Saturday, September 19, 2009

OBIEE ODBC Client

One of the features you get when doing an OBIEE install on windows is the ODBC Client application.

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I never had any use for it until I saw some entries by Nicolas and @lex on some ‘secret’ procedures.

http://gerardnico.com/wiki/dat/obiee/presentation_service/obiee_nqs_drill

http://siebel-essentials.blogspot.com/2009/08/oracle-bi-server-nqs-procedures.html

It appears to by a demo/check tool to test your sql when developing a application which uses a ODBC connection to the BI-server. I couldn’t find any documentation, so tips pointers are welcome.

After starting the application you have to click:

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File > Open Database to make a connection:

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The usage of the database field is unclear for me at the moment.

From the utility menu you can directly test your BI-server sql:

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From the View Schema you get an very unusable info of the catalog:

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I couldn’t get the query list to work….

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It seems this is a R&D/Q&D tool for the development team which somehow made it’s way into the production release. I you have some more info or usage- for it please let me know.

Till Next Time

5 comments:

Alex said...

Hi John,

good to see you back ;-)

I have no official info on the utility but in the OBI EE trainings it is used to issue test SQL against the BI Server presentation layer in order to ensure connectivity.

However the tool is - as you state - capable of connecting to any ODBC data source.

hope this helps to clarify

have a nice day

@lex

gerardnico said...

Hy John,

Thanks for the link. It's surprise me that you have found it. It's some ODBC procedures that I have found in the log by curiosity.

For your question about the database field, I think it correspond to the subject area.

And I agree with Alex : the tool is just here to test the connexion. You don't need to have an ODBC client as Excel to test it. ODBC Connexion with Excel

Fijn week-end en groeten
Nico

Shivas Royal said...

i have installed obi ee.. i'm able to access the following url from inside the machine.

http://server:port/analytics/saw.dll?Dashboard

However, the same is not accessible from the other machines which are inside the network

Anonymous said...

Hi John,
The ODBC client is mentioned in the docs here, FWIW:

The [..] client connectivity tools [...] NQClient.exe [..] means of distributing client connectivity to [...] remote clients that cannot otherwise access Oracle BI.

[...]NQClient.exe [...] [is] necessary for debugging and technical support issue identification.


I'm quite a fan of companies including tidbits like this in the box. That way people can tinker if they want to :)

John Minkjan said...

@shivas,

did you check the firewall setting of the other machines?

regards

John