Last month ASUG held a launch webcast to recruit members for the ASUG SAP BusinessObjects Lumira 2.0 Influence Council. You can apply here before Tuesday, March 28 when the survey closes. Please note the usual disclaimer applies that things in the future are subject to change.
Figure 1: Source: SAP/ASUG
The speakers for the webcast included Jason Olson, the Council Customer Chair and SAP's Jie Deng and Ramu Gowda.
Figure 2: Source: SAP/ASUG
Before kicking off the webcast, reviewed the opportunity for hands-on BusinessObjects Lumira 2.0 Designer/Discovery and BusinessObjects Cloud with Jie and Ramu before ASUG Annual Conference starts. Register here. SAP is offering hands-on before the product is generally available; it is a good opportunity to learn from the experts and network with other attendees.
Figure 3: Source: SAP/ASUG
Jason is the Customer Lead for the council and SAP points of contact to the Council are Jie and Ramu. Jason previously led the ASUG Web Intelligence Influence Council, so he is very experienced.
Figure 4: Source: SAP/ASUG
Jason reviewed the following:
Figure 5: Source: SAP/ASUG
Next, Jason reviewed the participant profile shown in Figure 5.
Before reviewing the charter for the council and the things slated for the next release of BusinessObjects Lumira 2.0, SAP reviewed SAP Lumira 2.0
Figure 6: Source: SAP/ASUG
Hopefully most have seen Figure 6, with 2 Lumira 2.0 Clients and 1 backend add-on to the BI platform. Discovery is for self-service users without IT knowledge. Discovery client can do data merging and blending.
Designer for professional IT designers who use scripting, CSS to write corporate dashboards. You can create a planning application - BPC embedded with Designer as the front-end. Designer can use reusable objects so others can reuse. It is like expert mode with more capabilities.
Discovery is for business user for easier ad-hoc analysis and visualizations. Two clients with different user types and scenarios.
These two clients are based on the same technology. The underlying technology is the same. File format is the same, to have a "seamless" interop scenario between clients. Business user can start in Discovery and then Designer can open the ad-hoc visualization to add scripting/CSS and interaction logic and make them into enterprise-wide dashboard.
Figure 7: Source: SAP/ASUG
Figure 7 shows a unified data connection/access with online mode and offline (acquired) mode.
Combined server add-on is the Design Studio runtime and the velocity engine. Use the Design Studio runtime (using BICS access to BW) - all BW OLAP functionalities will be supported as using BICS interface. Velocity engine is on the BI platform; data can be acquired there and can be used for the Designer.
You can use the Discovery client for data preparation.
Figure 8: Source: SAP/ASUG
Plan to ship for GA end of June timeframe; ramp-up is planned for mid-April (early adopt care program)
Figure 9: Source: SAP/ASUG
Lumira 2.0 has a compatibility mode; all 1.6 application would run
You can start new projects with new format
If you want to extend existing 1.6 application with 2.0 - you need to do an application conversion; convert to .m library, export the application from compatibility mode and import to .lumx mode
In 1.6 you can already convert to m library application. You decide when you want to convert
Figure 10: Source: SAP/ASUG
If you use 1.31 and you upgrade to 2.0 - all documents should be converted to 2.0 format without any effort by you.
In case 2, failed conversion, there are additional steps.
Figure 11: Source: SAP/ASUG
Infographics, images, data merging, format different text elements, chart configuration
Figure 12: Source: SAP/ASUG
Viz and compose room are together; only 1 room to create visualizations and use that for your dashboard
Context menu is easy to use.
The 2 clients share the same visualizations, geo maps, etc.
The user experience has been revamped, BW online connection, interop scenario with Designer.
Figure 13: Source: SAP/ASUG
Figure 13 shows examples - applications, designs
Figure 14: Source: SAP/ASUG
Composites are reusable objects to reduce TCO for development; composites are built in Designer environment; programming skill is lower than SDK
Adaptive Layout Container helps you achieve responsive layout
Bookmark concept is robust if you change the application
PDF export enhancements, charting enhancement (like Discovery)
ESRI as a basemap
Figure 15: Source: SAP/ASUG
Planned innovations are what is in SAP Lumira 2.0
Future includes broadcasting, mobile offline, commentary
Figure 16: Source: SAP/ASUG
Figure 16 discusses the charter for the council
Council is Open to ASUG Member companies
Question and Answer
Thanks to Jie and Ramu for answering 40+ questions.
