2 Overview of Oracle Business Intelligence Applications

This chapter provides an overview of Oracle Business Intelligence Applications, and includes the following topics:

• Section 2.1, "What is Oracle Business Intelligence Applications?"
• Section 2.2, "Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse Overview"
• Section 2.3, "Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse Architecture"
• Section 2.4, "Roadmap To Installing, Configuring, and Customizing Oracle Business Intelligence Applications"
• Section 2.5, "Using Repository Documentation"

2.1 What is Oracle Business Intelligence Applications?

Oracle Business Intelligence Applications is a prebuilt business intelligence solution.

Oracle Business Intelligence Applications supports Oracle sources such as Oracle E-Business Suite Applications, Oracle's Siebel Applications, Oracle's PeopleSoft Applications, and non-Oracle sources such as SAP Applications. If you already own one of the above applications, you can purchase Oracle Business Intelligence Infrastructure and Oracle Business Intelligence Applications to work with the application.

Oracle Business Intelligence Applications also provides complete support for enterprise data, including financial, supply chain, and workforce sources. These enterprise applications typically source from both Oracle data sources (such as E-Business Suite and PeopleSoft) and non-Oracle data sources (such as SAP).

Oracle Business Intelligence Applications consist of the components shown in the table below.

Table 2-1 Oracle Business Intelligence Applications Components

DAC metadata repository files

This content includes repository objects such as tables, subject areas, execution plans, and tasks, and is contained in XML files.

Embedded Informatica ETL Tool

This is a third-party application that performs the extract, transform, and load operations for the Data Warehouse.

Prebuilt Informatica content

This content includes Extract-Transform-Load (ETL) repository objects, such as mappings, sessions, and workflows, and is contained in the Informatica repository file (Oracle_BI_DW_Base.rep).

Prebuilt metadata content

This metadata content is contained in the Oracle Business Intelligence Applications repository file (EnterpriseBusinessAnalytics.rpd).

Prebuilt reports and dashboard content

This content is contained in the Oracle BI Presentation Services Catalog.

Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse

The prebuilt data warehouse that holds data extracted, transformed, and loaded from the transactional database (for more information, see Section 2.2, "Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse Overview").

2.2 Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse Overview

The Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse is a unified data repository for all customer-centric data. The purpose of the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse is to support the analytical requirements of Oracle E-Business Suite, Oracle's Siebel CRM, and PeopleSoft Applications.

The Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse includes the following (see figure below):

• A complete relational enterprise data warehouse data model with numerous pre-built star schemas encompassing many conformed dimensions and several hundred fact tables. For more information about the data warehouse data model, please see the Oracle Business Analytics Fusion Edition Data Model Reference .
• An open architecture to allow organizations to use third-party analytical tools in conjunction with the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse using the Oracle Business Intelligence Server.
• Prebuilt data extractors to incorporate data from external applications into the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse.
• A set of ETL (extract-transform-load) processes that takes data from Oracle E-Business Suite, Siebel CRM, PeopleSoft Enterprise and other transactional systems (OLTP), and creates the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse tables.
• The Oracle Business Intelligence Data Warehouse Administration Console (DAC), a centralized console for the set up, configuration, administration, loading, and monitoring of the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse. The figure below provides an overview of the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse.

Figure 2-1 An Overview Of the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse

Once you have installed Oracle Business Intelligence Applications, use the Repository Documentation option in Oracle BI Administration Tool to list the repository objects in a text file (for more information, see Section 2.5, "Using Repository Documentation".

2.3 Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse Architecture

High-level analytical queries, like those commonly used in Oracle Business Intelligence, scan and analyze large volumes of data using complex formulas. This process can take a long time when querying a transactional database, which impacts overall system performance.

For this reason, the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse was constructed using dimensional modeling techniques to allow for fast access to information required for decision making. The Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse derives its data from operational applications, and uses Informatica's data integration technology to extract, transform, and load data from various supported transactional database systems (OLTP) into the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse.

2.3.1 Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse Architecture Components

The figure below illustrates the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse architecture.

