IBM Cognos BI Introduction

Business Intelligence:

BI is nothing but a technology which are used for analysing the data that helps the business users for decision making purpose. It reduces the operating cost and helps to optimize the business. The main objective of Business Intelligence is to bring the right information at the right time.

For example: reporting tools & ETL tools are used to convert the raw data into useful information.

Cognos BI:

Cognos Business Intelligence solutions help understand, monitor and manage business performance which includes business reporting & analysis, profitability measurement, budgeting, forecasting optimization and cost management.

Cognos is a fast and efficient technique to deliver multidimensional business intelligence data.

Cognos is IBM's business intelligence (BI) and performance management software suite. The software is designed to enable business users without technical knowledge to extract corporate data, analyze it and assemble reports.

BI Tools available in market:

ETL Tools:

Informatica

Data Stage

Ab initio

Hyperion

Python

Oracle Warehouse Builder

Reporting tools:

Business Objects

Microstrategy

Siebel Analytics

Cognos

Qlik View

Tableau

Spot fire

BO (Business Object)

OBIEE

Hyperion

Pentaho

SAP Crystal Reports

JasperSoft

Cognos BI architecture:

The IBM Cognos BI architecture is separated into the following three tiers:

• Web server (gateways)
• Applications (dispatcher and Content Manager)
• Data (reporting/querying the database, content store, metric store)

Web server (gateways)

The user starts a web session with Cognos to connect to the IBM Cognos Connection's web-based interface/application using the web browser (Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox are the currently supported browsers). This web request is sent to the web server where the Cognos gateway resides.

The gateway is a server-software program that works as an intermediate party between the web server and other servers, such as an application server. The following diagram shows the basic view of the three tiers of the Cognos BI architecture:

The Cognos gateway is the starting point from where a request is received and transferred to the BI Server. On receiving a request from the web server, the Cognos gateway applies encryption to the information received, adds necessary environment variables and authentication namespace, and transfers the information to the application server (or dispatcher).

Similarly, when the data has been processed and the presentation is ready, it is rendered towards the user's browser via the gateway and web server. The following diagram shows the Tier 1 layer in detail:

The gateways must be configured to communicate with the application component (dispatcher) in a distributed environment. To make a failover cluster, more than one BI Server may be configured.

The following types of web gateways are supported:

• CGI: This is also the default gateway. This is a basic gateway.
• ISAPI: This is for the Windows environment. It is the best for Windows IIS (Internet Information Services).
• Servlet: This gateway is the best for application servers that are supporting servlets.
• Apache_mod: This gateway type may be used for the Apache server.

The following diagram shows an environment in which the web server is load balanced by two server machines:

To improve performance, gateways (if more than one) must be installed and configured on separate machines.

The application tier (Cognos BI Server)

The application tier comprises one or multiple BI Servers. A server's job is to run user requests, for example, queries, reports, and analysis that are received from a gateway.

The GUI environment (IBM Cognos Connection) that appears after logging in is also rendered and presented by Cognos BI Server. Another such example is the Metric Studio interface.

The BI Server must include the dispatcher and Content Manager (the Content Manager component may be separated from the dispatcher). The following diagram shows BI Server's Tier 2 in detail:

Dispatcher

The dispatcher has static handlers to many services. Each request that is received is routed to the corresponding service for further processing.

The dispatcher is also responsible for starting all the Cognos services at startup. These services include the system service, report service, report data service, presentation service, Metric Studio service, log service, job service, event management service, Content Manager service, batch report service, delivery service, and many others.

When there are multiple dispatchers in a multitier architecture, a dispatcher may also send and route requests to another dispatcher. The URIs for all dispatchers must be known to the Cognos gateway(s).

All dispatchers are registered in Content Manager (CM), making it possible for all dispatchers to know each other. A dispatcher grid is formed in this way.

To improve the system performance, multiple dispatchers must be installed but on separate computers, and the Content Manager component must also be on a separate server. The following diagram shows how multiple dispatcher servers can be added.

Services for the BI Server (dispatcher)

Each dispatcher has a set of services, which are listed alphabetically in the following table. When the Cognos service is started from Cognos Configuration, all services are started one by one.

The following table shows the dispatcher services and their short descriptions:

Service	Description
Agent service	Runs the agent.
Annotation service	Adds comments to reports.
Batch report service	Handles background report requests.
Content manager cache service	Handles cache for frequent queries to enhance performance of Content Manager.
Content manager service	Performs DML in content store db. Cognos deployment is another task for this service.
Delivery service	For sending e-mails.
Event management service	Manages the Event Objects (creation, scheduling, and so on)
Graphics service	Renders graphics for other services such as report service.
Human task service	Manages human tasks.
Index data service	For basic full-text functions for storage and retrieval of terms and indexed summary documents.
Index search service	For search and drill-through functions, including lists of aliases and examples.
Index update service	For write, update, delete, and administration-related functions.
Job service	Runs jobs in coordination with the monitor service.
Log service	For extensive logging of the Cognos environment (file, database, remote-log server, event viewer, and system log).
Metadata service	For displaying data lineage information (data source, calculation expressions) for the Cognos studios and viewer.
Metric studio service	This service is used for providing a user interface to metric studio for monitoring and manipulating system KPIs.
Migration service	Used for migration from old versions to new versions, especially series 7.
Monitor service	Works as a timer service-it manages the monitoring and running of tasks that were scheduled or marked as background tasks. Helps in failover and recovery for running tasks.
Presentation service	This service prepares and displays the presentation layer by converting the XML data to HTML or any other format view. IBM Cognos Connection is also prepared by this service.
Query service	For managing dynamic query requests.
Report data service	This service prepares data for other applications; for example mobile, Microsoft Office, and so on.
Report service	Manages report requests. The output is displayed in IBM Cognos Connection.
System service	This service defines the BI-Bus API compliant service. It gives more data about the BI configuration parameters.

IBM Cognos Content Manager

IBM Cognos Content Manager is the IBM Cognos Platform service that manages (among other things) the storage of the following application information: security settings and configurations, server configuration settings, packages, report specifications, and report output. IBM Cognos Content Manager maintains information in a relational database referred to as the content store database.

A minimum of one IBM Cognos Content Manager is required for each IBM Cognos Platform implementation.

Data Tier: Content providers

The IBM Cognos Business Intelligence Data Tier contains the following:

• Content Store—A relational database that contains data the IBM Cognos BI product needs to operate, such as report specifications, published models, and the packages that contain them; connection information for data sources; information about the external namespace, and the Cognos namespace itself; and information about scheduling and bursting reports.
• Data Sources—The data sources that can be accessed through IBM Cognos BI include relational databases, dimensional or OLAP cubes, flat files, and other physical data stores. They also include the connection information necessary for accessing the data.

Cognos BI Versions:

• Cognos Impromptu 6.0 -- Client based architecture
• Cognos 7 Series (7.1,7.2,7.3,7.4) -- Client based architecture
• Cognos ReportNet -- Web based Architecture.
• Cognos 8 series (8.1,8.2,8.3,8.4,8.4.1) -- Web based architecture
• Cognos 10 Series (10,10.0.1,10.1.1,10.2,10.2.1,10.2.1.1,10.2,10.2.2) -- Web based Architecture.

Cognos Interface/Components:

Web Based Interface/Components:

IBM Cognos workspace

The user can create and change dashboards to organize the information. The user can also take

advantage of interactive exploration and analysis, apply filters, and sort and change the display type to discover meaningful details about the information. In addition, the user can collaborate with insights about the business performance.

IBM Cognos workspace Advanced

The user can easily create reports, perform interactive exploration and analysis, apply filters, sort and group data, add calculation and statistics, add external data, and create additional objects to existing reports.

IBM Cognos Query Studio

The user can create simple reports with relational and dimensional data models, by using

calculations, filters, groups, and sorting.

IBM Cognos Report Studio

The user can create professional reports with advanced features, such as prompts, multiple objects, and advanced queries.

IBM Cognos Analysis Studio

The user can easily perform interactive exploration and analysis on dimensional data models.

Gaining Insight with IBM Cognos Business Intelligence V10.1 6

IBM Cognos Analysis for Microsoft Excel

The user can perform flexible, interactive exploration and analysis of multidimensional data into

Microsoft Excel.

IBM Cognos Metric Studio

The user can align tactics with strategy and monitor performance with scorecards.

IBM Cognos Mobile

The user can use reports and dashboards from a friendly interface on mobile devices.

IBM Cognos Planning

The user can insert and update plans and actual data.

IBM Cognos TM1

The use can insert and update plans and actual data

Windows Based Interface/Components:

Framework Manager:

IBM Cognos Framework Manager is the modeling tool for creating and managing business-related metadata for use in IBM Cognos BI analysis and reporting.

Cognos Metric Designer:

Metric Designer is the modeling tool used to create extracts for use in IBM Cognos BI scorecarding applications. Extracts are used to map and transfer information from existing metadata sources such as IBM Cognos Framework Manager and Impromptu® Query Definition (.iqd) files.

Cognos BI for Microsoft Office:

With IBM Cognos BI for Microsoft Office you can access IBM Cognos reporting data directly from within Microsoft Office applications.

Cognos Transformer:

IBM Cognos Transformer is the IBM Cognos BI modeling tool used to create PowerCubes for use in IBM Cognos BI.

Cognos Map Manager:

IBM Cognos Map Manager is a Window-based utility that administrators and

modelers use to import maps and update labels for maps in Report Studio. For

map features such as country or region and city names, administrators and

modelers can define alternative names to provide multilingual versions of text that

appears on the map.

Cognos Insight:

In IBM Cognos Insight, you can analyze data, explore scenarios, and influence decisions by creating personal or managed workspaces. Use these interactive workspaces to communicate results to managers. Because Cognos Insight supports write-back, you can also use these workspaces to gather and consolidate management targets, commitments, and forecasts.