Q: Can we attack the BeX query without hana ?
A: Both Discovery and Designer, would continue to support BEx Queries on BW.
Q: will the extensions built for designer work in discovery and vice-versa ?
A: Yes, in Lumira 2.0 we plan to have common extension framework. You can use Design Studio extensions in Discovery and vice-versa
Q: Does the merging of add-ons and the addition of the velocity engine help improve BO Universe Integration with Lumira Designer?
A: Yes, Designer can make use of prepared data in Discovery (imported from UNX) and build offline applications. this would address the 20k row limitation issue with
Design Studio UNX connectivity
Q: Will the row limitation for Universe Data Sources be lifted? Will it now start supporting Hierarchies and Attributes on a Universe Data Source?
A: Yes, row level limitations in Designer are removed. only when building application using acquired data (from Discovery). would support all enrichment done in
disocvery
Q: the "In memory Data Engine", it's a new stack ? different thant the BO platform ? Server ? thank
A: Its a velocity engine which we bundle with Lumira Desktop and Lumira Server for BI Platform. we just reuse the same technology in Lumira 2.0 and extend it to
Designer
Q: Is the discovery client a thick client or a thin clint
A: Both Discovery and Designer are going to be thick clients
Q: Is it possible to create Big Data Platforms connection such as Hadoop via Lumira 2.x?
A: Yes, you can connect and import data from Hadoop.
Q: Can we connect to excel and csv files from Designer with the same ease as in Lumira today?
A: You can connect to excel and csv from Discovery, prepare the data and then use this prepared data set in Designer to build applications
Q: Will we be able to publish the dashboard from Lumira 2.0 to a Shrepoint portal like how it is done with XCelsius (Dashboards)
A: You can make use of Open Document links to Embed in Sharepoint portal
Q: Will there be any manual effort involved in converting 1.x format application to 2.x format? If so, what kind of manual effort can we expect?
A: Depends on Design Studio or Lumira. For Design Studio, you need to open DS 1.6 application in new Designer. its automatic as long as DS 1.6 application is created
using .m libraries otherwise you need to migrate from common to .m library before conversion
Q: If my technicals experts go (tomorrow) to the Design Studio training (in SAP), can they developp easly to the discovery mode ? Or we need a new training ?
A: Discovery experience is straight forward and easy to learn. however with the flexibility Designer provides to build application a training would be required.
Q: awesome.. what about the existing extenions built for DS 1.6 or Lumira 1.31.. will that also be inter-operable ?
A: Yes, even existing applications are planned to work across.
Q: Will applications built on 1.6 SAPUI5 (not 'm') mode still be usable with 2.0 on compatibility mode?
A: Yes, you can continue to use in compatibility mode.
Q: Follow-up question on the excel file use in Designer. If the data in the underlying excel file is changed, what are the steps to view the refreshed data in Designer
A: You can make use of scripting and data source reload capabilities to trigger the refresh as long as excel file is in shared and accessible location
Q: Is there any column size limit when we upload data sets from the source system into SAP Lumira 2.X ?
A: Lumira 2.x delivers bundled in memory engine, there is no limit as long as underlying memory requirement are met
Q: Currently, UI5m does not offer Fragment Gallery for Online Composition. Will this be offered in 2.0?
A: this continues to be the same in 2.0 you can consider discovery for this use case with online support for HANA and BW in 2.0
Q: after the conversion of DS application to Lumira 2.0 , will all my bookmarks that have been created in 1.6 work seamlessly
A: We are re designing bookmarks to support additional enhancements to manage bookmarks better. unfortunately your bookmarks wont work after conversion. however, they
continue to work in compatability mode
Q: question, wil it still support d3 components
A: assuming for extensions, yes.
Q: we have ver 300 DS applications and over 40K bookmarks if they break then the sweepback can be very cumbersome
A: you can continue to use existing applications with support for bookmarks in compatibility mode in 2.0
Q: Will Lumira discovery stories now support auto fit full screen mode as opposed to Page sized based only
A: Lumira Stories rendering is planned to be responsive depending on the target device. however, rendering on full screen depend on the aspect ratio. We plan to
deliver aspect ratio specific to Launchpad to develop stories which can be rendered with all available space on launchpad. And you can use custom aspect ratio to be
able to render on full screen on any device.
Q: Has it Turkish language support for all charts and other features on Lumira 2.x? Lumira 1.x versions has no Turkish language supoort for Input Control box feature.
