Future of Integrating SAP Lumira into Your Existing BI 4 Landscape SAP TechEd Online Notes Part 2
Part 1 is here Integrating SAP Lumira into Your Existing BI 4 Landscape – SAP TechEd Online Notes Part 1 and discusses current state of Lumira including Cloud.
This is Part 2 covering the future. Note that things are subject to change. This is a recorded online EA201 session Integrating SAP Lumira into Your Existing BI 4 Landscape
Future: On Premise
Figure 1: Source: SAP
“SAP Lumira for SAP HANA” is in quotes as it is future functionality. It is not generally available.
Looking at native implementation on HANA appliance – use HANA accounts and security mechanisms
Figure 2: Source: SAP
You have today the cloud version on the left in Figure 2.
Put in cloud, mobile device and on premise with multiple deployment options
Lumira for HANA needs a HANA system with scalability and volumes
Figure 3: Source: SAP
BI4 is not going away but for some things you need HANA
Focus on BI4 will be more on quality and innovation, less disruption
Figure 4: Source: SAP
Figure 4 shows the future…two launchpads?
SAP knows this. Keep reading…
Figure 5: Source: SAP
Figure 5 is what SAP is working on. SAP wants to have HANA technologies and take advantage without dealing with HANA, having it show in BI Launchpad.
Administrators do not want 2 things to administer.
They want to bring in the user experience of Lumira into the BI4 platform but does not mean bring HANA into the BI Platform.
They want to see your Lumira artifacts next to the Crystal artifacts.
They are working on granular rights.
You would publish to BI Platform and not HANA
Figure 6: Source: SAP
Vision to have Lumira in the BI Launchpad – an integration with new technologies – not a replacement
Figure 7: Source: SAP
SP13 is now available
Lumira connects to universes today
Working to bring user and administrative experience in and use Lumira now
Question & Answer
Q: Doesn’t look like that much of enterprise solution as it is disconnected from the data source
A: This is why the Scheduling Agent is there and the server is coming in the future
Q: Why not publish in Launchpad?
A: Working on
Q: Can use an Excel spreadsheet from Analysis Office as a source for Lumira?
A: He has not tried this
Q: Can you pull up changes from HANA Views?
A: Yes – big deal about publishing back to HANA view – the big deal is the credentials
Q: Is this an offline tool that allows refreshes?
A: It is a desktop – “Explorer on the Desktop”
Q: How is the performance in writing back to the desktop?
A: This is a tough question to answer as part of the limiting factor is the desktop which has memory and depends on nature of the data; once it gets to 30 million cells – not recommended
Q: Can you deploy on a Citrix Server?
A: There is an SAP note for Lumira Desktop on Citrix
Browser side should be good
Q: Is there a scripted installer?
A: It is on the roadmap but not available today.
Q: Seems at odds with BI Platform?
A: Lumira uses universes, BI authentication, publish to Explorer
On Premise
Q: Is there a plan to have a schedule on the server to refresh data?
A: Philosophical question; if HANA is your data store – the data is already there
All that can be said about these two documents, are WOW.
Great overview, organization, follow-up, and Q&A.
*tweeted*
Thanks again for your extremely useful posts Tammy!
-Bijan
Tammy,
Any updates on when this integrated solution may be available?
Hi Barnaby - I haven't heard any firm dates yet, but I will try to find out at BI 2014 at the end of the month.
Hi Gurus,
Any updates on the integration ?? I like the concept of Story boards.
If it is integrated to BI Luanchpad then that would really great.
We saw a demo of it last month at BI 2014 - see http://scn.sap.com/community/business-intelligence/blog/2014/03/30/bi-2014--its-a-wrap
"Stephane demonstrated SAP Lumira on the BI Launchpad with the ability to share and publish Lumira on the BI Launchpad. This is not yet GA (neither are the Infographics). SAP hinted this would be around the SAPPHIRE / ASUG Annual Conference timeframe."
Yes this is coming in Q2. I am actually working on the communication on this topic as we speak.
I continue to fail to see why HANA is required for sharing Lumira Storyboards on the BI Platform. If the author used a CSV or UNX as a source and his/her workstation has the horsepower to build it, why on earth must we use HANA for that processing power on the server??? Figure 4, the left side, is what we want. If I am understanding Figure 5, HANA seems forced into this usage scenario.
Maybe I am wrong, so I'll ask: Is HANA required (in whatever form, sidecar/t-shirt/whatever) in every scenario where sharing to the BI Platform is the goal?
Hi Michael:
Lumira Server is not using HANA as just a datastore - it is a native application that leverages HANA natively - by using it as an application server, data calculation engine, and overall system platform. This is what gives Lumira Server its ability to be very quick on large datasets.
We must keep in mind that when we are "sharing content" with other users, we are not sharing a report with saved data that simply needs to be rendered. We are dynamically rendering data that is "living in HANA". That content is almost as interactive as it was for the person who initially created the content (in fact, using the same programmatic and rendering engines).
Note that even if the content is a UNX source or a CSV this is put into HANA so that Lumira can operate on it. (If you are familiar with Explorer, even Explorer does this by using Information Spaces to index content from an UNX or CSV). Since we are on HANA, no indexes need to be precreated and Lumira can give more flexibility in the type of exploration it allows the user to do.
So while it seems like we are simply rendering charts on the screen, Lumira Server is effectively a dynamic application where every view, chart, or control rendered is based on on-the-fly calculations within HANA. Unfortunately, the next generation technology has a cost to it - one that we are ACTIVELY working to reduce.
Great comprehensive explanation Ashish!
Ashish, thank you for taking time for responding, but for non-HANA customers who have experience with what Explorer could do without relying on HANA, this is a hard fact to accept without at least whining a little first.
For the very reason you mentioned about Explorer, I don't see why HANA was required for Lumira aside from a choice to not support (even as an alternative to HANA) something similar to an Info Space. After all, it was done for Lumira's Flash-based Explorer cousin.
It sounds like for us that on-premise sharing on the BI Platform will be limited to publishing Lumira data sets to Explorer as InfoSpaces and then building the equivalent of Storyboards (Exploration Viewsets) in Explorer. Quite unfortunate that we cannot do this with Lumira on the same platform without relying on HANA. 🙁
Hi Ashish,
While I appreciate the benefits a native HANA application can bring, the challenge is the fact that many customers will deploy Lumira as a powerful agile visualization tool to only a handful of Information Producers who will use the horsepower on their client desktops and then simply want to share their insights leveraging existing investments such as the BI platform. In that scenario I don't see any reason why a Lumira object could not be rendered/refreshed within the BI platform alone without having to reach over to HANA (particularly when BICS connectivity is introduced).