1. Cognos Connection and Cognos Portal Services Cognos 8 BI

2. What’s New? Cognos ConnectionCognos Portal Services Portal Pages are Content ObjectsWSRP Portlets Portlet-to-portlet CommunicationPortlet-to-portlet Communication * User ProfilesSupport for Plumtree Portal CMM Watchlist portletCMM Watchlist portlet * Controlling Access to StylesIntegrating Cognos Connection into 3 rd party portals using URL Inline Frames Improved customizability of styles and the Welcome screen Importing external WSRP portlets into Cognos Connection * These are features are common to both Cognos Connection and Cognos Portal Services Video demos and workshops are available to provide more insight into these new features A complete and thorough list of all new Cognos Connection and Cognos Portal Services features is available in the “Cognos 8 New Features Guide”

3. Objectives  In this module, we will examine:  Cognos Connection new features:  portal pages are content objects  portlet-to-portlet communication  user profiles  CMM Watchlist portlet  controlling access to styles  improved customizability of styles and the Welcome screen  importing external WSRP portlets into Cognos Connection  Cognos Portal Services new features:  WSRP Portlets  portlet-to-portlet Communication *  support for Plumtree Portal  CMM Watchlist portlet *  integrating Cognos Connection into 3 rd party portals using URL inline frame

4. Managing and Deploying Portal Pages  Save portal pages in Public or Personal folders for users to access in a self-service manner  Add pages to portal tabs as favorites  Add pages to other user’s portal tabs through user profiles  “Copy and Paste” pages as templates for users to build new pages  Assign security and permissions to pages  Create “compound” pages – pages that contain other pages inside of them  Portal Pages are content objects and inherit the same properties as other content objects, like Reports and Folders:

5. Pages Contents  Cognos Content Portlets for browsing and searching Cognos BI, viewing and analyzing Cognos Reports, and viewing Metrics Manager Watchlists. Additionally, you can view content from Cognos Series7.  Utility Portlets such as RSS Newsfeeds, Web sites, bookmarks, and images.  WSRP Portlets that complies with the WSRP spec can be viewed within a page.

6. Improving Usability through Portlet-to-Portlet Communication  User clicks on an entry in one portlet and the entry’s output is rendered in another portlet  Portlet-to-portlet communication can be enabled on all Cognos content portlets and utility portlets  Cognos Navigator and Search portlets populate the Cognos Viewer portlet  Image, Bookmark, and RSS Viewer portlets populate the HTML Viewer portlet  Portlet-to-portlet communication allows for the actions of one portlet to affect other portlets

7.  Administrators can set preferences, styles, and portal tabs for individual users and for all new users.  An administrator can only modify user preferences at the user level, not at the group level. Administrators can modify an existing user’s profile. Manage Your User’s Content, Styles, and Preferences Through User Profiles A default user profile can be set that will be inherited for all new users. Administrators can modify and administer the contents of “My Folders” for individual users.

8. Secure Styles  Access permissions can be set on individual styles, restricting which users, groups, or roles can use the style. Administrators can create different branding styles and deploy these different styles to different users through user profiles.

9. Securing Portlets and Setting Default Preferences Control user access to particular portlets Lock portlets to prevent end users from modifying the portlet preferences Change the default portlet preferences. Users will inherit these default when they place the portlet on a page. 3 1 2

10.  Apply a custom Welcome screen for each style using the default.css file.  You can now customize the existing Welcome Page.  Use your own custom Welcome page.  Set your own HTML page as the default Welcome page.  Embed only the Links from the existing Welcome into your new Welcome page.  Use a Cognos Connection personal page as your default start page.  You can even use a report as your own custom Welcome page. Improved Customizations – Customizing the Welcome Page  Customize text, colors, graphics, layout, fonts, and so on.

