Catalog Analysis

[DrSimon]

I need to be able to analyse a large catalog. The Content Overview is too unweildy to use, the Catalog Content macro isn't much better. I'd like to have the data in some sort of database format so I can compare changes etc. Before I go about writing what I suspect would be a time-consuming macro:
a) Has anyone else done this?
b) Someone has advertised a product called 'I-Assistant' (

http://www.i-sol.com)

on this forum. Does anyone have any experience of it and any idea of the price. I've downloaded some stuff and requested an evaluation copy but no answer from the company yet.
c) Are there any other products about?

Thanks in advance

Simon Rouse

 

[DrSimon]

Well I've got an evaluation version of I-Assistant (apologies web site is

http://www.i-sols.com).

I know I've got a huge catalog to deal with, but it's running slower than I expected on a 2.5GHz PC with 256Mb RAM. Is there anyone out there with experience of it?

 

[turnerjs]

I have been assigned as administrator for our recently purchased Cognos reporting tool (Impromtptu and PowerPlay).

I was not impressed with the catalogue documentation available (Content overview) and asked our Cognos consultant if there was something better. He was going to try and create macros to pull the data apart.

I asked for the I-assistant trial version this morning and will keep you informed of any successes.

 

[DrSimon]

Seems like we've both come to the same conclusion, turnerjs.
I'm a bit disappointed by the evaluation version so far. It doesn't allow you to compare catalogs which I am particularly interested in, and also seems to splatter EVALUATION comments at random,instead of displaying data items. There's a 30 day licence on the evaluation version, I expected almost full functionality for trying out something with a single user licence of 1990 euros
Simon Rouse

 

[Capoerista]

The standard macro is relatively easy to change so that it outputs in a format easy to load into a database. Pipe delimited as we use Informix. However it runs horrendously slow for us.

 

[DrSimon]

Thanks Capoerista. After your posting I decided to work in the macro. You're right, it doesn't take that much work to get it to create delimited output. It's slow on our 7Mb catalog but the I-Assistant s/w was even slower - not surprising really as my macro was customised for what I wanted while I-Assistant presumably gives you everything.

I'm now working on another macro to automatically document reports - have you attempted that? I'm having trouble extracting the filter details.

Simon Rouse

 

[griffindm]

Simon,

When I need to compare two catalogs for differences, I usually run the content overview to files and run an excellent utility I have, called SuperFileCompare, to detemine any differences. One limitation of this is that the content overview does not handle Alias references well in either the Joins or Folders areas. Like you, I would be interested in a tool that does a better job.

Regards,

Dave Griffin
The Decision Support Group
Reporting Consulting with Cognos BI Tools
"Magic with Data"

http://www.decisionsupportgroup.com

 

[turnerjs]

We purchased the I-Assistant last week. I have not had time to review the help documentation. I have only used it for documenting folders, tables and joins and that part works fine. The process to load my catalogues (generally under 1MB and around 150 tables) is < 1 minute. I have briefly looked at the catalogue compare and it appears to properly identify the table differences. I have not checked aliases or fields yet. The only complaint so far is after writing the documentation to MS-Word, I-Assistant hangs and I have to manually kill it and start again. I have not had time to look at this problem and the developer says it should not happen. Next week I hope to work with it more. I will keep you informed.

 

[Pommie]

I had a look at I-Assistant but didn't have enough time to evaluate it properly, I also didn't like EVALUATION scattered about either. I noticed a new product called DocuVisn by Envisn Information Systems that is supposed to document Impromptu catalogs, Impromptu reports, PowerPlay cubes and Upfront. Anybody know anything about this product? The demo on the web site looks interesting, but then again they always do...

John

 

[christenhusz]

Ever thought about Architect? In Architect (is available on the same CD as Impromptu) you can import the model from your catalog. In Architect you can see aal the relations between all the tables used for your model/catalog.

Martijn

 

[DrSimon]

Interesting idea Martijn. I thought about Architect some time ago but I went to a seminar about it and got the impression that it would take far too long to set up. We also don't use Access Manager and my memory seems to relate the two. Does Architect relate the database tables to the appropriate data items/folders in the catalog and does it take account of aliases as Dave Griffin & I (among others) are interested in?

Thanks to everyone else who has commented. The main catalog I am dealing with is about 4Mb with c600 tables and numerous aliases and filters which may explain why anaylsis is so slow. Any news about aliases turnerjs?

My current opinion is that a variant of 'Catalog Content' is the best solution. I still wonder why Cognos haven't come up with a better tool.

Happy Holidays to you all (as they say in the US)

Simon Rouse

 

[Pommie]

We've looked at Architect but had trouble pulling in our catalogs as we use Oracle Materialised Views, also we have nested folders in our catalog structure and I understand that Architect can't display them easily.
I've downloaded the DocuVision product and I'll have a look at it after Christmas and let you know what I think of it.

Merry Christmas from Down Under

 

[griffindm]

Pommie,

I've talked with some others that use Oracle materialized views, trying to get a handle on their benefits. One question I had that they did not have an immediate answer for is whether you can create indices for such a view. Do you know this one?

Have a great holiday! [santa2]

Dave Griffin
The Decision Support Group
Reporting Consulting with Cognos BI Tools
&quot;Magic with Data&quot;
Want good answers? Read FAQ20-2863 first!

 

[Pommie]

Happy New Year,

Dave,
I don't think indices can be created on a materialized view which is one of the drawbacks. We had 2 of our main dimensional tables based on them but we've been doing some work on them to improve the responsiveness and one has been changed back to a 'normal' table.

John

 

[griffindm]

Thanks John!

Dave Griffin
The Decision Support Group
Reporting Consulting with Cognos BI Tools
&quot;Magic with Data&quot;
Want good answers? Read FAQ20-2863 first!

 

[SudhakarKothamasu]

I found a script on Cognos Support site to get a content report for an Impromptu report. The document ID is 106040. You can search for it Cognos Knowledgebase.

Sudhakar

 

[gianluigi]

We have been using I-Assistant for over 6 months and we find it very useful. We just bought a few more licenses.

We are in charge of the Cognos support worldwide for our company, and we have often to check and compare catalogs (people in the countries tend to modifiy their catalogs and then complain that the standard reports do not work anymore ;-) )

Comparison of two catalogs is extremely powerful, we have several very large catalogs on Oracle Financials and I cannot imagine checking these cats with macro and text files. We use it to compare the table definitions and also the user classes. Also when you need to find a field, the search functionality is great (incredible that you dont have this in Impromptu...)

I agree that opening a large catalog can take several minutes, but you have to be patient, it's worth the wait.
BTW the price is not too high (1999$).

Gianluigi

 

[turnerjs]

It has been a few months, but I said I would get back. I have finally tested I-Assistant for comparing new/old catalogues. The results are excellant.

I find this is an very good tool for documenting Cognos catalogues, tables, joins and reports (I have not looked at security) for both Impromptu and Powerplay.

 

[DrSimon]

Thank you all very much. This has been very useful. I'm still not sure what is the best thing to do, but I;ve now got lots of views to take into account

Simon Rouse

 

[gset]

Hi turnerjs,

What can you compare exactly between 2 catalogs with I-Assistant? Tables? Folders? Joins? UserClasses?

Graham.