IBM Cognos Analytics 11.1.7 was released in the end of July 2020 with a FixPack update on Oct 9th and as an end user, you might think.... so what?
Well... this happens to be the best Cognos Analytics version ever and I will try to give you 15 reasons to move to that version!
But instead of just pointing to a long list of new features, let me walk through a day in the life of a business analyst instead, to see where it would improve the time to insights, the speed of developing content and the overall user experience.....so let's start....
Data preparations:As a business analyst, I have been given the task by my manager to verify our monthly salary expenses and of course deliver it in a format that can be consumed on a mobile phone.... in 15 minutes...
I start by looking at the Excel extraction of data I have from the HR system and drag&drop it into Cognos Analytics
1) Before building a Data Module on it, I wonder whether there might be some best practice around data modeling to help me on the way... well, with R7 there is! I grab my copy of the Best Practice guide and save it for my night reading...
https://community.ibm.com/community/user/businessanalytics/blogs/torben-noer1/2020/09/08/metadata-modeling2) I know we need some relative time categories to compare the different weeks, in a retail calendar....that's been added too... to the Data Module functions... great for using in a dashboard to compare different week - read more here:
https://community.ibm.com/community/user/businessanalytics/blogs/mohammed-omar-khan/2020/07/30/retail-calendar-and-fm-vs-data-module-gaps-whats-n3) I also know my manager have zero patience with filters - they need to be ready to use by just drag&drop them directly into the visualizations - So I will create a couple in the Data Module, they can then just be used directly in the dashboard.
4) I would also prefer to use Data Sets to create some specific extractions for some of my colleagues to work on - previously I didn't have that many options in tweaking the extraction but now I see I have the full reporting interface to customize that view - that will also save me a lot of time - more info in the bottom part here:
https://community.ibm.com/community/user/businessanalytics/blogs/rachel-su/2020/07/30/whats-new-in-cognos-analytics-1117-reportingSo, that was the first 4 time savers and extra value out of Cognos Analytics! I saved time on the best practice tips, on speeding up the development of relative time periods, on creating filters that can be used to drop on the visualizations and on creating a focused data sets for my colleagues to use.
Let's continue my work to get my manager those insights in the mobile phone...
Dashboarding:
I know my manager prefers combination charts with a lot of information's in them, but I'm a bit reluctant to use them since I can't have multiple measures as lines and I'm getting confused on where the data should go.... another reason to save time by moving to 11.1.7! Let's dig in....
5) I find the updated Line and Column visualization in the list and drag it into the canvas - I see it now has drop zones on the visualization, so I can easily understand where each element should go - as an alternative, since I know the column names, I will also simply type some of the names in the type-in slots at the right....only takes the first couple of letters until I have it... no more scrolling!
6) Since my manager specifically asked for the combination visualization, I'm happy it now supports multiple measures as columns and multiple measures as lines - I can design it how I want and even use logarithmic scale on one of them.
7) I decide to add a crosstab also with conditional formatting to show my manager where I think the concerns are... simple adding different rules in the properties and even throw in a smiley also!
I will now also speed up the data selection by using the filters I created in the Data Module - simply drag&drop them into the different visualizations where I need them.
I will also use the relative time periods I added in the Data Module - comparing this week with previous week have never been easier... just pick them from the list and add them to the canvas with a measure and Cognos Analytics will create the best visualization for me!
8) I also know my manager prefers to have the raw data behind the visualization ready at hand, so I use the new export visualization data and email them to my manager - easier than creating a new list and try to add the same filters etc...
9) I know this is a beautiful dashboard with all the right colors, fonts, style etc so I save the dashboard as a template - next time I create a dashboard, I just pick this template and I then just need to add data - simple as that!
For more information on these areas: https://community.ibm.com/community/user/businessanalytics/blogs/matt-denham1/2020/07/30/whats-new-in-cognos-1117-dashboards
So another set of time savers here - I can quickly create visualizations since the new drop zones and type-in slots clearly tells me what it means, I have the new updated combination visualization to add a lot of info's to compare in a single visualization - think large numbers on the Y1 axis and percentage numbers on the Y2 axis. I can save time and get more value of the crosstabs since I can clearly highlight the critical numbers to the readers. I can quickly extract the data behind a visualization which will save me a lot of time creating a duplicate and saving my dashboards as templates will save me time every time I create dashboards, ensuring corporate layout on it.
Mobile access:
My manager (and I...) are eager to use the dashboard visualizations on a mobile phone, but it's a very small interface for a large complex dashboards.... but no longer! With R7 came also the new mobile app that gives you the capabilities to use the AI Assistant and pin the visualization on your mobile devices.... let's dig in!
10) I download the new CA Mobile app on my iPhone, scan the QR code to get it connected to my Cognos Analytics system and off we go... first off is to see the dashboard I just created - I pin several of the visualizations to a pinboard and share it with my manager, so it's easily consumed.
11) I don't want to go into the pinboard every morning to verify the numbers, so I add a couple of alerts that will look for specific threshold values and schedule them to run every morning at 7am.
12) I also want to use the new voice interaction - NLG - with the AI Assistant, so I simple ask a question to my phone: "Show avg MonthlyIncome by State for Bachelors" to get a visualization created that I can just pin... simple as that!
For more information: https://community.ibm.com/community/user/businessanalytics/blogs/tim-aston1/2020/08/20/new-cognos-mobile-app
Why did I save time here? I can pinpoint exactly what part of the data I want to see and keep an eye on.... interact with Cognos Analytics, asking for insight, just by using my voice - very time saving! And I have all of the information's on the go...
But I'm not done in preparing the HR data for my manager.... let's continue...
13) I revert back to the web based version of Cognos Analytics to prepare some more content... I would also like to create a print report to be scheduled once a month... so I create a couple of pages in a report with the new combination visualization. I also want to add some baselines to them, to make it visible whether we are above or below some of the threshold values we have for salary and survey KPI's. And I use the Logarithmic scale for some of the large increasing values.
14) Since I have multiple pages in my report now, it's a bit heavy to run the full report during my design session...so I use the new "run one page" functionality to verify each page looks good before I continue...
More info on the reporting enhancements: https://community.ibm.com/community/user/businessanalytics/blogs/rachel-su/2020/07/30/whats-new-in-cognos-analytics-1117-reporting
The value here? The new combination visualization allows me to build more compact insight driven visualizations, adding baselines help the reader to understand what's important there and complex reports just got faster to build with the run-one-page options.
Now I only need to schedule the report to make sure it goes out every month as a pdf to all interested parties... earlier I had to go into multiple places to make sure the schedule was running correctly, but now it has all been combined into 1 modern interface... let's take a look....
Schedule:
15) I find the report in the portal, go to properties and create a new scheduling.... I can now see it's all in 1 window... format, recipients, formats, prompts, delivery method etc... even credentials can now be controlled here... easy, fast and simple...better than ever!
So hopefully I made my point here with just the first 15 options to save time and get to the results faster with Cognos Analytics 11.1.7 (which by the way is also the long-term-support-release, so another reason to ask your IT people for an upgrade...) - I honestly believe it's the best version ever!
Torben