BI 4.0 SP6 – How to import users in bulk from Central Management Console
You can add users or user groups in bulk to the CMC using a CSV (comma-separated values) file. Useful and intuitive.
Version
SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 SP6
Build Number : 1036
Product Version : 14.0.6
Context
A list of users is available as a .CSV file. You want to import users in CMS in order to manage them.
Step-by-step guide
1. First of all, we need a flat file where users are listed. Be sure to respect this kind of format below to avoid misunderstanding during next step.
| Action | User Group | User | Full Name | Password | Profile Name | Profil Value | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Add |
MyGroup |
MyUser1 |
MyFullName |
Password1 |
ProfileName | ProfileValue |
“Add” is an action and this key word is necessary. Other details complete user definition.
Must Know : Entries of your CSV file must be separated by a comma (,).
2. On the Users and Groups tab, click Manage Import User Group User/Group/DBCredential .
The User/Group/DBCredential window is displayed.
3. Click Browse, select a CSV file, and click Verify.
The file is processed. If the data is formatted correctly, the Import button becomes active.
4. Click Import.
The users or user groups are imported into the CMC.
😉 It’s done !
Tips
The following conditions apply to the bulk addition process :
- Any line in the CSV file that contains an error will be omitted from the import process.
- User accounts are initially disabled after being imported.
- You can use blank passwords when creating new users.
More informations
You can get more informations reading SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform Administrator Guide :
http://help.sap.com/businessobject/product_guides/boexir4/en/xi4sp6_bip_admin_en.pdf
Thank you for that, nicely done and could be quite handy! Incredible that I have overlooked that option before, since it seems to have been in BI 4.0 at least since SP4 (at which I am looking at right now).
Do you also happen to know the proper format for importing Database Credentials in bulk as well? I think that one would look somewhat similar, but I am not sure and could not find any information about that in the Admin Guide.
Thanks for your comment.
I'm looking for further test to define proper format for importing Database Credentials in bulk. I'll post a new version of my document once the answer found.
Stay tuned.
Hi William,
Nice overview (easier to read compared to the manual)..
Some suggestions:
You can update users via this script as well (like changing passwords and email). IN this case you can use the ADD statement just like creating the user as the CMS will pick this up as an update as the username has to be unique.
Bulk removing should be available by using the command "REMOVE" followed by the user..
so in example:
Col A Col B
Remove bobama
Add an existing user to an addtional group should be available via the add statement..
Although I have never tested this in BI4.0 this all worked in XIR2, so will be surprised if it does not work anymore
Thanks Merlijn for these details.Very useful.
Don't hesitate to add more tips, I'll test "REMOVE" command to go further... This kind of features already exists for a while but well-hidden so, I do it out of the box !
Regards,
Hi Merlijn,
Thank you for your extra info. I just wanted to make sure I am following you correctly, so if I had one person in multiple groups would this be the info I use in the CSV file for example John Smith or will one overwrite the other or will I have 2 John Smiths?
Also I think I understand the profile name, but if anyone can give me an example of profile values that would be a huge help.
Thank you for any help you can provide!
Erin
Thanks you for this article ,can the CSV be scheduled like AD,LDAP abd ctr. ?
Regards
Hi William,
Thanks for your article.Seems it is only works for concurrent user.What if I want to using CVS add named user?
Thanks Willian for the post.
Request you to share the input file format for importing the user groups in BULK.
Thanks in advance 🙂
Cheers!!
Dinesh
Hi everyone,
Thanks for comments. I'll try to answer soon and add extra informations.
Stay tuned ! 🙂
Hi William,
Thanks a lot for sharing this information
.
We are using SAP as authentication system for BI4.0
Is there a way we can bulk upload SAP Backend roles (BW roles) in Business Objects?
Thanks in advance 🙂
Cheers !!
Dinesh
Hi Dinesh,
Yes you can. In SAp Authentication options, you can import automatically SAP BW Roles and set up a security matrix to manage new users in SAP BW with automatic security profiles in SAP BI 4.0.
You can plan updates from SAP BW in these options, so BI Platform does it for you.
Each SAP BW role is created as a user group in CMC, so users are imported without any manual action.
Hope it will help.
Regards,
Thanks William for the response.
One more question 🙂
We need to create a lot of user groups for providing access to folder , universes, connections etc.
Is there a way we can mass upload user groups in BI4.0 system from some file(excel etc.). What we need is group name and description.
Best Regards,
Dinesh
Hi Dinesh,
When you add a user, if the group does not exist, it will be created during the import. When you delete the user with "Remove", this group is not deleted, even if the eliminated user is the last one in the group.
Hi Dinesh,
I added groups using the same steps as above the only difference was my CSV file had only two columns. Column A said "add" like the above sample and the B was my list of groups. I did this step first and then when I added my users, they went into these groups. See pic attached. I hope that is what you were asking and this help!
Hi Erin,
Thanks a lot for sharing. It works perfect.
However, is there a way we can include the group description as well? Using above script we can import groups but description is blank.
