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MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

  • 1.  MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Tue May 11, 2021 05:18 AM
    Hi to IBM Cognos representatives,
    we would like to use the new fancy visualizations in Report studio, but we very often end up at the old Charts due to technical limitations of the new ones.
    We use 11.1 R7 and we miss many features in 11.1 visualizations compare to the old "Charts".
    Do you plan to make the new visualization as powerful as the old ones? Or at least add some important features?

    This is the list.
    1. NO multilingual possibility - title axis
    2. NO possibility of custom - chart titles, legend title
    3. NO Conditional styles
    4. Render variable only on visualization level, not below
    5. Properties not available at DATA section
    6. Only alphabetical sorting by the field, NOT by other (Properties)
    7. Drill through
      1. NO Drill through possibility on Legend, Axis label
      2. Drill through only on shown items, (no PROPERTIES at DATA)
    8. ONLY palettes that are not transferred between environments compare to exact color selection
    9. Less combination possibilities
    Thank you.

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    Josef Minarik
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    #CognosAnalyticswithWatson


  • 2.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Tue May 11, 2021 08:24 AM
    To add to this list, can you please incorporate all the features and functionality that exist in dashboard visualization in Report Studio Visualization like abbreviation of measure and similar placeholder for rows and columns that exist in dashboard visualization.


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    Vincent Dsouza
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    Original Message


  • 3.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Wed May 12, 2021 02:54 AM
    Thanks for this list.  I hardly ever use the new Visualizations in reports - always fall back on the Legacy Charts.

    3 more things to add to your list:
    Exporting to Excel doesn't always work properly with Vizzes.
    Sorting on a data item that is not in the viz, but is in the query
    The use of a different data item in the axis label, eg show Month name, but group on YYYYMM

    I'm happy to just continue using the charts, only wish the resolution of the text was better.


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    Heather Staniland
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    Original Message


  • 4.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    IBM Champion
    Posted Wed May 12, 2021 03:00 AM
    I'd suggest to create an IBM Idea accordingly to all the missing feature points here. Don't know if IBM is watching the replies here very often.

    https://ibm-data-and-ai.ideas.aha.io/

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    Robert Dostal
    Team Leader BI
    GEMÜ
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    Original Message


  • 5.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Wed May 12, 2021 03:13 AM
    Edited by System Fri January 20, 2023 04:15 PM
    Hi,

    @RACHEL SU can you jump in?

    Thank you.​

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    Sonke Fenzl
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    Original Message


  • 6.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Wed May 12, 2021 06:32 AM
    There are already open following requests.
    This one is the most general and I added there my list: https://ibm-data-and-ai.ideas.aha.io/ideas/CA-I-2976

    https://ibm-data-and-ai.ideas.aha.io/ideas/CAOP-I-2448
    https://ibm-data-and-ai.ideas.aha.io/ideas/CA-I-2975

    Should I break the list to single requests?

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    Josef Minarik
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    Original Message


  • 7.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Wed May 12, 2021 10:34 AM
    Edited by System Fri January 20, 2023 04:37 PM
    @Robert Dostal ,I have the feeling that IBM employees cannot answer or reply on the more critical or professional subject when the working of Cognos is not on the level they promote it to be.

    I think in the last youtube livestream from PM square there was an IBM sales rep promoting the Cognos roadmap.
    One of the subjects was visualisations and his answer was that Cognos Already has a lot of good visualisations. For me, that sounds too much like a sales pitch.
    Like @Heather Staniland is saying if you still have to go back to LEGACY charts or older type charts (not 11.1) in Cognos in the year 2021.... I think it speaks for itself that the visualisations aren't as good as they should be.


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    Maarten den Dunnen
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    Original Message


  • 8.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    IBM Champion
    Posted Wed May 12, 2021 11:23 AM
    @Maarten den Dunnen,that's my exact feeling too. IBM pushes Cognos Analytics as one of the best-in-class BI suites but it still lacks important feature updates. I don't have an issue when I use the old chart engine. It's very powerful and has lots of settings for tuning. But when I look at presentations of CA now, they all contain Data Modules and the new 11.1 visualizations. No one talks about the gab between 11.1 viz and the chart engine.

    This must be addressed at IBM accordingly. Pointless to say that the same applies to DM vs. FM or the missing alternative for Analysis Studio and Event Studio. And: didn't someone say that Metric Studio is one the way to come back at least two years ago?

    The critical point is: it's not sufficient to say "more features are coming – just stay tuned". Customers need features now and not in years. I feel the pressure coming from Tableau and PowerBI even CA has it's standing in our company….