A: Yes, its planned to be supported
Q: Can we alter the default bookmark location?
A: in Discovery bookmarks are stored along with document.
Q: Does the "Next Gen" Conditional Formatting rule support dynamic values (values selected from a data cell instead of typing in a value as you would do on a Chart
Component today)?
A: No, it is not planned to be dynamic on cell for Lumira 2.0
Q: Is Online Composition going to be possible on Lumira 2.0?
A: Online composition scenario will be covered with Discovery client. so in Designer Client we are not going to support it anymore
Q: Will mobile support for Lumira 2.0 be same/different than Lumira 1.x. Please elaborate if time permits.
A: Mobile BI support is planned to be at parity with Lumira 1.x with Mobile BI 6.6 release planned along with Lumira 2.0 GA
Q: one item that will help us is an css visual editor with in the studio
A: we have a css editor in Designer. There you can open CSS and also edit it and directly upload to BI Platform.
Q: Are we also looking to bring in some of the Explorer features as well ?
A: Yes, we plan to bring in Keyword search and faceted visualisation post 2.0
Q; Can Analysts working for Partners be a part of the council?
A: yes, a few will be accepted
Q: The personalization feature of Explorer is one of the more important one.
A: You can make use of enhanced bookmarks in Discovery 2.0
Q: We are a multi-tenant setup and create design studio dashboards. With the current bookmarking, bookmarks can be saved to the main bookmark directory. In the
webcast, I was told that the bookmarks are saved along with the design studio documents. (I was asking if we could alter the default location for bookmarks in the
CMC application area for Design Studio that is currently not alterable). Since we create and publish these to the bi repository for our customers, they would not have
the access rights to modify/save the bookmarks, and different users could have their own bookmarks. We are in the process of the security requirements to allow
bookmarks and am looking for guidance. We are on the latest version of Design Studio and plan on migrating when 2.0 is released.
A: Bookmarks continued to be stored in the hidden application folder with no possibility to change the location.
In future releases we plan to deliver the capability to save the bookmark as hyperlink object anywhere in BI Platform (of course based on security)
In 2.0 we are planning to also provide the possibility to store bookmark with application together in Repository folder, but unfortunately we must skip this item
because of other high priority features.
So in Lumira 2.0 , Bookmarks are still stored in CMC Bookmark folder as in Design Studio 1.6.
With Lumira 2.0 user can define personal (only user itself can see this bookmark) or global bookmarks (everyone who has the authorization for the folder can see this
bookmarks) and they can be assigned to bookmark folders.
The authorization /Administration of Bookmarks in 2.0 stays the same like Design Studio 1.6.
Figure 1: Source: SAP/ASUG
The speakers for the webcast included Jason Olson, the Council Customer Chair and SAP's Jie Deng and Ramu Gowda.
Figure 2: Source: SAP/ASUG
Before kicking off the webcast, reviewed the opportunity for hands-on BusinessObjects Lumira 2.0 Designer/Discovery and BusinessObjects Cloud with Jie and Ramu before ASUG Annual Conference starts. Register here. SAP is offering hands-on before the product is generally available; it is a good opportunity to learn from the experts and network with other attendees.
Figure 3: Source: SAP/ASUG
Jason is the Customer Lead for the council and SAP points of contact to the Council are Jie and Ramu. Jason previously led the ASUG Web Intelligence Influence Council, so he is very experienced.
Figure 4: Source: SAP/ASUG
Jason reviewed the following:
Influence Councils are interactive forums where members can communicate ideas and concerns about product plans and SAP services directly to SAP development and product managers.
The majority influence councils are product related.
Each IC has a leadership team that manages activities. This team is comprised of the Product Manager, Customer Contact and HQ representative.
The average Influence Council has 15+ companies, with 1-2 representatives per company. Meetings take place in both a virtual and face-to-face setting depending on need.
Figure 5: Source: SAP/ASUG
Next, Jason reviewed the participant profile shown in Figure 5.
Before reviewing the charter for the council and the things slated for the next release of BusinessObjects Lumira 2.0, SAP reviewed SAP Lumira 2.0
Figure 6: Source: SAP/ASUG
Hopefully most have seen Figure 6, with 2 Lumira 2.0 Clients and 1 backend add-on to the BI platform. Discovery is for self-service users without IT knowledge. Discovery client can do data merging and blending.
