Creating OLAP Universes from SAP BI 7.0

[Former Member]

Hello,

We have installed the BO XI 3.0 Enterprise (without Crystal Reports) both the server and the client components.

What I would like to do now is

to generate OLAP universes with Universe Designer from SAP BI 7.0. To do so - as it is posted in multiple forums - it is required to install the SAP Integration Kit. That's what we have done on the server side. On the client sied, however, when trying to install the Desktop components of SAP Integration Kit, this is not possible as we do not use Crystal Reports.

Now the following questions:

• Is it at all possible to generate OLAP universes in Universe Designer when no client-side Integration Kit components are installed (as we do not use Crystal Reports)?

I have tried to establish a new connection (connection type Secure) in Designer: In the list of available data´access drivers I can, however, find a driver for SAP Business Warehouse 3.x only. We use BI7.0. I wonder why this driver is not yet integrated in the XI3.0 installation package. Trying to use the BW3.x driver for BI7.0 did not work (Error SBO0001, Exception Calling cnx). I guess it will be possible to install the additional data access driver for BI7.0. But I have not seen any source of information on where to get the additional data access driver and how to install it. So

• where can I get a data access driver for SAP BI7.0, in order to generate OLAP universes with the Designer? Is it somewhere downloadable or do we have to buy any new licence? Where can I get more information on how to install it?

Many thanks in advance for your help!

Konrad

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Konrad,

You have an interesting point.

Crystal is required to install the integrtion kit. SAP will now need to clean up the install for the kit as your scenario suggests and the fact that you can use OLAP universes and Webi to develop reports.

The basic installation requirements both on the server and client side entail installing (in this order)..

1) Crystal

2) SAP Gui

3) Integration Kit

... so that all dll's and what not are registered correctly and able to detect the other components from each of these packages as I think many dll's are used from each of these...

To get your environment to work for you you could try installing an evaluation version of Crystal on your server and you client and then the other components as listed above.

You should now be able to create a universe connection and universe on the client and export it to the repository. Using Webi you can create a report.

Hope this helps

Jacques

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hello Jaques,

First, thanks for your helpful response.

To be sure to get your right: As you suggest, installing Crystal Reports first (be it the evaluation version), and then installing the Integration Kit on server and client side, would also install a data access driver for SAP BI 7.0 in Universe Designer? As a consequence, OLAP universes can only be created with Universe Designer, if Crystal Reports is installed?

Thanks, Konrad

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Konrad,

I would say yes. I think Crystal still plays a major role in the distribution of the so needed dll's. or at least this would be a good workaround to your issue.

[WMuellner · Accepted solution]

Hello all,

sorry to say, but there are NO SAP BI 7.0 drivers. The SAP BW 3.5 interface is the same for SAP BI 7.0 and it should work as well.

Btw: I didn't know that you cannot install the Integration kit without having Crystal installed on the client... I think to remember I did this several times...

What you definitely need on the client is the SAP GUI!! But take care, there might be some problems still with SAP GUI > 7.0, so if you use SAP GUI 6.40 or 7.0 it should work fine...

hth,

Walter

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hello Walter,

Thanks for the response.

• I'm using the following SAP GUI: 710 Final Release, Version 7100.2.7.1038, Build 971593, Patch-Level 7.

• Trying to install the Desktop part of the integration kit results in the follwoing message: Unable to perform Desktop installation. The installation is unable to proceed with a desktop installation because Crystal Reports 2008 was not detected. To perform a Desktop installation, it must be installed.

• Without having installed any integration kit on the client side, I can still see the data access driver for SAP Business Warehouse 3.x in the Universe Designer (when trying to define a new connection). After providing the respective parameters, however, a connection is not established successfully. When testing the connection it just tells me that the connection trial failed (SBO0001), without providing any further details.

What do you think, is the problem? The SAP GUI? Is it at all required for my purposes (generating OLAP universes in Designer from SAP BI) to install the integration kit on the client side? As far as I have read, it is?

