Large Ad-Hoc and Publishing Environments

[Jeff McQuigg]

Hi All -

Does anyone have any good experiences to share on how to setup and
manage a large ad-hoc environment and publishing user created
content? I have some thoughts on this but wanted to get feedback from
others, especially those who've had to live with it long after us
consultants leave.

* How did you set up the folder structure?
* How/where do you maintain security? In the primary security source
(e.g. EBS) or in OBI webcat directly?
* How much self control does the business have in creating folders and
assigning users access to folders?
* What kinds of IT involvement is there on user content? Any periodic
reviews/cleanup?
* When publishing a business derived report to a dashboard, how does
that happen? How much does IT get involved?
* How do you ensure the webcat doesn't balloon out of control after a
few years or months?
* How do you handle structural changes (re-orgs), or people moving in
and out of any ad-hoc Line-of-business groups?

Any thoughts appreciated.

Jeff M.

[Joel Acha]

Hi Jeff

Based on my experience to date, here are my thoughts:

With regards to folder structure, users are only allowed read only access to Shared folders.

in terms of security, we "inherit" this from active directory by using AD groups via Weblogic Application Roles to manage user access. This enables security to be managed externally.

We have a model in place where a central reporting team manages infrastructure and maintains control of shared folders. Users build dashboards within their personal folders and if they want these promoted to shared folders, the central team kite marks and quality checks these reports/dashboards ahead of promotion to shared folders.

Each business area, has a number of "power users" who have undergone some level of training on OBIEE reports/dashboard development.

This model has worked quite well and the only area that some business areas have had is with regards to dependency on central team for report promotion and assistance with advanced features for instance. This has been mitigated by allowing the business area in question to provide funding for a dedicated resource within the central reporting team.

Regards
Joel

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[Jeff McQuigg]

Thanks Joel.

Anyone else have any experiences to share?

Jeff M.

[Michael Wilcke]

Jeff,

we have one really non-standard client, where all users are BIAuthors,
ca. 50 in total.

PLUS: great adoption, if not enthusiasm. Haven't seen this before.
MINUS: the growing chaos you seem to have in mind

Answers to your concerns in detail:

* How did you set up the folder structure?

=> one central orderly shared folder structure for the official
dashboards
=> one decentral chaotic shared folder structure for individuals
and teams to PLAY
=> personal folders (as is)

* How/where do you maintain security? In the primary security source
(e.g. EBS) or in OBI webcat directly?

=> OBI webcat

* How much self control does the business have in creating folders
and
assigning users access to folders?

=> limited: BIAdministrator creates new shared folders in chaos
zone, access not limited
=> dashboards can be created

* What kinds of IT involvement is there on user content? Any
periodic
reviews/cleanup?

=> central part (official dashboards) is maintained by a small core
team
=> they carry stuff over from chaos zone on request

* When publishing a business derived report to a dashboard, how does
that happen? How much does IT get involved?

=> business is free to work in chaos zone and has read-only access
to order zone
=> core team is a BICC, in this case not a part of IT

* How do you ensure the webcat doesn't balloon out of control after a
few years or months?

=> BIAuthors loose track themselves in their part of chaos zone -
and start cleaning up things themselves
=> in case of problems the core team would be challenged

* How do you handle structural changes (re-orgs), or people moving in
and out of any ad-hoc Line-of-business groups?

=> no problem in chaos zone
=> the may result in different access right to order zone, assign
different roles
Any thoughts appreciated.
=> see my first remark

Hope this helps - Mike