Figure 2-2 An example Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse architecture

The figure above shows the following Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse components:

• DAC client. A command and control interface for the data warehouse to allow for set up, configuration, administration, and monitoring of data warehouse processes.
• DAC server. Executes the instructions from the DAC client. The DAC server manages data warehouse processes, including scheduling, loading of the ETL, and configuring the subject areas to be loaded. It dynamically adjusts its actions based on information in the DAC repository. Depending on your business needs, you might incrementally refresh the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse once a day, once a week, once a month, or on another similar schedule.
• DAC repository. Stores the metadata (semantics of the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse) that represents the data warehouse processes.
• Informatica PowerCenter Services:
  • Integration Services - The Integration Service reads workflow information from the repository. The Integration Service connects to the repository through the Repository Service to fetch metadata from the repository.
  • Repository Services - The Repository Service manages connections to the PowerCenter repository from client applications. The Repository Service is a separate, multi-threaded process that retrieves, inserts, and updates metadata in the repository database tables.

  For information about using the Oracle Business Intelligence Data Warehouse Administration Console (DAC), see Oracle Business Intelligence Data Warehouse Administration Console Guide .

  2.4 Roadmap To Installing, Configuring, and Customizing Oracle Business Intelligence Applications

  To install, configure, and customize Oracle Business Intelligence Applications, do the following:

  • For the source systems that you are using, follow the appropriate pre-installation steps in Chapter 3, "Pre-installation and Predeployment Requirements for Oracle Business Intelligence Applications".
  • Install and set up the Oracle Business Intelligence Applications components and Informatica PowerCenter components as described in Chapter 4, "Installing and Setting Up Oracle Business Intelligence Applications". Note : For an example that shows a typical deployment topology for Oracle Business Intelligence Applications, see Section 4.1, "About Oracle Business Intelligence Applications Topologies".
  • (Mandatory) Perform the source-independent steps that are required before a full data load, described in Section 7.1.1, "Configuration Required Before A Full Load", followed by the source system-specific steps that are required before a full data load for the appropriate source system that you are using, as follows:
    • Section 7.2.1, "Configuration Required Before A Full Load for Oracle EBS"
    • Section 7.3.1, "Configuration Required Before A Full Load for PeopleSoft"
    • Section 7.4.1, "Configuration Required Before A Full Load for Siebel Source Systems"
    • Section 7.2.2, "Configuration Steps for Controlling Your Data Set for Oracle EBS"
    • Section 7.3.2, "Configuration Steps for Controlling Your Data Set for PeopleSoft"
    • Section 7.4.2, "Configuration Steps for Controlling Your Data Set for Siebel Source Systems"
    • Chapter 8, "Configuring Oracle Procurement and Spend Analytics"
    • Chapter 9, "Configuring Oracle Financial Analytics"
    • Chapter 10, "Configuring Oracle Supply Chain and Order Management Analytics"
    • Chapter 11, "Configuring Oracle Human Resources Analytics"
    • Chapter 12, "Configuring Oracle Sales Analytics"
    • Chapter 13, "Configuring Oracle Contact Center Telephony Analytics"
    • Chapter 8, "Configuring Oracle Procurement and Spend Analytics"
    • Chapter 9, "Configuring Oracle Financial Analytics"
    • Chapter 10, "Configuring Oracle Supply Chain and Order Management Analytics"
    • Chapter 11, "Configuring Oracle Human Resources Analytics"
    • Chapter 12, "Configuring Oracle Sales Analytics"
    • Chapter 13, "Configuring Oracle Contact Center Telephony Analytics"

    Once you have installed and configured Oracle Business Intelligence Applications components, configured the modules (optional), and customized Oracle Business Intelligence Applications (optional), you are ready to start running ETLs.

    For a detailed example of how to run an ETL for Oracle Financials with an Oracle EBS OLTP data source, see Section 4.16, "About Running A Full Load ETL".

    For information about running ETLs, see Oracle Business Intelligence Data Warehouse Administration Console Guide .

    2.5 Using Repository Documentation

    When you deploy Oracle Business Intelligence Applications, you can use the following documentation and tools to manage your metadata:

    • Repository Documentation Using Oracle BI Administration Tool, you can generate repository documentation that lists the mapping from the presentation columns to the corresponding logical and physical columns. You might use this information for gap-analysis, or to create a record of your repository that you can use to compare with other repositories. To generate Repository Documentation into a text or comma-separated file, log into Oracle BI Administration Tool and choose Tools, then Utilities, then Repository Documentation. For more information about generating repository documentation, see Oracle Business Intelligence Server Administration Guide .
    • Presentation Services Catalog Using the Catalog Manager, you can view the names of the prebuilt dashboards and requests in the Presentation Services Catalog. To view the Presentation Catalog, select Catalog Manager from the Windows\ Start\Programs\Oracle Business Intelligence menu.