Designer for professional IT designers who use scripting, CSS to write corporate dashboards. You can create a planning application - BPC embedded with Designer as the front-end. Designer can use reusable objects so others can reuse. It is like expert mode with more capabilities.
Discovery is for business user for easier ad-hoc analysis and visualizations. Two clients with different user types and scenarios.
These two clients are based on the same technology. The underlying technology is the same. File format is the same, to have a "seamless" interop scenario between clients. Business user can start in Discovery and then Designer can open the ad-hoc visualization to add scripting/CSS and interaction logic and make them into enterprise-wide dashboard.
Figure 7: Source: SAP/ASUG
Figure 7 shows a unified data connection/access with online mode and offline (acquired) mode.
Combined server add-on is the Design Studio runtime and the velocity engine. Use the Design Studio runtime (using BICS access to BW) - all BW OLAP functionalities will be supported as using BICS interface. Velocity engine is on the BI platform; data can be acquired there and can be used for the Designer.
You can use the Discovery client for data preparation.
Figure 8: Source: SAP/ASUG
Plan to ship for GA end of June timeframe; ramp-up is planned for mid-April (early adopt care program)
Figure 9: Source: SAP/ASUG
Lumira 2.0 has a compatibility mode; all 1.6 application would run
You can start new projects with new format
If you want to extend existing 1.6 application with 2.0 - you need to do an application conversion; convert to .m library, export the application from compatibility mode and import to .lumx mode
In 1.6 you can already convert to m library application. You decide when you want to convert
Figure 10: Source: SAP/ASUG
If you use 1.31 and you upgrade to 2.0 - all documents should be converted to 2.0 format without any effort by you.
In case 2, failed conversion, there are additional steps.
Figure 11: Source: SAP/ASUG
Infographics, images, data merging, format different text elements, chart configuration
Figure 12: Source: SAP/ASUG
Viz and compose room are together; only 1 room to create visualizations and use that for your dashboard
Context menu is easy to use.
The 2 clients share the same visualizations, geo maps, etc.
The user experience has been revamped, BW online connection, interop scenario with Designer.
Figure 13: Source: SAP/ASUG
Figure 13 shows examples - applications, designs
Figure 14: Source: SAP/ASUG
Composites are reusable objects to reduce TCO for development; composites are built in Designer environment; programming skill is lower than SDK
Adaptive Layout Container helps you achieve responsive layout
Bookmark concept is robust if you change the application
PDF export enhancements, charting enhancement (like Discovery)
ESRI as a basemap
Figure 15: Source: SAP/ASUG
Planned innovations are what is in SAP Lumira 2.0
Future includes broadcasting, mobile offline, commentary
Figure 16: Source: SAP/ASUG
Figure 16 discusses the charter for the council
Council is Open to ASUG Member companies
- Apply for membership via the survey at https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/Lumira2
- ASUG HQ and Council leadership will review applications
Question and Answer
Thanks to Jie and Ramu for answering 40+ questions.
Q: Can we attack the BeX query without hana ?
A: Both Discovery and Designer, would continue to support BEx Queries on BW.
Q: will the extensions built for designer work in discovery and vice-versa ?
A: Yes, in Lumira 2.0 we plan to have common extension framework. You can use Design Studio extensions in Discovery and vice-versa
Q: Does the merging of add-ons and the addition of the velocity engine help improve BO Universe Integration with Lumira Designer?
A: Yes, Designer can make use of prepared data in Discovery (imported from UNX) and build offline applications. this would address the 20k row limitation issue with
Design Studio UNX connectivity
Q: Will the row limitation for Universe Data Sources be lifted? Will it now start supporting Hierarchies and Attributes on a Universe Data Source?
A: Yes, row level limitations in Designer are removed. only when building application using acquired data (from Discovery). would support all enrichment done in
disocvery
Q: the "In memory Data Engine", it's a new stack ? different thant the BO platform ? Server ? thank
A: Its a velocity engine which we bundle with Lumira Desktop and Lumira Server for BI Platform. we just reuse the same technology in Lumira 2.0 and extend it to
Designer
Q: Is the discovery client a thick client or a thin clint
A: Both Discovery and Designer are going to be thick clients
Q: Is it possible to create Big Data Platforms connection such as Hadoop via Lumira 2.x?
A: Yes, you can connect and import data from Hadoop.
Q: Can we connect to excel and csv files from Designer with the same ease as in Lumira today?