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    Robert Dostal
    Team Leader BI
    GEMÜ
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    Original Message


  • 9.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Wed May 12, 2021 03:27 PM
    @Robert Dostal your Critical point is exactly the dilemma I have with my current customer.

    I have situations where the customer is coming (analyst) with a nice analysis report. Can I do the same ??
    Yes, and No, some features (like map visualizations) I cannot do out of the box with Cognos. And then some other visualization I can make but then if I want the more up-to-date graphical feeling with 11.1 I cannot change the visualization to the specs the Analyst wants it. If I go to the Rave of legacy charts yes I have all the options to work with it. But do;'s it give the same wow factor (anno 2021...?   no)

    Because of this scenario, I started to work with Powerbi to check some things out. pfff... and yes there is a lot to catch up with if Cognos wants to get the visualizations on track.

    And now this is more or less focused on the Visualisations part...(But then again, isn't that one of the primary focus of a BI Tool /Platform ??)
    The same is going on with other parts of Cognos, how can studios be marked as LEGACY and not even get a proper replacement. Why implement new modeling studios but forget a big part of crucial modeling options (FM / DM). Is it getting better YES but why label FM as (Legacy) no ongoing development if your replacement studio isn't up to the full task yet. I understand the switch to go to web-based modeling, I really do. But I get the feeling IBM is working on 1001 items but not solving or focussing to really complete some of its core Cognos functions to be competitive.

    As you stated we as customers or professionals consultants need to know what we can expect. No sales line with "feature" or other major things.
    No be specific and be bold (IBM). Because I see the market from my customers switch if Cognos cant be competitive or deliver on its core features.


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    Maarten den Dunnen
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    Original Message


  • 10.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Thu May 13, 2021 07:37 AM
    Unfortunately, I have to agree with Marteen and Robert in the sense that I do not see a sudden change.
    I also followed the live stream from PM square and was disappointed.
    Ibm seems to be looking at another path towards a future with more AI and far away real needs.
    Our voice does not come loud or is not considered.
    See for example power bi where every month requests and ideas proposed by the community are promoted and released ...

    The market has already changed and Cognos is chasing the others.
    And it is we developers, we Cognos professionals who have been in the trenches with cognos for many years, to be the first to defend and sponsor the product but we have come to not understand the future and the reason for some decisions and choices on Cognos development and roadmap.

    When I see that many of the ideas that are proposed are not taken into consideration, it means for us and for IBM itself to make customers dissatisfied and a new possobility for compettitors to take place.
    So IBM, please stay more near to us



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    Magnum BI
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    Original Message


  • 11.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Thu May 13, 2021 11:31 AM

    Hi Josef,

    Thank you for starting the discussion. This is an area that needs more attention. I agree with you. Here are my comments:

    1. This is something should be addressed.
    2. Legend title not customizable should be addressed as well. Most of our authors add a text item for custom chart title.
    3. We are planning this work currently.
    4. This is not on the plan right now. What exactly are you trying to achieve with rendering variable?
    5. Can you please clarify properties at DATA selection?
    6. This is on my list to do.
    7. This should be available already on legend and axis label. It works for me. Drill through using extra data is planned.
    8. Agree we need a better way to transfer custom palettes. Development is looking at alternative solutions.



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    RACHEL SU
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    Original Message


  • 12.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Fri May 14, 2021 04:05 AM
    @RACHEL SU Can you be more specific on some of the items, when can we expect changes?

    Most of the items @Josef Minarik brings up are already RFC for, and some of them from as early of end 2018 and q1 2019. sow it isn't something new that just came up. Most of the things are subjected to functionality that was there in the older visualisations and not anymore in 11.1 we can have lots of discussions about why to introduce something new when it isn't as good as the old version. But from an Agile point of view, I can understand adding new features and work as you go. But then it should not stop after the introduction. We are more than 2 / 2,5 years later from the 11.1 visualisation introduction and they still underperform from looking at the legacy charts.

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    Maarten den Dunnen
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    Original Message


  • 13.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Sun May 16, 2021 06:38 PM
    Edited by System Fri January 20, 2023 04:51 PM
    Hi Rachel,

    I appreciate your response on this forum/blog.

    Unfortunately I have to agree with Maarten, it's getting harder to defend Cognos to customers within Europe.
    I still love working with Cognos, but don't like discusions about BI capabilities.

