Step through a detailed process for how to create easy-to-navigate dashboards using SAP BW Web Application Designer. Watch this session to:

• Identify the key components that you must include in dashboard reports.
• Get advice for how to leverage the top five SAP BW Web reporting features.
• Explore metrics provided with SAP BW Business Content in the areas of HR, finance, sales, and procurement.
• Understand what you can use out of the box and what you need to customize.
• Gain insight into how to overcome common drill-down challenges that can hamper user adoption of dashboard reports.
• Obtain expert recommendations for how to incorporate more comprehensive SAP BW slice-and-dice capabilities directly into a dashboard.
• Find out how to embed jump reports into the dashboard so that users can drill into the ODS for details about the root causes of corporate performance.
• Determine if you need ABAP to modify Web tables and incorporate print and PDF options into your dashboard reports.
• Delve into report design criteria for ensuring good dashboard performance, a key to high user adoption.

Releases covered: SAP BW 3.5 | SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 | SAP NetWeaver 2004 |SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: Matt Christensen, PRAGMATEK Consulting Group

Advance your understanding of SAP Business Explorer (BEx) Query Designer and Analyzer, the staples of any SAP BW reporting environment. Watch this session to:

• Learn how to leverage undocumented BEx capabilities to generate higher-quality sales reports.
• Learn how to use exceptions to highlight report results that deviate from expectations or projections.
• Find out how to color-code exceptions so that you can identify them easily with a quick scan of your sales report.
• Acquire valuable tips to integrate exceptions with Reporting Agent or BEx Broadcaster so that you receive notification the moment an exception occurs.
• Find out how to use conditions to create ranked lists and statistical reports.
• Delve into effective but often underused capabilities for creating and calculating formulas.
• Gain insight into how to get around BEx row and column limitations, as well as how to avoid getting too many records in your query results.
• Get a handle on how and to what extent you can - and cannot - incorporate Excel formatting and functionality into your SAP BW sales reports.

Releases covered: SAP R/3 | SAP BW 3.5 | SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: Penny Silvia, Knightsbridge Solutions

Watch this session to determine when Report Painter is preferable to custom ABAP reporting in terms of cost, time, and maintenance.

• Get illustrated, step-by-step instructions for building complex financial reports with Report Painter.
• Learn how to set up currency translations to run and view single reports in multiple currencies while controlling the exchange rate.
• Get tips to properly maintain your reporting libraries, currency exchange rate tables, and FI/CO currency settings, and find out why this is key to running multicurrency reports.
• Find out how to include a calculated key figure (CKF) section in your report when standard row/column functionality isn't sufficient to complete intricate formulas.
• Identify (and avoid) maintenance challenges that can occur in reports with CKF sections.
• See how your counterparts leverage Report Painter within their R/3 and SAP BW reporting landscapes and take a detailed look at the techniques that have proven to be most valuable.

Releases covered: SAP BW 3.5 | SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 | SAP NetWeaver 2004 |SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: Bulent Alev, Independent Consultant

Take a critical look at the requirements, capabilities, and limitations of SAP Business Explorer (BEx), Web Application Designer, Crystal Reports, and other popular third-party tools.

• Understand the criteria you need to determine which combination of tools best meets your report formatting and printing needs.
• Understand how your choice of tools varies depending on your current SAP NetWeaver BI version.
• Get a clear picture of your out-of-the-box and customization options to enhance formatting of your reports.
• Weigh the pros and cons of using macros as a formatting tool (Hint: They're user-friendly but carry a high maintenance cost!).

Releases covered: SAP BW 3.5 | SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 | SAP NetWeaver 2004 |SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: Penny Silvia, Knightsbridge Solutions

See how to configure SAP BW and SAP Business Planning and Simulation (BPS) in combination to formulate, evaluate, and modify business plans based on actual financial data. Watch this session to:

• Examine the required formulas, both simple and complex, for rolling up granular income statement data into higher level intercompany balance sheets using SAP BW.
• Discover how to integrate SAP BW balance sheets into SAP BPS for Web-based access by managers, as well as how to determine whether adjustments to business plans are required.
• See examples of how managers can change plan and financial data in BPS and send it back to SAP BW through a shared InfoCube to generate read-only reports for business, functional, and casual users.
• Learn how to perform near real-time plan allocations from SAP BPS.
• Tap into a proven "lock-out" strategy that provides users with viewing access to SAP BPS while restricting them from changing sensitive information.
• Obtain expert advice for how to rapidly and cost-effectively get started with and maintain your SAP BW and SAP BPS reporting environment to better synchronize business plans and actual financial data.

Releases covered: SAP BW 3.5 | SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 | SAP NetWeaver 2004 |SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: Graham Johanson, Breakwater Consulting

Go beyond standard SAP BW capabilities and extract greater value from your SAP BW system.

• Learn how to apply user exit variables to determine fiscal period offsets, present specific selection options, and draw better conclusions from your SAP BW reports.
• Properly customize and define different types of variables and calculations to increase the flexibility of your SAP BW reports.
• Build, execute, and link complex calculations so that your reports generate more detailed analyses and results.
• Discover if, when, and how to use virtual characteristics and key figures (ABAP required) versus calculated or restricted key figures.
• Tap into expert advice for using replacement path variables to make your reports easier to maintain.

