Upgrading the Oracle BI Repository from 10g to 11g.

To upgrade the OBIEE 10g repository and presentation catalog, perform the following steps by using the Upgrade Assistant utility. Please note that the Weblogic Administration Server and the Managed Server in the 11g environment must remain running during the upgrade process.

1) Navigate to the ORACLE_HOME\Oracle_BI1\bin directory of the Oracle Fusion Middleware installation. In this example, the directory path is C:\obi11g\Oracle_BI1\bin

2) Double-click ua.bat to open Upgrade Assistant in the graphical user interface mode. This tutorial describes how to use Upgrade Assistant in the graphical user interface mode. You can also use the Upgrade Assistant command line to perform these tasks.

Step 1. On the Welcome screen, click Next.

Step 2. On the Specify Operation screen, select Upgrade Oracle BI RPD and Presentation Catalog and click Next.

Step 3. On the Specify Source Details screen, select Upgrade Repository (RPD).

• Click Browse next to the RPD File field.
• Browse to the location of the 10g version of the Sample Sales repository and click Open. 
• The path to ABC.rpd is added to the RPD File field.
• Enter the Administrator User Name and Administrator Password for the 10g ABC repository. In this example, the username and password are both Administrator.
• Enter and confirm a password that will be used to secure the upgraded 11g repository. This password is required for 11g repositories. It does not have to match the 10g repository password or any other password. In this example, the password is Admin123
• Click Next to continue.

Step 4. On the Specify Weblogic Server screen, enter the Weblogic Admin Server port number. Typically the port number is 7001.

Technical Differences Between OBIEE 10g & 11g

Some important points/enhancements in OBIEE 11g when compared to OBIEE 10g are listed below,

1. OBIEE 11g uses WebLogic Server as the application server as compared to Oracle AS or OC4J in OBIEE 10g.
2. The clustering process in much easier and automated in OBIEE 11g.
3. We can now model lookup tables in the repository.
4. The new UI called Unified Framework now combines Answers, Dashboards, and Delivers.
5. A new column called the hierarchical column in introduced.
6. BI Publishers is fully and seamlessly integrated with OBIEE 11g.
7. New time series functions PERIOD ROLLING and AGGREGATE AT are introduced.
8. In OBIEE 11g we can create KPIs to represent business metrics.
9. The aggregate persistence wizard creates indexes automatically.
10. The session variables get initialized when they are actually used in OBIEE 11g unlike OBIEE 10g where they were initialized as soon as a user logs in.
11. OBIEE 11g now supports Ragged (Unbalanced) and Skipped Hierarchy.
12. You can also define Parent-Child hierarchy in OBIEE 11g as well.
13. SELECT_PHYSICAL command is supported in OBIEE 11g.

In OBIEE 11g there are some changes in the terminology as well.

• iBots are renamed as Agents.
• Requests are renamed as Analyses.
• Charts are renamed as Graphs.
• Presentation Columns are renamed as Attribute Columns.

Success factors of implementation..

Before implementing a BI solution, it is worth taking different factors into consideration before proceeding. According to Kimball et al., these are the three critical areas that you need to assess within your organization before getting ready to do a BI project:

1. The level of commitment and sponsorship of the project from senior management
2. The level of business need for creating a BI implementation.
3. The amount and quality of business data available. 

Business sponsorship:

The commitment and sponsorship of senior management is according to Kimball, the most important criteria for assessment. This is because having strong management backing helps overcome shortcomings elsewhere in the project. However, as Kimball state: “even the most elegantly designed DW/BI system cannot overcome a lack of business [management] sponsorship”.

It is important that management personnel who participate in the project have a vision and an idea of the benefits and drawbacks of implementing a BI system.

Business needs:

Because of the close relationship with senior management, another critical thing that must be assessed before the project begins is whether or not there is a business need and whether there is a clear business benefit by doing the implementation. The needs and benefits of the implementation are sometimes driven by competition and the need to gain an advantage in the market.

Companies that implement BI are often large, multinational organizations with diverse subsidiaries. A well-designed BI solution provides a consolidated view of key business data not available anywhere else in the organization, giving management visibility and control over measures that otherwise would not exist. 

Amount and quality of available data:

Without good data, it does not matter how good the management sponsorship or business-driven motivation is. Without proper data, or with too little quality data, any BI implementation fails. Before implementation it is a good idea to do data profiling. This analysis identifies the “content, consistency and structure of the data. This should be done as early as possible in the process and if the analysis shows that data is lacking, put the project on the shelf temporarily while the IT department figures out how to properly collect data.

These essential steps of business intelligence includes but not limited to:

1. Go through business data sources in order to collect needed data.
2. Convert business data to information and present appropriately.
3. Query and analyze data.
4. Act on those data collected.

User aspect:

When gathering the requirements from the business users, the local IT department should also be consulted in order to determine to which degree it is possible to fulfill the business's needs based on the available data. 

Taking on a user-centered approach throughout the design and development stage may further increase the chance of rapid user adoption of the BI system.

BI chances of success can be improved by involving senior management to help make BI a part of the organizational culture, and by providing the users with necessary tools, training, and support.

Training encourages more people to use the BI application.

BI Portals:

A Business Intelligence portal (BI portal) is the primary access interface for Data Warehouse (DW) and Business Intelligence (BI) applications. The BI portal is the users first impression of the DW/BI system. It is typically a browser application, from which the user has access to all the individual services of the DW/BI system, reports and other analytical functionality. 

The BI portal must be implemented in such a way that it is easy for the users of the DW/BI application to call on the functionality of the application.

The BI portal needs to be easy to use and understand, and if possible have a similar look and feel as other applications or web content of the organization the DW/BI application it is designed for consistency.

The following is a list of desirable features for web portals in general and BI portals in particular:

Usable: User should easily find what they need in the BI tool.

Content Rich: The portal is not just a report printing tool, it should contain more functionality such as advice, help, support information and documentation.

Clean: The portal should be designed so it is easily understandable and not over complex as to confuse the users.

Current: The portal should be updated regularly.

Interactive: The portal should be implemented in a way that makes it easy for the user to use its functionality and encourage them to use the portal. Scalability and customization give the user the means to fit the portal to each user.

Value Oriented: It is important that the user has the feeling that the DW/BI application is a valuable resource that is worth working on..