oracle smart view for office 10 tips & tricks you must know key performance ideas, inc

Oracle Smart View for Office: 10 Tips & Tricks You Must KnowPosted on December 16, 2011 by Daniel Poon

Oracle Hyperion Smart View for Office (Smart View) is a Microsoft Office Add-in that provides a common

interface designed specifically for analysts to interact with the data and business intelligence content that they

have stored within their Oracle’s Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) system.

One of the most common way of using Smart View is users access Excel to interactively investigate the data

contained in the different sources such as Oracle Essbase, Hyperion Planning, or Hyperion Financial Management

(HFM) etc.

In this post, we will discuss some of the tips and tricks that we think you’ll find very useful.

1. Downloading the right Smart View Client?

Smart View has gone through many changes over the last few releases. Users are recommended to upgrade their

Smart View client that had been installed on their PC. One major confusion for users though is not knowing where

and which version they should be downloading. This is because users don’t necessarily upgrade their client when

they are informed of a change, it could take several months for various reasons. When they have a genuine need to

do so later, more changes may have been introduced.

Fortunately Oracle has made this a simpler process now. If you want to obtain the most compatible version of

Smart View client, simply log into Oracle Workspace and click on Tools | Install | Smart View. Oracle

Workspace will prompt you to download the relevant SmartView client.

2. Dealing with ‘#NoData’ or ‘#Missing’

In data intersections where there is no data i.e. blank, Smart View will display “#NoData” or “#Missing” by default

depending on the version of your Smart View. This can cause issues for your Excel report because both “#NoData”

and “#MIssing” are text cells that cannot be computed. One way to overcome this is to configured Smart View to

display zero in its place. To do this, click on the Options button, under the Data Options group, you will see the

“#NoData/Missing Label” setting. Simple type ‘0‘ into the field and then press OK.

3. How to print Point of View (POV) Headers

Key Performance Ideas, Inc.Vision. Technology. Solutions.

Oracle Smart View for Office: 10 Tips & Tricks You Must Know | Key P... http://www.keyperformanceideas.com/blog/hyperion-smartview-for-offic...

1 of 6 8/29/2013 6:51 PM

One of the key user benefits Often, analysts would generate a widely popular report such as “Revenue by Quarter”

in Smart View. On screen, the Point of View manager is shown to allow the user to understand the data inference

(e.g. geography, scenario, product etc). However, if you print the Excel worksheet, you cannot see the Point of

View.

Well here’s a trick. In Excel click on the Insert tab and then click the Insert Header & Footer button. Now

enter “POV:{}” on the header or footer field. When you click outside of the field to commit the entry, you will not

see any changes.

In order for the Point of View to appear on your worksheet, you will need to click the File | Print | Print button.

4. Fix Smart View Time Out Issue

Large data retrieval often requires more time to complete. As a result, users may be notified of the error: “The

request timed out. Contact administrator to increase NetRetryCount and NetRetryInterval.”

To overcome this on the client’s PC (where Smart View is installed), go to the Windows Registry Editor by clicking

Start | Run | regedit. Next navigate to the following entry:

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings]\

One important thing to take note is make sure you choose “CurrentVersion” and not “Current Version” with a

space, because both folders exist under the Windows folder, and can be quite confusing.

Now enter the following registry key and value:

“ReceiveTimeout”, use dword and enter hexidecimal ’00dbba00′;

“KeepAliveTimeout, use dword and enter ’002BF20′;

“ServerInfoTimeout”, use dword and enter ’002BF20′.

The above values are shown in hexadecimal, not decimal and correspond to 18000 milliseconds (3 minutes) and

240 minutes for the receive timeout.


2 of 6 8/29/2013 6:51 PM

Now, restart the client PC and you should be able to retrieve large data sets without issues.

