OBIEE Let's Get Professional

Recently I was asked to have a look a some development work from some off-shore companies as part of a vendor selection. This triggered me to make a small random order check list of does and don'ts before your send your material to your customer. If you know any more, let me know and I will add them to the list.

• Don't do your development as an extension of the PAINT or SALES rpd. Start with a clean one.
• Replacing the Oracle logo with your own Company logo, sending in the SALES webcat as a Proof Of Concept, claiming 10k as costs, is not only very stupid, it's illegal / criminal!
• Do a consistency check before you send it to the customer.
• Don't do any customizations in S(K)_ORACLE10 directory, create a new one.
• Check which version of OBIEE your customer is using.
• Clean the RPD of test users.
• Remove any test material from the RPD.
• Start with a clean WEBCAT.
• Develop shared filters directly as shared filters, do not copy them.
• DO NOT USE other customers data in a Proof Of Concept for a new lead.
• If the customer gives you test data in separated XLS sheets, try merging them into one sheet, this will save a lot of time configuring ODBC connections.
• Don't go overboard with the aggregate persistence wizard. 400 aggregate tables on one fact table is plain stupid. If a customer really needs that, try selling them a product like ESSBASE.
• Install a version control system. (Don't forget to check in/out !)
• Develop your reports based on the customers screen size, most will still be on 17" (1024 x 768).
• Check your calculations against common sense: a €50,-- per year / per employee turnover should might be a good indicator that the calculation is wrong.
• Check your calculations against common sense: a .0004% annual growth 5 years in a row is very very strange.......
• Have one standard for graphs; 2D graphs are better "readable" then 3D.
• Keep your reports to one colour schema.
• Document your work!
• Try to avoid case 1=0 constructions in your prompts, use a proper LOV table.
• 27/11/08: Adrian Ward: When doing a presentation to the client, run through it first to cache the results. It will be far more impressive.
• 28/11/08: Bytus: Never try to recreate the Excel "requirements specifications", screenshots of old systems or Powerpoint mock-ups 1:1 at all costs.
  Work towards the best approximation which satisfies the actual clients needs (not his wishes) while bringing forward the strong points of OBI EE.
  (It can never be an Excel!)
• 03/05/08: Sunil: Above all be truthful and claim only what you know.
• 19/01/09: John Minkjan: Create different connection pools for different user groups
• 19/04/09: John Minkjan: Read Stephen Few: Information Dashboard Design: The Effective Visual Communication of Data
• 06/05/10: John Minkjan: Use display folders to organize your work.
• 28/06/10: John Minkjan: Don't use SYSTEM accounts in your connection pool
• If you are also the DB guy: http://ora-00001.blogspot.com/2011/07/mythbusters-stored-procedures-edition.html

Till Next Time