Cognos 10

Cognos 10 vs Cognos Analytics C11

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9/26/2017 
Cognos 10 vs Cognos Analytics C11

Why Compare?

If you are like me, you want to see a comparison of products to understand what you are getting vs. what you are missing.  To me, it is a very easy way to understand the impact.  For those of you on Cognos 10, you are probably wondering what is in Cognos Analytics and why you should upgrade.  I have put together an easy to understand Cognos 10 vs Cognos Analytics C11 comparison.

Cognos 10 vs Cognos Analytics C11 - What is available?

Cogno 10                  

Cognos Analytics C11

Report Studio

Workspace Advanced

Viewer

New Reporting Module

Query Studio

Available, hidden by default.

Analysis Studio

Available, hidden by default.

Workspace

New Dashboard Module

Event Studio

Hidden by default - no enhancements planned

Metric Studio

Only available in Cognos Analytics C11 R6 and prior

​Cognos for MS Office

Available in Cognos Analytics C11

Cognos Connection

Available as new portal

Administration Area

Same area plus new administration items.

Framework Manager

Cognos Analytics C11 version available

Transformer / Powerplay

Available now in Cognos Analytics R7

​Dynamic Cubes

Available

As you can see, most of what was in Cognos 10 is available in Cognos Analytics.  What Cognos Analytics has done is simplify the entire user experience.  No longer do you need to know what studio to use nor do you need to create a bunch of widgets to create dashboards.  You have a very powerful tool in a much better package that will lead to efficiencies and user adoption.

To learn more about the latest release, check out this blog ​​Cognos Analytics 11.0.7​​​

Return to Essentials Guide on Cognos Analytics

Geospatial Reporting: In & Out Of The Box

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As more and more Cognos users begin to explore all of the capabilities in Cognos 10, the subject of “geospatial reporting” comes up. Now, first off, Cognos 10 does have out of the box geospatial reporting capabilities. So, picture this, one Saturday you’re looking to kick up your feet and realize an Ottoman is needed. So off to Home Goods you go to find the perfect piece. While in line to check out, you find the perfect picture frame with the cliché stock photo of a smiling family. You think to yourself, “Hey, I’ll leave the picture in and let guests assume they’re my extended family.” This is all well and good until someone looks into it and then you need to get a professional photo of your smiling family, your dog, your cat, your ferret, your parakeet, and of course, yourself.

What does this have to do with geospatial mapping and Cognos? Just because something is functional and looks good out of the box doesn’t mean that it is the best route to take. Like I mentioned before, there are basic geospatial mapping capabilities with Cognos 10 that are available right out of the box. But, there are also some very impressive third-party products that plug seamlessly into BI. ESRI is one of the Geospatial providers that offers one of the best integrations with Cognos BI. You can see several examples by clicking on their website link above, or another example of ESRI from youtube. Remember, always question, because knowledge is power, and the best user is an educated user.

The Difference Between Cognos Express and Cognos Enterprise

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The Difference Between Cognos Express and Cognos Enterprise

IBM Cognos has two offerings for organizations looking for a complete Performance Management solution. One is IBM Cognos Enterprise Solutions and the other is Cognos Express. If you are looking for the power IBM offers, you may have some questions about what is the difference between Cognos Express and Cognos Enterprise.

So, we thought we would take a moment to walk through some of the differences. Note with each new release this information will change. IBM is expected to release a new Cognos Express version in the very near future and we will write again on Express once it’s released. As for now, IBM Cognos Express is positioned as the mid-market solution from IBM however, large companies can purchase it.

Cognos Express offers integrated modules for query, reporting, analysis, visualization, dashboarding and planning. Once installed, the product essentially creates a local data mart (via TM1) behind the scenes.

The biggest difference between Cognos Express and Cognos Enterprise is the number of users.

Express product supports a maximum of 100 users running a single server. Originally IBM had four modules in Cognos Express: Reporter, Advisor, Xcelerator, and Planner. Over the years, they simplified the licensing. In Express you can invest in Performance Management (TM1) or Business Intelligence, or both. Below is an older comparison to help you translate the old license to the Enterprise licenses. For the latest information on the differences between Cognos Express and Cognos Enterprise check out our most recent Cognos Express comparison blog.

Cognos Express LicensesClosest Comparable Cognos Enterprise Studios
ReporterReport Studio & Query Studio
AdvisorAnalysis Studio
XceleratorTM1 Modeler
PlannerTM1 Contributor
CompleteReport Studio, Query Studio, Analysis Studio, TM1 Modeler, TM1 Contributor

The biggest difference between Cognos Express and Cognos Enterprise is clearly the price. As of this posting, Cognos 10 Enterprise has a lot of new functionality that is not available in Cognos Express. Functionality like mobility, Business Insight, Active Reports and Metric Studio is missing. My recommendation is that you evaluate your business requirements and explore how both options meet your needs. Consider your expected growth. Make sure you will not out grow IBM Cognos Express too quickly and you will have to upgrade to Enterprise. Both offerings provide powerful Performance Management solutions, but check it out for yourself. Lodestar Solutions would be happy to answer any questions you may have on the differences between Cognos Express and Cognos Enterprise.

Link to Latest Version of Cognos BI
http://www-01.ibm.com/software/analytics/cognos/express/trial-demo.html

For the latest information, contact Lodestar Solutions at Services@lodestarsolutions.com.