5. How to Retain Excel Formatting

For most analysts, building financial reports requires rigorous Excel formatting e.g. cell color, borders, data

precisions etc. In Smart View version 11.1.2.1, the user has the option whether to let Smart View or Excel control

the formatting. For highly formatted report, users should use “Excel Formatting” over Smart View. To do this,

click on the Options button. Choose the Formatting tab and check the “Use Excel Formatting” option. Click OK

to confirm.

6. Using Provider Services Properties

In Smart View version 11.1.2.1, users will appreciate the ability to control the Smart View Client. For example, the

user could set the “Force Client Upgrade” option and the Smart View client could be automatically prompted for

upgrade whenever Oracle EPM is upgraded by IT. This could help to reduce future manual maintenance effort.

The Provider Services preference can be found towards the bottom right of the Smart View window.

7. Display Member Name and Alias On The Same Row

One of my pet peeve on SmartView vs. the legacy Essbase Add-in is that SmartView does not have the extremely

useful option to display the member name and alias together. Well that’s all changed in from Smart View version

11.1.2.102. You can turn on the option to display both member names and alias in Smart View by clicking on the


3 of 6 8/29/2013 6:51 PM

Options button, choose the Member Options tab and select”Member Name and Alias” for Member Name

Display.

8. Using Multiple Grids

One extremely cool feature in the new version of Smart View is the ability to retrieve multiple grids into the same

worksheet. Previously this is prohibited. In addition, you can use a different data source e.g. different Essbase

cubes for each of the data grid created. To do this, all you have to is highlight a region of your worksheet and select

“Ad hoc analysis” for a particular data source.

You will be asked if you want to enable the multiple grids feature in this worksheet. Choose Yes.

Data for the first grid will be pulled into the worksheet. After this, you can repeat the same action to build more

data grids on the same worksheet.


4 of 6 8/29/2013 6:51 PM

9. Use Smart Slices To Create Data Views

Smart Slices can be described as a view of a data source such as Oracle Essbase or Hyperion Planning, made up of

a selection of members, filters or combination designed to limit the data set. It is especially useful for distribution

of information to users who has authorization to use the data, and is likely to be using it repeatedly. For example,

you could create a Smart Slice for the General Ledger accounts for the current month, which will be useful to the

accounting department for the financial close.

10. Smart View “Power Pack” Extensions and Utilities

Although Smart View is already a very powerful tool, it’s functionality can be further extended by installing the

Smart View Power Packs. You can download and install the Smart View Power Packs by clicking on the link here.

The list of Smart View extensions are quite impressive. They include:

Adjust Data Extension – Simple data adjustment panel for use with Smart View.


5 of 6 8/29/2013 6:51 PM

Options Extension – Quickly change the most common options for Smart View.

Table of Contents Extension – Display open workbooks and worksheets originized by connection type.

MDX Script Library Extension – Run MDX scripts and use them as a starting point for new queries.

Substitution Variables Extension – List and use Essbase substitution variables in ad-hoc operations.

Grid Themes Extension – Format ad-hoc grids with pre-defined themes.

Member Search Extension – Search for Essbase memebers in the Smart View panel without the need to open a

dialog.

Smart Chart Extension – Link native Excel chart to ad-hoc grids. The chart will update as you zoom or pivot.

Extend Smart View Add-In – Once installed the add-in will add a new ribbon to Excel called ‘Extend SV’. This

ribbon allows you to refresh all worksheets and workbooks, submit data for all worksheets and workbooks, and

store key options with the workbook so when another user opens that workbook they can use the options the

creator was using.

Smart View VBA Conversion Tool – Tool that will assist in the conversion of Legacy (Classic) Add-In VBA code

to equivalnt Smart View VBA Code.

This post is getting long, and so we will cover the Smart View extensions in another post in the future. Thank you

for visiting our blog.

This entry was posted in Oracle Hyperion Smartview for Office and tagged Configuring Smartview, Smartview, Tips and tricks. Bookmark the permalink.

Key Performance Ideas, Inc.

Proudly powered by WordPress.


6 of 6 8/29/2013 6:51 PM

oracle smart view for office 10 tips & tricks you must know key performance ideas, inc

Documents