Released on December 22, 2015, Cognos Analytics 11 brings a more user friendly unified interface, improved efficiency in all business intelligence needs, and a consistent user experience across mobile and web applications.

Cognos Analytics 11 new highlights include

~ Simplified user experience

~ More capabilities to limit or remove IT from the process.

~ More self-service options

~ Customizable user interfaces

~ Comprehensive search feature

~ Automatic selection of the best visualization

~ Reference templates to create standard reports

~ Test and validate models in same environment

~ Quickly format and style your reports

~ Easier drag and drop functionality

~ Enable web based modeling

~ Quickly build interactive reports (drill, sort, filter) and the ability to start web or mobile

~ Personalize your analytics environment w/ favorites, notifications and your content

There is also some important information to consider with Cognos Analytics 11. Query Studio, Analysis Studio and Cognos Workspace will no longer be supported after this current release. Cognos Workspace Advanced is the new report authoring and dashboard functionality.

Also, the gateway component has been replaced with WebSphere Liberty in addition to the following content stores which will no longer be supported after the current release:

• IBM DB2 10.1
• IBM DB2 for z/OS®, 10.1
• Microsoft™ SQL Server 2008
• Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2

The following content viewer will not be supported after the current release:

~ Microsoft Office 2010

Many data sources will not be supported after this current release. You can find a listing of these data sources HERE.

If you are current on support, you can access the Cognos Analytics 11 download through the IBM software link. You will access to the following eAssembly.

After spending just a little time with this product, I think you will find the simplified environment, self-service reporting and the user customization as great changes aimed toward competing products. Framework manager, DQM, Dynamic Cubes and the high technical features from report studio remain intact making this newest release of Cognos BI better than ever!