Successfully Migrating from BusinessObjects XI 3x to BI4.1 Webcast Part 1

[TammyPowlas]

This was an SAP webcast last week given by henry.banks of the SAP Customer Experience Group.  These are my notes.  The usual disclaimer applies although no roadmap information was provided.

Figure 1: Source: SAP

Figure 1 shows some of the top reasons to upgrade to BI4.1 including Mobile service, across devices

There was a point about having a single point of maintenance and support

Figure 2: Source: SAP

Figure 2 shows some of the value drivers of going to BI4.1 including Native HANA and BW support, pervasive mobile,

Bottom left talks about supporting future innovations

Quality – includes forward fits (see BI4 New Maintenance Process ASUG Webcast)

Figure 3: Source: SAP

HANA as a data source

Multi source, agnostic data sources

Figure 4: Source: SAP

Mobile servers are now embedded in BI Platform; no longer an add-on

All content can be launched except Analysis (but you can go from Analysis to Design Studio and then be Mobile - see Updated - Mobilizing your Analysis Office Workbook to Design Studio)

Figure 5: Source: SAP

Figure 5 covers BICS support; and good news is BW users don’t need BI Java

It includes improved performance

Figure 6: Source: SAP

Figure 6 shows the solution is available using the cloud (see SAP Cloud Appliance Library (CAL) )

Data federation is now on BI platform

Hot backup with zero downtime approach

Monitoring is embedded into CMC

Figure 7: Source: SAP

SDK’s are available for CVOM charting engine

SAP BI4.1 is building up for Zero downtime

Virtualization papers on SCN (see Virtualizing SAP BusinessObjects BI 4)

Client tools render in HTML5 optimized for mobile deployments and more lightweight

Figure 8: Source: SAP

All code lines ported to BI4.1

How to plan migration:

Figure 9: Source: SAP

Figure 9 shows you can move from XI 3.1 to BI4.1

Complications/workloads exist for some legacy systems – XIR1 or CR Enterprise 8, 9, 10; may need to do a staging area; recommend use latest SP for XI3.1 as the staging area

Figure 10: Source: SAP

Functional should include scope use cases and requirements and position the tools

If it is a technical upgrade, then check that all elements and dependencies can be upgraded – may need to do conversion exercises and reworking

Figure 11: Source: SAP

Tools used for upgrading are different and need planning - see The Quick and Dirty Guide to SAP BusinessObjects 4.1 Training and SAP BusinessObjects Delta Workshops

Figure 12: Source: SAP

Planning phase is important

SAP suggests involving end user IT and service provider

"Communicate transparently"

Some best practices to go from SAP BI4 to SAP BI4.1 can be found at sap.com/upgradebi

Figure 13: Source: SAP

When going from 4.0 to 4.1, there is no moving but simply install patch on same system

Do not create a new installation is SAP's recommendation because then you have to move

See Doing a full install for updating from BI4.0 to BI4.1? Think again...

More to come

Also see this hands-on session at SAP TechEd && d-code Las Vegas Migrate SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.x Reports to BI 4.1 Using the Platform Tools