

Because each InfoCube normally only supports an individual business subject or process, there is a need to create reports where data from different processes are joined. MultiProviders are used for this purpose. They exist as a logical definition only, so they do not physically store any data.

MultiProviders are also frequently used in cases where a single InfoCube would become very large due to high data volume. MultiProviders also become cubes (that is, data tables) in Spotfire.

Business Explorer (BEx) Queries

SAP BW users can create Business Explorer (BEx) queries in the BEx Query Designer. BEx queries are intended to provide the end users with queries for reporting and analysis in SAP BW. In Spotfire each BEx query becomes a cube.

Note: For a BEx query to be visible in Spotfire, the query has to be configured to allow external access by OLE DB for OLAP. This is done by selecting the Allow External Access to this Query by OLE BD for OLAP check box in the Extended tab in the Query Properties for the query in the BEx Query Designer application.

When you select a SAP BW BEx query in Spotfire, you may have to specify desired values for predefined variables. The specified values will be used to limit the selected data. Once the BEx variables have been specified, you cannot change them.

Even if the BEx query has allowed you to filter out some values for a column or hierarchy, you will see the full range of values from the source if you click Limit Data in the Data Selection in Connection dialog. This means that if you are not careful, you may select values in the Limit Data dialog that are already filtered out by the BEx query, and the resulting selection will be empty. This is also applicable when filtering in Spotfire.

Variables

Variables act as parameters to a Business Explorer (BEx) query. They are filled with values and processed at query runtime.

For example, you might have a BEx query that reports sales for the year 2014. When new data for 2015 becomes available, you do not want to change the year to 2015, but rather want the end user of the query to select which year the query should be executed for.

In that case, you modify (parameterize) the query so that it uses a variable for the year. Then, the end user can specify the year of interest by selecting a value for that variable when the Spotfire analysis is opened.

Variables are globally available, so that once they are defined, they are available for use in any BEx query. However, not all variables are available to Spotfire. The underlying SAP BW driver does not return any Text variables. In addition, only variables that have the processing types Manual Entry or Default Value are returned by the driver. Hierarchy and Hierarchy Node variables are not supported by Spotfire.

Key Figures

Key figures are numeric values, quantities, dates or times.

For example, typical key figures are sales revenue, or, quantity sold. That is, key figures are the measures of the cube and the are found under 'Key Figures' in the Spotfire Data panel.

Characteristics

A characteristic usually denotes a business entity that is being evaluated or measured by a key figure. Characteristics can be either attributes or hierarchies. Attributes are further broken down into display attributes and navigation attributes.

SAP BW hierarchies are represented as hierarchies in Spotfire. Navigation attributes are represented as columns in Spotfire. Display attributes are currently not available in Spotfire.

Navigation attributes can be used in BEx queries for drilling and filtering and are thus visible to Spotfire (in the context of the BEx query).

Note: Navigation attributes appear as display attributes in the context of an InfoCube and are therefore not visible in Spotfire in that context. If you need to access these attributes in Spotfire, the workaround is to create a BEx query based on the InfoCube, and expose the navigation attributes in the BEx query.

Dimensions

In SAP BW, dimensions are groupings of logically related characteristics.

However, not all characteristics belong to a dimension, so Spotfire does not show these dimensions. Instead, all characteristics are found under the 'Characteristics' dimension in Spotfire.

SAP BW Data In-memory

When it comes to import of data from a cube, the most important thing to think about is to limit the data to import as much as possible by making sensible selections. This is because import of large amounts of data may not work.

Note: SAP BW has a built-in limit of 1M cells when it comes to import, so try to make sure the number of selected cells is less than this number.

See Importing Data from Cubes for details.

Note: It is not possible to import multiple characteristics that belong to the same dimension.

See also:

Cubes in Spotfire

Importing Data from Cubes