Groovy offers creative ways to force data into acceptable ranges. But, what happens when there is an acceptable reason for abnormal trends, or drivers? With Groovy, you can not only add limits to data cells, but you can also allow entry outside of those ranges if the user enters an explanation. With Groovy, you get the best of both worlds! Read more
Say what? An application where no calculations are performed with the Essbase calculation engine?
Business logic, currency, and every other calculation can be performed within Groovy outside of Essbase. I don’t know how I feel about this yet, but the thought of building this in calculations on an ASO cube is intriguing. The elimination of consolidating BSO cubes and data movements with Smart Pushes is also interesting. Some of my coworkers have built entire applications this way with great success and speed. I wanted to replicate this on a small scale to identify the pros and cons of this methodology, and here is what I found. Read more
Almost every ePBCS application will require the need to run business logic and execute data movements on specific months based on a scenario selected. Almost every Data Form will require action to be taken dynamically based on the selection of the Scenario. Read more
One of the challenges working with grids is validating the results. As with an Essbase calculation, Smart View reports are developed to validate results. The same happens when calculations, or data movement, is executed in Groovy via grids. When the results in Smart View aren’t accurate, where do you go? Read more
Gridbuilders are the link to moving data from BSO to ASO, and ASO to ASO. Gridbuilders can also be used to save calculated results that are executed directly in Groovy. If it jumped into your head, yes, you can completely bypass the Essbase calculation engine. I have a coworker that has done exactly that – everything in Groovy and had all the forms connected directly to ASO! There is an example of this in my presentation at KScope, Last Minute ODTUG Planning Sourvenirs. Before we get too far ahead, back to the basics. Read more
Because so many methods in PBCS require parameters that are maps and lists, it is very important to your productivity and effectiveness to understand, use, and be able to manipulate collections. Collections include lists, maps, and ranges. These are based on Java collection types and include a ton of useful methods. This article will cover lists and maps. Read more
One of the more surprisingly useful things that can be done in a Groovy calculation is querying metadata. This was discussed in Part 11: Accessing Metadata Properties, but I recently had a situation where users could load data at parent levels and have it allocated down to the bottom of the hierarchies. Read more
Building on the previous post and in the spirit of reusing code, this will expand on the concept by walking through the creation and use of functions in Groovy calculations. Functions have huge value in reducing your Groovy calculations and streamlining development. Read more
Now that you are knee deep in Groovy, help yourself out and reuse common code. The more you learn, the more efficient you will be and will laugh at some of your initial attempts at your Groovy calculations. If you are like me, you get excited about all the possibilities and learn as you go. When you find better ways to do something, or even preferable ways, you end up with an application with inconsistent representations of the same logic. You are too busy to go back and update all the snippets you have improved, so it stays in a somewhat messy state.
Do yourself a favor and start reusing some of the things you need in every script. Read more
KScope has concluded, and what a fantastic week it was. I love the years I get the feedback that I have an abstract selected so I can attend. This year, I was awarded Oracle Ace, so it was really nice to be nominated and recognized for my contributions to the community. Read more