11. Improved Customizations – Additional Details  Resources for customizing Cognos Connection:  Default.css – Changes colors fonts, and graphics for each style, including the Welcome Page  System.xml – Modifies functionality and hide elements in the UI (i.e. move an image, change the font for page elements, hide sections in the UI)  Portal_en.xml – Allows for the text rendered through Cognos Connection to be modified, including the Welcome Page.  Using your own Welcome Pages  The following URL will display only the links for the Welcome page: http:// /Cognos8/cgi- bin/cognos.cgi?b_action=xts.run&m=portal/main.xts&startwel=yes&linksOnly =yes&linksTarget=top"/  Embed these links into a frame on an HTML page to preserve capabilities

12. Improved Customizations – Additional Details (cont’d)  Use your own start page  Add the parameter http://server/customwelcomepage. html to the system.xml file to use your own start page  Use a personalized My Page as your default start page  Users can choose to not see the Welcome page and instead view a personalized page as their default start page

13. Emergence of Open Standards – WSRP  What is WSRP (Web Services for Remote Portlets)?  Open standard allowing portals to accept a web service from a third party software application into a portlet  Allows Web applications to create standard WSRP portlets that will be compatible with all WSRP-conforming portals  More on WSRP:  Adopted by (2003), this consortium of over 75 leading software companies committed towards the development and adoption of Web Services  WSRP is a relatively new standard still in its infancy:  Portal vendors are just now starting to adopt it  WSRP spec has its limitations and is ongoing changes to address these And many more…

14. Importing WSRP Portlets to Cognos Connection Import any WSRP compliant portlet Portlets are readily available for consumption Securing can be set on these portlet - restricting access to individual users, groups, and roles Add these external portlets to any page, just as you would with Cognos portlets Administer your Portlets Create pages with these new portlets 3 1 2  As a WSRP consumer, Cognos Connection:  can view data from WSRP-compliant portlets  complements your BI pages with portlets from other external Web applications

15. Examine the CMM Watchlist Portlet  CMM Watchlist is exposed as a portlet.  This allows users to view scorecards within My Pages of Cognos Connection and through their Enterprise Portal. Create custom Pages with scorecards in Cognos Connection Integrate CMM into 3rd party portals – IBM WebSphere, SAP EP, and Plumtree portals

16. Support for Plumtree Portal  Cognos Portal Services provides out-of-the-box portlets for Plumtree Portal 5.x Out-of-the-box portlets available for Plumtree include:  Cognos Navigator  Search  Viewer  CMM Watchlist  SDK Extended Application  Single Signon

17. Cognos 8 BI Cognos Portal Services Integrating Plumtree with Cognos 8 BI

18. Cognos Portal Services and WSRP SAP EPIBM WebSpherePlumtree All Cognos Portal Services’ portlets were written to comply with the WSRP 1.0 specification In Cognos 8, SAP, IBM WebSphere, and Plumtree are supported portal vendors Portal-specific WSRP connectors are needed to provide single sign-on support Cognos Connection is WSRP portlets from other Web applications Cognos Connection Cognos 8 WSRP External WSRP portlets

19. Support for 3rd Party Portals using URL Inline Frames Advantages Provides a way to access Cognos products through any portal Easy to setup without any programming Disadvantages Does not leverage portal functionality Performance issues with IFrames – leading to scalability issues  Parameterized URLs allow for custom Cognos content to be placed directly within a web page viewer portlet (IFrame)  Through custom styles, the Cognos Connection UI can be customized to match the portal UI Any Portal IFrame to Cognos Connection Cognos 8 and/or ReportNet Cognos Enterprise BI Cognos Enterprise Planning Cognos Financial Consolidation

20. Support for 3 rd Party Portals using the Cognos SDK Cognos SDK (Cognos 8 and/or ReportNet SDK)  Provide an open and extensible architecture allowing customers to leverage the SDK for organizations to build and then integrate custom Cognos portlets into their Enterprise Information Portal Cognos Enterprise BI Cognos Enterprise Planning Cognos Financial Consolidation Portlets written using the Cognos SDK Any Portal  All Cognos functionality is exposed through the SDK. Customers can write their own custom portlets to meet any business need.  Although the SDK is open and flexible and allows developers to “do anything”, building custom portlets with the SDK requires extensive coding and extensive development knowledge with both the Cognos SDK and the portal’s SDK.

