September, 2017
From the Editor
The big news this month is this: over the weekend of September 23 and 24th, we migrated our Business Warehouse to a new computing platform. What does that mean to you? A faster reporting environment! We conducted several speed tests in which we compared the time it took for a report to return data in the new environment versus the production environment we have been using since 2011. Here’s a look at the test results for a cross section of BW reports known for the long time it sometimes takes for them to return data:
As you can see from the graph, the speed improvements were significant for these data-intensive reports. Additionally, the majority of the 200+ BW reports we tested returned data in under 5 seconds. Your results may vary depending upon the age-range and amount of data requested, but we guarantee you should be able to notice a significant performance difference in BW reporting.
I hope you find this issue of the Newsletter informative. Please let me know if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions for future BW Newsletters.
Bill Stewart
Training Calendar
September/October Training Opportunities
Introductory Workshops
As is true each month, an assortment of introductory workshops will be available. These sessions present to new employees – or employees assigned a new business role – the fundamentals of reporting for a particular subject area. The sessions are a great way to review material, too. Even if you previously attended an intro session, you are likely to learn new things about reporting – or to be reminded of concepts that you had forgotten.
Click on any of the following links for a course description and/or to register for an upcoming session:
Supplier Resource Management Reporting
Labor Distribution (Payroll) Reporting
Intermediate-Level Workshops
Advanced Reporting for Payroll Coordinators: we will explore the reports developed based on the HCM Employee Model, especially the Employee Master Data Snapshot and Historical View of Payments reports. Register to attend either session by visiting this page. Remember, the reports are available only to payroll coordinators and managers, although the workshop is aimed at payroll coordinators.
Tips & Tricks
Create a Variant
Do you find that you frequently specify the same variable values when executing a BW report? Those values might include a set of grants or a list of vendors or a group of employees. By using a Variant, it is possible to save those variable values so they can be recalled, thereby avoiding the need to specify them again. Unlike a saved View (aka favorite), a Variant is available only to you and only to the report for which the Variant is created. You can create as many Variants as you need for any BW report (or saved View) and it’s easy to delete Variants when you no longer need them.
Read this Help guide to learn all about Variants: BW How to – Save and Use a Variant.
Add Your Own Calculation Based on Report Key Figures
Did you know you can perform a calculation on the fly based on Key Figure data? Suppose you have a list of Limit Orders and you know how much you have spent against each limit. If you want to know how much you have left to spend, do you export the report data to Excel and perform the calculation there? Don’t bother; there’s a simpler way. You can create a new Key Figure column to show how much is unspent.
Take a few minutes and read this document: BW How to – Create a Calculated Key Figure
End Notes
Custom Training Sessions
Have you ever thought that it would be really useful if you could get members of your department together with a trainer to focus on BUworks functionality that is specific to the work your department does? I’m happy to work with any department or group that would like to develop and conduct a custom basic- or intermediate-level reporting training session. There are only two requirements for such a session: (1) input from the group is necessary to develop a relevant agenda, and (2) the group should include four or more employees. If you’re interested in discussing the development of a custom session for your department or school/college, contact me via email or give me a call at 617-353-6382.
No Longer Interested in the Newsletter?
You can unsubscribe from the Newsletter email list by visiting this page.