    Before Cognos Analytics, IBM bought Many Eyes, but it looks likes IBM is closing this great capability.
    I had some great IBM Cognos Consultants contacts with lots of RAVE knowledge (Many Eyes).
    They where able to create any visualization chart I ( my customers ) requiered.
    I know, everything is possible within Cognos (RAVE) Charts.
    It's not perfect, but it's (was) available.

    So my questions:

    - what happened with all the free RAVE charts ?
    - why are the 1000+ Many Eyes Charts (to import within Cognos) not available anymore ?
    - what happened with the TIGER team?
    - I think the question of Maarten is valid: how can other BI vendors can beat IBM, they have the same challange...

    And I agree with Maarten in we don't like:

       * we are working on it..
       * we are looking at it..
       * development is looking at it..
       * please create a RFE..

    Kind Regards,

    ------------------------------
    Chris Bos
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    Original Message


  • 14.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Tue June 08, 2021 10:01 AM
    hi @RACHEL SU
    I added my answers.
    4. I might want to render labels, titles or legend based on some conditions.
    5. Mainly needed for DT when I want to pass other items from query and also for sorting.
    ​
    Also I am adding one more

    10. I do not see any detail in Page structure view

    Thank you

    ------------------------------
    Josef Minarik
    https://www.linkedin.com/in/josef-minarik/
    ------------------------------

    Original Message


  • 15.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Fri May 14, 2021 09:07 AM
    Hi Josef,

    You can sort the visualizations by adding the data item to the Additional Items, go to the query, select the data item and set the Pre-sort.
    It's limited but it works.

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    David Hill
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    Original Message


  • 16.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Mon May 17, 2021 04:07 PM
    1000% agree with Marteen, Magnum BI and Chris Bos i finally felt enough defending cognos since 2 years they never provide what users requires or asking(basic dash boarding features to advanced features). So finally decided to switch to Power BI which has everything already why to use cognos when PBI is providing everything from basic properties to advanced features. waiting since 2 years but no improvement on cognos except UI changes and AI(not sure who are using AI in cognos),

    Power BI releases bunch of new features every month and implements user requested ideas quickly within months and it has lot of you tube tutorials and community whereas cognos releases each time with UI changes with handful of features with hundreds of bugs and few are related AI again which of no use. So tired of using Cognos and tired of waiting for dash boarding advanced capabilities and tired of defending it. So 

    Bye bye Cognos we switched to Power BI which is deeply advanced reporting/dash boarding capabilities tool. Thank God we can accomplish any kind of complex user requirements with this power bi tool which is why top i think. 


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    abc def
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    Original Message


  • 17.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Tue May 18, 2021 02:18 AM
    Hi, 

    We too do have a lot of push back from our customers and we plan to review other tools including PowerBI.

    1. Does PowerBI have the capability to build models using few hundreds of tables like we build packages in FM (ours are relational models from real-time application database)? 
    2. Can we build /deploy once and let users from various tenants access the content based on security?
    3. We have many customer reports with complex logic. Can we build complex logic into queries in powerBI like we do in cognos reporting?

    Your answers/experience may help us in our evaluation of the tool. Thanks in advance. 

    Regards


    ------------------------------
    Kiran Passumarthi
    www.linkedin.com/in/kiranpassumarthi
    ------------------------------

    Original Message


  • 18.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Tue May 18, 2021 02:45 AM
    Edited by System Fri January 20, 2023 04:13 PM
    Hi all

    This thread conversion has certainly awoken some deep passion.  Having been a Cognos developer and advocate since 1994 I can understand all the comments, suggestions, impassioned pleas even.

    The way I see it, the evolution of Cognos had skipped over a key element - visualization.

    I see a BI roadmap as follows:

    1. Data sourcing and modelling - Cognos tackled this long ago (FM) and has been the winner ever since.
    2. OLAP - our love for Powerplay and Transformer says it all - still nothing comes close. (Dynamic cubes falls into the same bucket as IWR)
    3. Report development - again nothing can touch Cognos's features in pixel-perfect report dev
    4. Dashboards & Viz - this bit hasn't received the attention it needed, and other tools like Tableau, Power BI and even Looker beat it easily.  You must remember that the decision-makers (ie the people that buy the software) are these users.....  Sure, we can make our own, but why spend more time on that when other tools have them ready and waiting.  Maps and tooltips, are a particular bug bear of mine. (Its been years and years waiting for customized tooltips)
    5. AI - IBM seemed to be placing all their eggs in this basket, by-passing the fundamentals of good Viz.  This is usually seen by users as pretty cool, but isn't the deciding factor when choosing between software.

    There are so many amazing chart engines out there - Dundas, Fusion Charts etc - why doesn't IBM just buy one of them? Job done.