What You Should Know About IBM Cognos 10 Licensing

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Last week, I attended the C10 BI partner training in Toronto and despite the chilly, snowy weather the product was hot!  Cognos 10 is like dessert to C8.  The base functionality for IBM Cognos 10 licensing is very similar to C8, so upgrades will be pretty painless; however Cognos added functionality that is SWEET.   My favorite was the Business Insight functionality.  Enhanced consumers and higher will be able to create their own workspace where they can analyze and interact with the information displayed through a dashboard unique to them.  For the semi-power user with a BI Advanced Business Author license or higher they will be able to use Business Insight Advance which starts to combine the functionality of C8 Query Studio, C8 Analysis Studio and Report Studio Express in to one.  The good news is that unlike Report Studio Express, Business Insight Advance can report off relational data.

I believe as clients start to understand the functionality and benefits of Business Insight, end users will leverage it to be their “Start of the Day” dashboard.  The items that they are most concerned about each morning will be displayed whether it is sales metrics, inventory data, or cash forecasting.  It will be displayed how they want to see it in drillable tables, charts, graphs… The user can select a prompt value to filter all the panes simultaneously to reflect your selection.

So what you need to know about C10 licensing is that if you are on C8 and current on support, you can migrate your licenses to C10 without cost; however if your end users are Consumers or Recipients they will not get rights to the new functionality like Business Insights.  They will be business as usual with C8 functionality.   If you want the consumers to get the sweet dessert offered by C10, the licenses will need to be upgraded to the Enhanced Consumer license and there is a cost associated with this upgrade.   Similarly, if you have a Business Author license which gives you Query Studio but want more robust functionality offered in the Business Insight Advanced, you would need to upgrade to the BI Advanced Business Author at a cost.

The IBM Cognos 10 licensing at first glance can be confusing. But Lodestar Solutions is here to help answer your questions.  The graph below should help clarify the functionality associated with the various licenses.

IBM Cognos 10 licensing functionality

 

For more information, call Lodestar Solutions 813-254-2040

 

What to Know In Cognos 10 BI

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As I’m sure you heard, IBM unveiled Cognos 10 BI at IBM's annual Information on Demand (IOD) event in Las Vegas recently.

Cognos 10 is the first major BI release since Cognos 8 was published in 2005.  Don’t worry, you didn’t miss version 9 – in an effort to have the numbers of all the various modules in line, IBM jumped to 10.  Cognos 10 presents a more integrated user interface along with a broader offering of analytics and technology. The recent acquisitions by IBM of SPSS , TM1 (Applix) and Clarity are now a part of the offering.

It’s alleged that IBM Cognos learned from issues experienced in the Series 7 to C8 release and this time they have made moving from C8 to C10 “SEAMLESS” per Rob Ashe, IBM General Manager of Business Analytics.

As a user of C8, what should you know?

IBM Cognos is expanding the scope beyond their BI offering to include decision making tools including integrated statistics and mobile BI.

C10 looks great and hopefully it will meet half of the hype.  The new active reports will help us all justify a new iPad as it extends mobileBI.  C10 Collaboration looks fantastic and you can now create and assign tasks based on insight gleaned from BI results and on automatic alerts and triggers.  But clients need to meet their basic reporting needs first.   For clients using TM1 and BI, the great news is they claim to have really addressed the reporting speeds.

Here are a few more items C8 users should know:

Licensing–  For end users to take advantage of a lot of the new BI functionality, they will need to have an IBM Cognos Enhanced Consumer license or higher.  For many of you, you own Consumers, not Enhanced Consumers, so you would need to pay a small fee to upgrade your Consumer licenses to Enhanced Consumers.   But the good news is if you do this while still on C8, you will be able to benefit now by getting functionality of Go Dashboards and Go Search for your Enhanced Consumers.

Cognos Planning 10- They announced the new IBM Cognos Planning 10 release, but the majority of the changes are more backend.  We should see some performance improvements and ability to handle larger cubes; however TM1 is still better at handling huge cubes.

Cognos 10 buzz words:

Business Insight is essentially a common BI workspace that allows users to view, assemble and organize BI, analytic and planning content from a unified interface without the need to switch between interfaces.

Life Cycle Management is the capability to handle upgrades from one version to another.  It is now possible to run reports and queries in both IBM Cognos 8 and 10 at the same time and then compare the processing differences side by side. This should reduce the testing needed in version upgrades.

Dynamic Query is a new feature that results from performance enhancements. With this feature enabled, reports, queries and cube building are shortened. This is done by caching and query routing techniques. Results indicate performance improvements of up to 30 to 40 percent.

Statistical Integration is the result of SPSS being integrated into the analytics umbrella of IBM Cognos 10. SPSS has added a Modeler capability making it easier for non-statisticians to benefit from predictive modeling in a much broader business context, thus increasing the potential for improved business performance. Those with the skills to harness its power can receive some big benefits quickly, but there is an additional cost for SPSS.

Active Reports allow users to receive self-contained interactive reports by email. This extends the reach of BI to mobile and offline workers that can work on these active reports and perform what-if scenarios if required.

TMI BI Integration Enhancements–  IBM stated that BI reports running off of TM1 were up to 80% faster in Cognos 10 than in Cognos 8. (Need I say more?)

Collaboration One can now create and assign tasks based on insight gleaned from BI results and based on automatic alerts and triggers. This is achieved with the integration of Lotus Connections and Business Analytics.  You most likely will need to connect a server or two to your environment to get this going.  And if you don’t have Lotus Connections,  I believe you have to purchase an AU license for Lotus Connections for each user.    I believe IBM might have an ulterior motive here and will use this opportunity to introduce the Lotus platform into enterprises dominated by Microsoft Office applications.

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