Step-by-Step Guide: Creating a SAP Analytics Cloud (Formerly SAP BusinessObjects Cloud/SAP Cloud for Analytics/C4A) Analytic Model by importing data from Excel

Hi Everyone!

You might have already seen a lot of training videos about SAP Analytics Cloud (Formerly SAP BusinessObjects Cloud/SAP C4A) published by SAPAnalyticsTraining here. The purpose of this blog is to make you better understand this topic by a hands-on exercise that I have created. I hope it makes it simpler for you to learn and implement this easily. In this blog, you will learn about creating an analytic model in SAP Analytics Cloud by importing data from an excel file. You can use any data that you have. 

Let’s begin with an introduction:

SAP Analytics Cloud (Formerly SAP BusinessObjects Cloud/SAP C4A)  combines all analytics capabilities including planning, predictive analytics, and business intelligence (BI) – in a single SaaS solution.

Models: A model is a representation of the data and is required to perform the analysis and communication of the data. With SAP Analytics Cloud Modeler, the user can create different models for further analysis and to even create stories for a better representation.

For more information, please have a look at this User Guide provided by SAP.

Here, we will be creating an Analytics-Type Model by importing data from an excel file.This example talks about the sales data of a super market like Product Name, Profit, Discount, etc. After this exercise, you would have a complete data model in SAP Analytics Cloud and you can later use this to create stories.

Creating an Analytic Model:

As soon as you log in, you can see the homepage which looks like this:

Your Home screen is the place where you can pin reports, stories, and visualizations, as tiles. You can also add personal notes and upcoming events there. When you first start SSAP Analytics Cloud, the Home screen displays quick-launch shortcuts that can help you get started working on your analytics tasks right away. For example, you can:

• Drag an Excel file onto the Home screen to import the data.
• Launch the Financial Planning Wizard to create plans on the fly.
• Start the Explorer, where you can begin analyzing data and creating visualizations.

Steps:

1. You can directly drag and drop a source file into the “Connect To Data” block of the homepage or you can click on “Home” and then select “Modeler”.

2. Click on the “+” icon on the top right corner of the page.

3. Select “Import File from your computer”.

4. Select the source xslx file you downloaded from here. Select the Orders page. Then click on “Import”.

5. Then, you will be redirected to this page:

6. The import process analyzes the source data and creates an initial data view with proposed dimensions for the new model. You then refine the proposal by specifying the attribute type for each dimension in the new model. Select “Order_Quantity” field and change the Attribute Type from “Property” to “Measure”. Measures represent quantifiable data such as revenue and quantity sold.

7. You need to mark a field’s Attribute Type as ID if you would want to visualize this against measures when creating stories.

8. Select “Order_Date” and change the Attribute type to “ID”.

9. Now Select the Dimension Type to be “Time”.

10. Select “Longitude” field and click on “Create Location”.

11. Make sure that “Latitude” and “Longitude” are selected as shown.

12. Select “Create Model”.

13. Click on the save icon.

14. Select “ACCOUNT_AUTO”. Select the Aggregation type of each of these measures to “SUM”.

15. Click on the Save icon. You have successfully created a model on SAP BusinessObjects Cloud by importing data from an excel file.

Summary: You have just created a model by following these steps:

1. Selected a source file and entered a name for the model that will be created.
2. Started the import process, which creates the initial data view.
3. Specified attribute types for the dimensions.
4. Started the automatic creation of the model.

This model can then be used to create stories in SAP Analytics Cloud (Formerly, SAP BusinessObjects Cloud/SAP C4A).