    Cognos is still the most complete enterprise BI platform, without a doubt - but most of its strengths are only appreciated by BI architects and data modelers, and these are not the ones making the purchase.  A picture really does paint a thousand words.

    My 2c worth.

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    Heather Staniland
    ------------------------------

    Original Message


  • 19.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Tue May 18, 2021 03:02 AM
    @Kiran Passumarthi, I think your questions are not something for this topic. But i would expect its would be possible, i would connect a Powerbi expert to fact check it. As a Cognos expert i know a lot of cognos but i do not have 15 year of powerbi hands-on experience hahahah. 

    But it is good to see that I'm not alone in the struggle of defending/searching for ways to Keep my Customers happy with Cognos.
    I know some professionals cannot speak out because they are connected via their company/consultancy form with IBM. And as A European (Dutch) our way of being critical or have a discussion about these kinds of things can somethings be a bit intimidating because of its directness, but keep in mind it's not mend that way. It's still for construcitve communication for really pressing that change is needed i hope more professionals will let there voice be heard.

    @Heather Staniland    ​ sow true !! and serectly i still love Transformer.. why they dont make a 2.0 or 3.0 version with cubes in mem like the Datasets methode. with a good schedular or event trigger. and you have a sollid sollution for some small to mid size customers that not have a DWH or a BICC.

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    Maarten den Dunnen
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    Original Message


  • 20.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Tue May 18, 2021 06:03 AM

    Hi to all,
    I am so glad I started this discussion and it turned to the higher topis about overall Cognos experience and its outlooks. I so much agree with @Heather Staniland and her points and the feelings of other guys above (Maarten, Robert, Magnum, Chris). This is not so much heard and highlighted on the official IBM Cognos broadcasts.

    Me and other Cognos experts on my project share the same frustration of Dash & Viz and on the other side we adore the maturity of the "legacy" parts - FM, pixel perfect reports, OLAP (we have a big DWH with an automated system for Cube generation because of their speed), event studio. This is where the Cognos has been very strong. And I am saying this humbly from my experience - ex IMBer Cognos consultant, then BI consultant with hands on experience and certification in Microstrategy, PBI, Tableau, QLIK and some overview of other tools.

    My customer was dissatisfied with Cognos Dash & Viz. We even did training for users based on well prepared IBM Getting started materials (actually those are not available any more). So after some costly upgrades with low added value, many bugs and limitations the management decided to adopt the PBI for Dash & Viz and left the Cognos only for the pixel perfect reports even though they would like to reuse the existing data models. They decided not to upgrade the Cognos unless some revolutionary features would be added, because the old good parts of Cognos are not upgraded anyway and are sufficient for the purpose of lists and crosstabs. And indeed AI is just cool but not revolutionary in way of customer/client demand.

    These are my and my team's points what we really desire and what would put Cognos on track and return to the leaders.

    1. DM has full FM capability so we can take advantage of new features, mainly Data sets.
    2. Regain the trust of the community by prompt implementation of the most desired feature from https://ibm-data-and-ai.ideas.aha.io
    3. Make the View metadata (Ctrl + q + /) functions and the report advanced Viewer (Ctrl + Alt + m) official and supported.
    4. At least visualizations in reports with capability of legacy charts.
    5. Preservation of Cubes and the multidimensional functions. Data set style would be welcomed, analysis studio, event studio.
    I am also an European and I like to be straight. Honestly, I think most Cognos nuts as me do not care much about AI, NLP, Mobile, Notebooks if the rudiments for creation efficiently and systematically a neat complex report or dashboard with new century design are not provided. So please bear in mind the opinion and frustration of the Cognos expert horde that is still willing to advocate the Cognos before turning the backs.
    ​

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    Josef Minarik
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    Original Message


  • 21.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    IBM Champion
    Posted Tue May 18, 2021 06:27 AM
    Great, summary!! Thanks for starting this and moving it here from RfE pages @Josef Minarik.

    May I add:

    1.) Display and Use-Filter Item settings from FM modell to preserve multilanguage filtering of texts resolving to ID in the underlying database
    Usercase:
    * Create a report in Europe ... share it with your friends in the US or Canada and have "Golf Equipment" filtering from "Golf Zubehör" to exactly the same dataset.

    2.) Usage of Coporate Fonts instead of IBM fonts / Skinning and Themes to be deployable from one to another environment without hacking into 10 CSS files with every new release.