Releases covered: SAP BW 3.5 | SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 | SAP NetWeaver 2004 |SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: Matt Christensen, PRAGMATEK Consulting Group

Discover how you can use the SAP BW Analysis Process Designer (APD) to overcome the five toughest cost accounting reporting challenges. Watch this session to:

• Obtain expert advice for how APD can be used to save calculated financial variances for further analysis.
• Get specific examples of how this approach can simplify report queries and dramatically speed runtime execution.
• Delve into proven tips and techniques to automate the process of providing variance explanations and year-end performance projections by storing variance information outside SAP BW and joining it to the appropriate InfoCube using a MultiProvider and Universal Data Connect (UDC).
• Uncover the causes of poor performance, such as unmanageable data volumes and long- running report calculations that can occur in highly complex financial report queries and find out how to prevent them.
• Gain insight into how to manage large volumes of highly parameterized reports, such as pre- calculated Web reports.
• Find out how to simplify queries to achieve fast-running cost reports within a very narrow window of time.

Releases covered: SAP BW 3.5 | SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 | SAP NetWeaver 2004 |SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: David Bromlow, Quivira

SAP BW Web report templates are tied to their data source. Each new user request for a Web report modification can involve hours of complex and costly recoding by highly specialized developers. Watch this session to:

• Discover a new way to leverage SAP query variants in conjunction with SAP BEx Web Application Designer (Web AD) to create reusable, forms-based templates that do not require recoding every time a user requests a new look and feel.
• Learn how to combine table-driven development and structured design techniques with simple JavaScript to make Web AD items work better with query variants.
• See how original queries, query variants, and descriptions can be simply stored in a table that the user can access directly from the MIME repository.
• Gain insight into how the development team can more easily meet end-user requests by updating these tables and running them through an existing Web template rather than having to update the template itself.
• Weigh the benefits and tradeoffs of this approach.
• Determine if it could ease the burden on your IT staff while giving users what they want faster and for less cost.
• Bonus: Look for sample templates you can either use as developed or take apart to build your own in your appendix file.

Releases covered: SAP BW 3.5, SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0, SAP NetWeaver 2004, SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: Doug Childs, Baer Group/Enterprise Data Group

Delve into Web reporting techniques that enable you to go beyond simple data display to a rich, collaborative user experience. Watch this session to:

• Gain insight into how to leverage SAP BW, SAP NetWeaver Portal, and Web technologies such as Asynchronous JavaScript and XML (AJAX) to build an interactive enterprise reporting framework.
• Tap into the latest Web features delivered with SAP NetWeaver and determine how much custom development is required to embed analytic transactions into your reports.
• Learn how to integrate R/3 and SAP BW data together in the portal for more comprehensive analytics.
• See an example of how to use AJAX programming technology to build a Web user interface with the same performance characteristics as a desktop environment.
• Evaluate the amount of effort involved, and determine if it could simplify report access for your end users.
• Bonus: Detailed code samples to help you jump-start your own Web report development activities are available in your appendix files.

Releases covered: SAP BW 3.5 | SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 | SAP NetWeaver 2004 |SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: David Bromlow, Quivira

Draw on expert advice to produce financial reports in SAP BW.

• Learn the proper way to set up and format cells and structures using the SAP Business Explorer (BEx) Query Designer.
• Examine the financial report formatting options available to you with SAP BW and know which option is best for the job at hand.
• Move from standard balance sheet and income statements to detailed reports that include financial ratios and KPIs such as return on assets, inventory turns, and return on investments.
• Watch a comprehensive demo that shows you how to incorporate financial, sales, and purchasing data in the same SAP BW report to glean the overall business implications of your financial activities and decisions.
• Explore the benefits, requirements, and limitations of using SAP BEx Web Application Designer to create formatted financial Web reports.
• Unleash powerful but little-known techniques to add custom formatting to Web reports.
• Determine which reports are and are not good candidates for the Web, and find out how to secure critical financial data with a sound approach to security and authorizations.

Releases covered: SAP BW 3.5 | SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 | SAP NetWeaver 2004 |SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: Graham Johanson, Breakwater Consulting

Move beyond the documentation with lessons gleaned from SAP BEx Broadcaster deployments. Watch this session to:

• See how your counterparts leverage the SAP BEx Broadcaster, available with SAP BW 3.5 and later, to better schedule and execute the delivery of SAP BW reports.
• Watch demos, infused with real-world advice, to set up and operate SAP BEx Broadcaster.
• Prepare for hardware and software prerequisites and learn how these requirements may change depending upon how you publish and distribute reports.
• Understand the key differences between using SAP BEx Broadcaster to publish and distribute reports via your in-house email system versus SAP NetWeaver Portal.
• Discover how tagging the SAP BEx Broadcaster onto your SAP BW process chains further automates your report scheduling, and get tips to ensure you do it right.
• Learn where the security threats lie and how to apply the right controls to ensure that unauthorized parties do not gain access to broadcasted reports.
• See why you should consider a core governance council to maintain control over SAP BW report distribution as you roll out the SAP BEx Broadcaster.
• Determine if and how SAP BEx Broadcaster should be configured and set up depending on the type of user receiving the reports.
• Get sample code to help you bypass domain conflicts that can arise when you call reports from SAP BW into SAP NetWeaver Portal.

Releases covered: SAP BW 3.5 | SAP NetWeaver BI 7.0 | SAP NetWeaver 2004 |SAP NetWeaver 7.0
Session presented by: Bjarne Berg, MyITgroup