21.  Administer the Portal Workshop 1

22. Summary  In this module, we have examined:  Cognos Connection new features:  portal pages are content objects  portlet-to-portlet communication  user profiles  CMM Watchlist portlet  controlling access to styles  improved customizability of styles and the Welcome screen  importing external WSRP portlets into Cognos Connection  Cognos Portal Services new features:  WSRP Portlets  portlet-to-portlet Communication *  support for Plumtree Portal  CMM Watchlist portlet *  integrating Cognos Connection into 3rd party portals using URL inline frame

23. New Features Workshops 1.Creating New Pages – 15 minutes 2.Working with User Profiles – 15 minutes 3.Customizing the Cognos Connection Welcome Page – 30 minutes 4.Customizing a Cognos Connection Style – 30 minutes

24. Workshop #1: Creating New Pages Creating a new page  Click on the “new page” icon  Select a location to save the page (i.e. Public Folders)  Choose your layout and click on the “add” button to add portlets to the page  Add Cognos Navigator, Search, and Viewer portlets  Configure your page style by adding a title and instructions  Add this page to your portal tabs Configure your new page  Click on your newly created page (i.e. Public Folders)  Click on the “edit” button within each portlet to customize it.  Default folder, search, or report to view  Default actions to view  Number of entries  View the page and rearrange the layout, if needed, by clicking on the “edit page” button.

25. Workshop #1: Creating New Pages Enable Portlet-to-portlet Communication  Edit the Cognos Viewer portlet. Under Channel name, type: “viewer”  Edit the Cognos Navigator portlet. Under destination channel name, type: “viewer”  Repeat for the Cognos Search portlet  Click on a report in either the Cognos Navigator or Search portlet. The report will be rendered in the Cognos Viewer Import WSRP Portlets  Go to Tools > Portal Administration  Under Portlets, click on “Import New Portlet”  Select “Web Services” and enter in the following URL: http://wsrp.netunitysoftware.com/WSRPTestService/WSRPTestService.asmx?Operation=WSDL http://wsrp.netunitysoftware.com/WSRPTestService/WSRPTestService.asmx?Operation=WSDL  Proceed through the wizard, selecting the default values  A new portlet folder is now displayed  Add this new portlet to your page, following the steps in the previous slide

26. Workshop #1: Creating New Pages Secure the Page  Browse to the newly created page  Click on “Set Properties” and then click on the “Permissions” tab  Remove the “everyone” group from this list, so that only Portal Administrators have access to this page  Login as a user that is not a portal administrator. Notice that you will not see this page under Public Folders

27. Workshop #2: Working with User Profiles Modify an Existing User’s Profile  Login as an administrator  Go to Tools > Directory  Click on a namespace  For a given user, select “Set Properties”  Add a new page to this user’s Portal Tab and change their Style Preference  Note: This setting can only be applied on a user-level. Administrators cannot modify profiles on a group or role basis. Create a Default User Profile  Go Tools > Directory and click on a namespace  Click on the “edit default user profile” button  Modify the profiles for all new users  Note: This setting will only take affect for new users that have not logged into Cognos Connection. Any existing user will retain their existing user profile

28. Workshop #3: Customizing the Cognos Connection Welcome Page  Modify the existing Welcome Page  Go to the /Cognos8/webcontent/skins/corporate/portal folder  Backup the default.css file  Edit the default.css file  Browse to the section labeled “/* ====== Welcome screen ====== */”  Change the welcomeMainBodyWelcolumn to Black (#000000)  Change the welcomeMainBodyStudioColumn to Grey (#CCCCCC)  Modify other parameters within this section and notice how this affects the appearance of the Welcome Page

29. Workshop #4: Customizing a Cognos Connection Style Create a New Style  Make a copy of all of the files and folder in /Cognos8/webcontent/skins/corporate  Create a new skins folder and paste the Corporate folder within this new folder  Modify the default.css file  Change the background-color to #FF00FF  Change the anchor color (a) to #FFFF00 Add this Style to Cognos Connection  Go to Tools > Portal Administration > Styles  Click on “New Style” and name your new style  Point this new style to the physical directory that was created in the step above  Go to Preferences and use your new style  Modify some additional parameters in the default.css file to see how this affects the style

30. References  Cognos Administration and Security Guide  Cognos Connection User Guide  Camtasia Video Demos  Portal Integration FAQ

31. Questions?