Thanks, Konrad

[WMuellner · Accepted solution]

Konrad,

did you have a look into the "supported platforms guides"? I think to remember some note somewhere, sayin we support only SAP GUI 7.0, and that 7.10 does not work properly. Try to use the "old" 6.40 GUI, this should work anyway.

First of all, try to connect via SAP Gui. If this DOES work then most probably it's a problem with the version...

hth,

Walter

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hello,

Installing the evaluation version of Crystal Reports finally allowed me to also install the client/desktop component of the SAP integration kit. As a consequence, I can now establish a connection to SAP with UniverseDesigner, and I can even see InfoCubes to connect to.

However, most of the InfoCubes of BW are not available for selection. There is not a single BW query shown, and both the Favorites folder as well as the $InfoCube folder are empty. Only a few cubes are available for selection as DataSources, I could however not figure out the difference between the selectable ones and those not available for selection.

Did anyone of you face similar problems? What could be the reason?

Thanks,

Konrad

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi,

I have faced similar issues with BW queries. I went to the query designer and in query properties (extended tab) have enabled and allow external access to query.

This makes the query availaible in the universe designer.

thanks,

shesha

[WMuellner · Accepted solution]

Hello Konrad,

just checked again: there is no need to install Crystal Reports on the Windows Client, if you only want to use OLAP Universes. When installing the "Integration Kit for SAP Solutions" on the Windows client make sure you use the "custom" installation, then select only Client software, this will do it.

Regards

Walter

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hello Walter,

just checked again: there is no need to install Crystal Reports on the Windows Client, if you only want to use OLAP Universes

Thanks for your response. Interestingly, in our case, only after installing Crystal Reports and the the client part of the integration kit, we could establish a connection to SAP BW with UniverseDesigner.

However, the problem described above still remains the same:

• When testing the connection, a success message appears

• However, only a few data sources / infoproviders (some few InfoCubes, not a single BW query, no Favorites) can be selected for reporting off the BW.

@ Shesha: thanks for the valuable hint on allowing external access in BW Queries. However this didn't solve the problem neither.

Cheers,

Konrad

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Conrad,

Are the transports loaded on your SAP BW system(s)?

Regards

Jacques

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Good afternoon,

I'd like reopen the thread.

We can nowadays establish a connection to SAP BI 7.0 with Universe Designer, however we can access BW QUERIES only. No InfoCubes are selectable. (I am sorry for misinforming you in the previous two postings where I understood that the displayed Infoproviders were cubes).

Our systems are set up as follows

- BO Enterprise XI30

- Crystal Reports

- SAP Integration Kit

- the required transports

Both in Crystal Reports as well as in Universe Designer, when trying to establish a connection with the OLAP connection browser, we can see the BW queries only. Clicking the $INFOCUBE folder, however, no cubes are displayed (Crystal brings the message: Error when calling the cube list for catalogue $infocube without any further details).

Did you ever face a similar problem? Are there any specific settings required in order to get access to the olap cubes?

Thanks for any hints.

Konrad

[alex_shalynin · Accepted solution]

We have exactly the same problem (BO XI R3 + BW 7). Cannot get the list of Infocubes in Universe Designer while creating connection to BW. Only queries are visible.

[WMuellner · Accepted solution]

Konrad,did you check that the SAP user used in the universe connection has enough rights in SAP BI to be able to also read the metadata?

Try to use a "administrator" or sap_all user to test.

regards,

Walter

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Konrad,

Were you able to get a solution for your issue?

I too am facing the same problem as in , am unable to see the list of infocubes, only queries are seen in the designer.

Please let me know if you have got a solution.

Regards

Sreeranjani.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hello Sreeranjani,

Yes, we can now report on InfoCubes directly. Our solution was to reinstall the Enterprise XI Server including transport files and integration kit (actually we set up a new/additional one). Don't know what we made differently then but it solved the problem eventually.

Hope this helps. Best regards,

Konrad

[Former Member]

Sudheer,

We are struggling with the same problem of the InfoCubes not showing up in the $INFOCUBE folder.

Our InfoCubes have already been installed from Business Content. Do we have to reinstall them?

Regards,

Mike....