Thanks again
🙂
Dinesh
I have not tried it, but can you add a description column to the file like the user group column? Let me know if you try it and if it works and if I get to that point I'll let you know as well.
My only concern is that once you have created all the users, you need to enable all the users one by one, and it should also include a field for Description.
Hi,
This is really amazing feature. i tried this and unfortunatelly it is not working.
In our environment we are using BO4.1 SP2, and Windows AD authentication. We recently migrated user groups and it is broken from original groups.
So all users are existing in user list , now i want to add this users in to corresponding groups. some time one user might belongs to multiple group.
When i tried this i am getting error, Any idea? am i missing something?
Belive me we have 60K users and we are not able to imagine this do by manually...
Thanks in advance
I am not sure why it did not add your groups but it looks like you may have used a name you have already used so it did not want to override the original. Can you put a screen shot of your file of your groups? That may help people see what happened.
Example of group add below.
Action User Group
Add Accounting
Add Customer Service
Then if I have a person who belongs to more than one group then the user add file would look like below.
Action User Group User Full Name
Add Accounting Bjones Bob Jones
Add Customer Service Bjones Bob Jones
You just make 2 line items for that person and it will place them in both groups. I was worried it would over-write the first one, but in mine it did not. I would test it in yours with just a few to be sure though.
Heads up though. I was just testing adding people in ours and was unaware at the time we only had a few licenses and when I added people it kicked some of our original users off. They still showed up in the groups and users, they were just not allowed to log in! Oops!
Hope that helps!
Erin
Hi Erin,
Thanks for the reply. We have to add different set of users in to different groups.
So we are trying one by one group. in the below case only few id's through error.
If i remove those id's and import then works fine. i tried to research with those id's but not able to find the differences.
We have to add540K + users in to different groups.
Hi Satheesh,
That is strange. I have no idea why those three would give you an error. Can you see if their are some sort of hidden characters or something may be in those cells or lines? Have you tried adding any one of those by hand to see if it would work that way, just to test that there is not something in your file in those lines that may be keeping these from going through?
Hi Satheesh,
Did you ever figure out why you got the error above? When I loaded my users the first time we had to remove them and now when I have tried the above steps that worked before, I get an error similar to yours. It verified it fine and the Status says success, but if I look at the history and instance it gives me the error then.
Thank you for any info you can provide.
Erin
Part of the error below.
Parse Results
Number of lines read: 29
Number of blank lines skipped: 0
Commit Results
Number of users attempted to commit: 29
Number of groups attempted to commit: 13
Error in objects: RS Sales Manager Group
Error: The property list(s) 'SI_ADM_ADD_USERS_TO_USERGROUP, SI_ADM_ADD_USERS_TO_USERGROUP' committed on the object named 'RS Sales Manager Group' with id number 89704 contained reference(s) to non-existant object(s) with id number(s) 90616, 90617.
Good note!!
Very useful. Thanks
Hi,
As Wen Mao asked before, seems this only works for if we have a concurrent user licensing. What if I want to add bulk users if I have named users license. Because I have named user license and I tried the bulk loading but users were NOT added in to the CMC.
Thanks,
Skugan V
Hello, we are also running into this. Is there a way to add named users, and not concurrent users?
Thanks,
Aly K.
May be this will help you for Bulk Users conversions.. Its FREE 🙂
Free - SAP BI 4 Named User | Concurrent User Bulk Conversion
Hello,
Is it possible to add the description for a Group using CSV?
Please advice,
Thank you,
SS
Hi William,
I decided to take your work ahead and have collated some information regarding other functionality: Adding Bulk Users & Groups in SAP BI 4.x: Revisited .
Cheers!!
~Sarvjot Singh
Thanks for your udpate !
I'll have a look asap 🙂
William
Is there a way to bulk enable the users that are added. Since all the users that are added are disabled by default. It could save a lot of time 🙂
Hello Arjun,
True, I had the same situation, all users were disabled by default.
There is a possibility to mass change the users to enabled. The solution is to go to the usergroup, rightclick and choose 'Account Manager'. You will be able to change three parameters:
With the last one mentioned, you will be able to enable all users by authentication types which are provided for your system. For example you can enable 'Enterprise' by checkbox this type and checkbox again Enabled and click on Save.
Off-course be careful because you will change all the users in the chosen group.
Also be careful when you open this screen the first option 'Change User Passwords to New Value' is checkbox is default 'Yes', so you would change all the passwords as well.
Kind regards,
Paul
Does this work on BO 4 or does it have to be BO4 sp4
Hello Guys,
What if the users are named users and not concurrent users?
Thanks,
Himanshu
Hi
I am able to import users using this csv format. But not able to see that user in enterprise account. How to add user as enterprise alias if its already present in ldap
We have user/user-group in ldap. But LDAP is migrating to a new host (Novell Edirectory version update including tree structure changes) we would like to create enterprise alias account for all the user and user group before migration so that when we do migration user/user group mapping will be deleted from ldap. Then we can use enterprise account to retain the mapping and after migration switch over from enterprise account to latest ldap group.
Thanks
Goms