ASUG Annual Conference - ASUG Influence and BEx Quo Vadis

[TammyPowlas]

We had an ASUG Analysis Influence Council at ASUG Annual Conference where attendees learned how the ASUG Analysis Influence Council influenced SAP:

Features influenced by the ASUG Analysis Influence Council

Analysis Office

1) Converting BEx 3.5 workbooks

2) Variants

3) Launch BEx Query Designer (coming in 1.4 release)

Picture of SAP's Alexander Peter by Joyce Butler

Analysis OLAP - features where ASUG Analysis Influence Council provided input

1) new prompt dialog

2) custom grouping

3) mobility for Analysis OLAP

We also learned that the broadcasting feature will come to Analysis Office through a BI4.1 feature pack later this year.  The planned release for Analysis Office 1.4 is early June.

Ian McAlpine said that the ASUG Analysis Influence Council "feedback is highly prized and valued to SAP."

BEx Quo Vadis Community Lounge

Right after this session there was an ASUG Community Lounge session titled "BEx Quo Vadis" or "BEx where are you going".  We had a similar community lounge at last year's conference but no one showed up.  I was quite skeptical about doing it again, but lee.lewis insisted and fortunately joyce.butler and SAP's eric.schemer agreed to do it.

We had a great turnout this year, and special thanks goes to Lee, Joyce and Amy Finke of ASUG Headquarters.  Amy redesigned the lounge areas, which were called "theatres", which was a huge improvement.

Photo by Danny Pancratz

Oftentimes people hear that "BEx is going away" - this is not the case for the BEx Query Designer.

An attendee asked "what are the gaps between Analysis Office and BEx Workbooks?"  Alex said he felt document integration and broadcasting were still two missing features.

SAP also said that "BEx query designer remains core modeling tool for BW".  "We are not replacing BEx Query Designer" says SAP in BEx Quo Vadis session. 

Here is a link to a vine video where Alex discusses Analysis Office.  Also jie.deng answered questions about placing Design Studio applications on the Enterprise Portal (minimum version required is 7.3) - here is the link to the vine video.

Thanks to all who attended and thanks to SAP's Alex Peter, Jie Deng and Ian McAlpine for their support of ASUG.