Informix WHERE CLAUSE DATE bug in SAP BusinessObjects

While creating a universe off an Informix database, I discovered a bug that SAP never took care of or provided any documentation on fixing, which was quite of surprising. Basically using a date object in the filter will generate an incorrect WHERE clause. In the following example, we create a simple universe off an Informix database via an ODBC connection Informix ODBC Connection Using...

November 29th, 2021 by David Lai 

Connecting HANA Live to SAP Analytics Cloud and SAP BusinessObjects (Part 2)

In this article we will go through creating different HANA Connections in SAP BusinessObjects and then using them in different applications. We’ll also talk about the differences between the different types of HANA connections. (more…)
September 8th, 2020 by David Lai 

Connecting HANA Live to SAP Analytics Cloud and SAP BusinessObjects (Part 1)

Being able to connect to a live HANA connection via SAP Analytics Cloud or SAP BusinessObjects is important, as query processing is all done on the HANA engine rather than SAC or SAP BOBJ. To accomplish this, you will need to setup SSL capabilities on the HANA side, setup correct user authorization, and then setup the connections on SAC and SAP BOBJ. Unfortunately, this is not so straight forward...

August 27th, 2020 by David Lai 

Data masking vs Business object security in SAP BusinessObjects

In the previous article, we talked about how to implement data masking using data security profiles at the universe level to prevent users from viewing sensitive data. Data Masking in SAP BusinessObjects However we can also use business security profiles to limit users from accessing certain objects. In this article, I’d like to present my thoughts on both methods. (more…)
February 23rd, 2019 by David Lai 

Checklist of items to watch out for when applying an SAP BusinessObjects patch or service pack upgrade

Every time I apply a service pack upgrade or patch at a client site, I’m always excited about the features or fixes. However it is very annoying that any customizations get overwritten. This includes items such as: Branding, Single Sign-On, Modifications to the login page The following is a checklist of items that I backup beforehand when applying a service pack or patch upgrade (more…)
December 19th, 2018 by David Lai 

Web Intelligence – Unable to insert comment

The ability to add commentary to web intelligence reports is a powerful new feature released in SAP BusinessObjects 4.2. However, it does not work straight out of the box. Here are some steps to get comments to work. (more…)
November 30th, 2016 by David Lai 

Scheduling jobs based on trigger events

Being able to schedule a job based on a trigger event is a very important feature in SAP BusinessObjects. For example, let’s say we have a report that is refreshed daily based on data updated by a daily ETL process. We only want the report to be refreshed if the ETL process completes successfully. There are 2 ways of creating a trigger event. You can either create a file trigger, where the ETL...

March 9th, 2015 by David Lai 

Setting up SAP BusinessObjects single sign-on based on WinAD logins.

Single sign-on (SSO) is an important feature that I highly recommend all organizations to setup in their SAP BusinessObjects implementations. It allows users to move between services securely and uninterrupted without specifying their credentials each time. SSO effectively joins these individual services into portals and removes the service boundaries – switching from one application to the...

February 3rd, 2015 by David Lai 

Importance of Apply to Subobject in User Security

As a user security best practice in SAP BusinessObjects, it is best to start with no access and then slowly grant access to the groups whom require access.  Otherwise we will end up having to explicitly remove access for every group that should not have access, which is really a pain in the ***. As you know when you add a new user, that user is added to the Everyone group by default. Before providing...

November 26th, 2014 by David Lai