    3.) Set default appearance of ReportStudio elements to strip down the interface for "standard" user expierence to be closer to QueryStudio

    Hope being straight forward helps. ​

    ------------------------------
    Ralf Roeber
    https://linkedin.com/in/ralf-roeber-470425a/
    ------------------------------

    Original Message


  • 22.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Tue May 18, 2021 06:33 AM
    RAVE 2 functionality was released as part of Cognos Analytics 11.0.5.
    Today, after 18 Cognos releases!!! developers are still using the Cognos 10 vizualisations, because they are more flexible.
    Maybe IBM should spend a whole release only on updating the vizualisations. And if it is too much work or too complex, start with the most important like, line, bar and combination charts. Add all the functionality (or more) and flexibility to this vizualisations, make sure it works in dashboard, reporting, pdf.
    I think this is a better approach than adding some features every release. This is only frustrating for report builders.
    In my opinion there should be more focus on 1 or 2 topics for a new release so that they can be fully completed.

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    Thomas van der Meer
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    Original Message


  • 23.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Tue May 18, 2021 09:27 AM
    Thanks for starting this thread!

    I totally agree with you all. Cognos is a great enterprise BI tool but it is lacking a lot on the visualization front. We were facing the same thing for past 2 years so finally we decided to acquire senturus data connector so we can leverage cognos packages/data modules in tableau and it is working really well. We have done few dashboards in tableau and users love it.

    I think Cognos needs to focus only on visualization for next few releases otherwise we will see a lot more clients switching to other tools. 

    I hope Cognos development team listens to us and come back to us with some kind of a plan so we can communicate that to our customers as well.

    Thanks,
    Hemal

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    Hemal Patel
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    Original Message


  • 24.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Thu May 27, 2021 10:21 AM
    Hi Josef, in regards to sorting by another column (number six on your list), just wanted to share this in case you were unaware. You can achieve this if you are using a data module.

    Here's more info: How to sort one column based on values in another column


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    Jeremy Aude
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    Original Message


  • 25.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Fri May 28, 2021 05:42 AM
    @Jeremy Aude thanks for the info !! , It's a solution but not for every problem. The advanced sort capability lets you do more things for other product of items sorts options. And not always you want to have that sort as a default like you do with DM sort solution you are referring to, and not every Dev has DM modification rights depending on the role he or she has in the team.


    @RACHEL SU I hoped to hear more from maybe you or other IBM dev, I think it would be good to have a more open communication dialogue about these kinds of real-life developers issues we as Cognos Dev have. But there is a lot of silence,.. .
    that's never a good thing if you have clients and dev that really want to work with your product and are passionate about working with Cognos but have some good points on existing problems that keep on being discarded,.. or get the feeling that they are. 




    ​​​

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    Maarten den Dunnen
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    Original Message


  • 26.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Fri May 28, 2021 10:26 AM
    Hi Maarten,

    We absolutely appreciate everyone's feedback. These are all the features on our to do list. My team is working on public facing roadmap which should provide visibility for customers to understand what the lab's working on this year. We are hoping to have that published soon.

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    RACHEL SU
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    Original Message


  • 27.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Fri May 28, 2021 11:12 AM
    Hi Rachel,

    I really appreciate the engagement here in the community. I personally am not a fan of the RFE site because the engagement seems spotty. For instance, this RFE on More Properties/Editing options for Rave 2 Visualizations was created in Dec 2016 and no update from IBM except for changing the status to "planned for future release". What properties are planned and when would be nice to know.

    Thanks again. Jeremy.

    ------------------------------
    Jeremy Aude
    ------------------------------

    Original Message


  • 28.  RE: MISSING FEATURES 11.1 visualizations in Report studio

    Posted Fri May 28, 2021 12:34 PM
    Hi Rachel, 

    thanks for your reply, 
    Not to undermine the work your doing, but why make a list of what your team is working on by year.
    80 to 90 % of all business work Agile, sow why not make a blog post every sprint (2 or 3 weeks,) or openly present the results as you would do in Agile.
    Let us know or make open discussions about some of the projects in improving objects or make them more public for input from the forum. Why else have this platform if (IBM / Cognos) is not taking advantages of the knowledge from the developers working with it?

    (IBM) wants to have input from its clients and developers, but this also means that IBM needs to communicate back.

    Like @Jeremy Aude tells, the RFE website has over 2900 request for cognos. and even the top 5 pages with the most votes go back many many years.
    Interesting to see when their request is getting implemented or added via the accelerators catalog.

    Still, I'm glad we can see a roadmap in future, and hopefully more updates from active development. 
    ​​

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    Maarten den Dunnen
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    Original Message