[Former Member]

Hi Mike, Go to SE37

Run the function module bapi_mdprovider_get_cubes and as Catalog put $INFOCUBE, then F8.

You will see something like Infocube CUBENAME........

Go to BI content and find it and Install the CUBENAME or Activate it. This will solve your problem.

I have been struggling with this problem since 1 month , I activated many cubes and installed a few BI Content Cubes , luckily Ingo suggested me this solution......Thanks to Ingo.

[Former Member]

Hi , please help creating a universe using Infocubes.

$Infocube folder is empty. but iam able to see Queries.

Environment is SAP BI7.1, BO Edge3.0, SQL Server 2005

Thanks in advance

[Former Member]

Hi,

When selection $Infocube folder to display infocubes list, do you have an error message displayed?

Did you try to use MDXSample.ex (from SQL Server 2000) to see if you are able to view the list of infocubes?

We have the same issue on one of our server and the problem is coming form a multiple info provider that is invalid. So an error message is generated and then no info provider is accesible.

Didier

[Former Member]

Hi, I did not get error, i see $infocube folder is empty in Universe designer.please let me know how use MDXSample.ex.

Edited by: S S on Feb 18, 2009 9:13 AM

[Former Member]

Hi,

This is a Visual Basic application that you can download here: [MDX Sample|http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=7824ba50-3e29-45cf-8c02-5597c014a707&displaylang=en]

You need Microsoft Visual Studio 6 to compile it and run it.

To use it with Microsoft the provider is "MSOLAP". To use it with SAP the provider is "MDRMSAP".

Didier

[Former Member]

Hello All,

I also faced the similar situation. I was also not getting the list of cubes under $INFOCUBE in Designer. I solved this problem by installing the cubes in BI.

In your BI system, Go to RSA1 and go to BI Content tab and install all the cubes in BI Content. Once you dont install the cubes, all the cubes will appear under $INFOCUBE, in BO Designer. You dont need to re-install BO or Integration kit for this.

Cheers.

Sudheer.

[Former Member]

We were also facing the same trouble using the SAP Integration Kit for BOXI 3.0, which has some issues.

(when installed on a server it will restart all your services without prior confirmation during installation, there is no way in the GUI to change the serial number other than reinstalling the whole kit, etc.)

Instead of "Desktop Install" select "Custom Install" and install the Data Access components (R/3, BW...) only.

After that Designer will allow you to authenticate with SAP logon and create connections to BI 7.0 queries / cubes. To create SSO connections to SAP BI 7.0 you have to logon to Designer using the SAP credentials , even if all your users (Enterprise, AD, SAP, LDAP) are aliased and mapped to e.g. an enterprise login.

In order to see all queries, did you try publishing your queries first?

[Former Member]

Hi,

First, Crystal reports is not necessary to generate OLAP universes of SAP BI 7.

I confirm that you need to install Integration Kit for SAP.

You can run the setup of Integration Kit for SAP to change the license key without reinstalling the whole software.

Concerning OLAP universes we support SAP BW 3.5 and SAP BI7.

In fact "SAP BI 7" has not been created in the connections list but it is supported.

To be able to see your queries in Designer you must first set the option "Release for OLE DB for OLAP" in Query Designer.

Regards,

Didier

[Former Member]

Has anyone here tried installing the Business Objects BW Universe Builder 4.0?

I believe we had some consultants get this working with BW7 when using BOXi R2, however we are now in the process of installing R3 and this product appears to be incompatible with R3.

From memory this product was a fantastic tool for building a universe over BW, no matter if it was a table, DSO, cube, infoset or multicube - but not infoobject.

[Former Member]

Hi, just these days I'm working on a customer already using BW UB 4.0 with BO previous versions; they tried to install it with BO XI 3.0, but it doesn't work. The workaround has been to install BW UB 4.0 on a machine whit BO Designer 6.5, create a universe upon BI 7, save it in local, move it to a desktop with Designer XI 3.0 and publish it to XI. The only things to remember are that patch support ends on 7-oct-08, and tech support on 7-oct-09. However, because of a better support and maintenance, I've suggested the customer starting to use SAP Integration Kit technology.