innov-7: can you create a report in less than 15 seconds? rakesh godhani software architect

INNOV-7: Can you create a report in less than 15 seconds?

Rakesh GodhaniSoftware Architect

© 2006 Progress Software Corporation2INNOV-7 Can you create a report in less than 15 seconds?

Agenda

Business case / challenges Fundamentals of EasyAsk BIRT How EasyAsk brings it all together The little extras that go a long way Q & A

EasyAsk Ad Hoc Reporting


Huge capital investment in business data Few people have access

• Technical barriers– DB schema– SQL– Query/reporting tools

Time• Data – what, where, how to get it, transform it• Reports – layout, fonts, headers, footers,

subtotals, page numbers, etc.

Business case / challenges - Technology


Business case / challenges - Complicated

More data – more complex• Joins, where clause etc.

IT – Technically savvy• Resource & budget constraints

• Please as many people as possible


Business case / challenges - IT

IT (cont.)• ‘One report fits many’ approach

– Extraneous columns – clutter– Missing columns/values– Requests for follow-on queries

Further delays

All this results in …


Business case / challenges - Frustration

USER FRUSTRATION


Fundamentals Of EasyAsk

Ease of information access to a broader set of users

Lower the technical requirements• SQL

• DB Schema

Talk in a more familiar tongue• Business concepts

EasyAsk Goals


EasyAsk is Smart

When talking about concepts, EasyAsk figures out:• Tables, columns, column values

• Relationships (joins)

• Formulas (e.g. age)

• Grouping

• Security


EasyAsk Natural Language Ad-Hoc Query

ConceptualView

LogicalView

PhysicalView

DBMS

Translates Natural Language Questions into SQL

English SQL

EasyAsk

Using a dictionary in which each definition shows how the word relates to the database


Sample Interpretation

Report

Employee

Name

And

Salary

Grouped

By

State

City

(built-in)

Stemmed root of Employees

First & Last Names

(built-in)

Column of Employees

(built-in)

(built-in)

Column of Employees

Column of Employees


Generated SQL

SELECT PUB."Employees"."State" as "State", PUB."Employees"."City" as "City", PUB."Employees"."First_Name" as "First Name", PUB."Employees"."Last_Name" as "Last Name", "Salary" as "Salary"

FROM PUB."Employees"

ORDER BY 1, 2


Sample2 Interpretation

Who

buys

Dairy

But

Not

Meat

Products

Cust First & Last Names

Cust.CustID = Orders.CustID

Value of Category Name

(built-in)

(built-in)

Value of Category Name

Table


Generated SQL

SELECT PUB."Customers"."Company_Name" as "Company Name", PUB."Customers"."First_Name" as "First Name", PUB."Customers"."Last_Name" as "Last Name"

FROM PUB."Customers"

WHERE (exists(SELECT *

FROM PUB."Products", PUB."Line_Items", PUB."Orders", PUB."Categories"

WHERE ("Category_Name"='Dairy') and PUB."Customers"."Cust_Id"=PUB."Orders"."Cust_Id" and PUB."Orders"."Order_Id" = PUB."Line_Items"."Order_Id" and PUB."Products"."Product_Id" = PUB."Line_Items"."Product_Id" and PUB."Categories"."Category_Id" = PUB."Products"."Category_Id") and not exists(SELECT *

FROM PUB."Line_Items", PUB."Orders", PUB."Products", PUB."Categories"

WHERE ("Category_Name"='Meat') and PUB."Customers"."Cust_Id"=PUB."Orders"."Cust_Id" and PUB."Orders"."Order_Id" = PUB."Line_Items"."Order_Id" and PUB."Products"."Product_Id" = PUB."Line_Items"."Product_Id" and PUB."Categories"."Category_Id" = PUB."Products"."Category_Id"))


Supported Languages

Dutch English French German Italian Portuguese Spanish


EasyAsk Review

Masks the complexity of the underlying DBMS

Allows use of accustomed terminology Enables data access to broader set of users.


BIRT

Business Intelligence Reporting Tool• Eclipse plug-in – Open source

• Two Major releases

What is it?• Report creation tool

• Reports can be saved & re-executed

• Easy to use layout tool – WYSIWYG

• PDF Generation


BIRT Issues

Suffers same pitfalls as all other reporting tools• SQL & Schema knowledge

But it has a query builder• Great for simple lists, BUT as more

information is required, the SQL gets complicated quickly

– Multiple tables, more complex where & group clauses


BIRT Issues (cont.)

Query & report tightly coupled• Additional column requires design change

• Easy-to-add parameters to restrict the where clause, but the column display tends to be fixed.


How EasyAsk Brings It All Together

EasyAsk Ad Hoc Reporting – Takes a user question and…• Computes the SQL

• Identifies additional information that is used to DYNAMICALLY create a report design

• Report design can be effected by templates (report styles)

• Refreshes the report and presents it to the user


THIS IS THE MAGIC!

EACH QUERY RESULTS IN A

CUSTOM REPORT


Design Information Returned By EasyAsk

EasyAsk Returns• SQL

• English column names and order

• Grouping information

• Identifies columns that need totaling


TRANSLATION

ENGINE

Typical EasyAsk Data Retrieval

RETRIEVAL

ENGINE

DBMS

DICTIONARY

QUERY

SQL +

RESULTS

‘percentage of sales by state?’


Ad Hoc Report Construction

DBMS

DICTIONARY

QUERY

SQL +

REPORT

TRANSLATION

ENGINE

REPORT

ENGINEREPORT

GENERATOR

DATA RET &FORMATTING

TEMPLATE

ENGINEDESIGNREPORT

RETRIEVAL ENGINE


Sample Report


DEMO


The Little Extras

Templates• Can change look & feel to mirror your

applications

• Certain rules must be followed– Styles must have well-known names

Header, footer, defaultgroupheader/footer, groupheaderlevel1 … n, groupfooterlevel1 … n

– Must be in <install-dir>/server/reports/templates


The Little Extras (cont.)

Template (cont.)• Every custom generated report can have that

look & feel

Emailing Scheduling


Any Query?

Almost any query• Not crosstabs or comparisons … yet

Let’s not forget charts either.


In Summary

Removes the technical hurdles (SQL, DB SCHEMA, Reporting Tool)

Reduces the burden on IT Leverages acquired wealth of information

across a broader set of users Makes life easier for users

• resets focus to making business decisions• provides EASY access to data • removes task of acquiring & formatting the

information with which to base their decisions.

EasyAsk Ad Hoc Reporting


Questions?


Thank you foryour time

innov-7: can you create a report in less than 15 seconds? rakesh godhani software architect

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