A: You can connect to excel and csv from Discovery, prepare the data and then use this prepared data set in Designer to build applications
Q: Will we be able to publish the dashboard from Lumira 2.0 to a Shrepoint portal like how it is done with XCelsius (Dashboards)
A: You can make use of Open Document links to Embed in Sharepoint portal
Q: Will there be any manual effort involved in converting 1.x format application to 2.x format? If so, what kind of manual effort can we expect?
A: Depends on Design Studio or Lumira. For Design Studio, you need to open DS 1.6 application in new Designer. its automatic as long as DS 1.6 application is created
using .m libraries otherwise you need to migrate from common to .m library before conversion
Q: If my technicals experts go (tomorrow) to the Design Studio training (in SAP), can they developp easly to the discovery mode ? Or we need a new training ?
A: Discovery experience is straight forward and easy to learn. however with the flexibility Designer provides to build application a training would be required.
Q: awesome.. what about the existing extenions built for DS 1.6 or Lumira 1.31.. will that also be inter-operable ?
A: Yes, even existing applications are planned to work across.
Q: Will applications built on 1.6 SAPUI5 (not 'm') mode still be usable with 2.0 on compatibility mode?
A: Yes, you can continue to use in compatibility mode.
Q: Follow-up question on the excel file use in Designer. If the data in the underlying excel file is changed, what are the steps to view the refreshed data in Designer
A: You can make use of scripting and data source reload capabilities to trigger the refresh as long as excel file is in shared and accessible location
Q: Is there any column size limit when we upload data sets from the source system into SAP Lumira 2.X ?
A: Lumira 2.x delivers bundled in memory engine, there is no limit as long as underlying memory requirement are met
Q: Currently, UI5m does not offer Fragment Gallery for Online Composition. Will this be offered in 2.0?
A: this continues to be the same in 2.0 you can consider discovery for this use case with online support for HANA and BW in 2.0
Q: after the conversion of DS application to Lumira 2.0 , will all my bookmarks that have been created in 1.6 work seamlessly
A: We are re designing bookmarks to support additional enhancements to manage bookmarks better. unfortunately your bookmarks wont work after conversion. however, they
continue to work in compatability mode
Q: question, wil it still support d3 components
A: assuming for extensions, yes.
Q: we have ver 300 DS applications and over 40K bookmarks if they break then the sweepback can be very cumbersome
A: you can continue to use existing applications with support for bookmarks in compatibility mode in 2.0
Q: Will Lumira discovery stories now support auto fit full screen mode as opposed to Page sized based only
A: Lumira Stories rendering is planned to be responsive depending on the target device. however, rendering on full screen depend on the aspect ratio. We plan to
deliver aspect ratio specific to Launchpad to develop stories which can be rendered with all available space on launchpad. And you can use custom aspect ratio to be
able to render on full screen on any device.
Q: Has it Turkish language support for all charts and other features on Lumira 2.x? Lumira 1.x versions has no Turkish language supoort for Input Control box feature.
A: Yes, its planned to be supported
Q: Can we alter the default bookmark location?
A: in Discovery bookmarks are stored along with document.
Q: Does the "Next Gen" Conditional Formatting rule support dynamic values (values selected from a data cell instead of typing in a value as you would do on a Chart
Component today)?
A: No, it is not planned to be dynamic on cell for Lumira 2.0
Q: Is Online Composition going to be possible on Lumira 2.0?
A: Online composition scenario will be covered with Discovery client. so in Designer Client we are not going to support it anymore
Q: Will mobile support for Lumira 2.0 be same/different than Lumira 1.x. Please elaborate if time permits.
A: Mobile BI support is planned to be at parity with Lumira 1.x with Mobile BI 6.6 release planned along with Lumira 2.0 GA
Q: one item that will help us is an css visual editor with in the studio
A: we have a css editor in Designer. There you can open CSS and also edit it and directly upload to BI Platform.
Q: Are we also looking to bring in some of the Explorer features as well ?
A: Yes, we plan to bring in Keyword search and faceted visualisation post 2.0
Q; Can Analysts working for Partners be a part of the council?
A: yes, a few will be accepted
Q: The personalization feature of Explorer is one of the more important one.
A: You can make use of enhanced bookmarks in Discovery 2.0
Q: We are a multi-tenant setup and create design studio dashboards. With the current bookmarking, bookmarks can be saved to the main bookmark directory. In the
webcast, I was told that the bookmarks are saved along with the design studio documents. (I was asking if we could alter the default location for bookmarks in the
CMC application area for Design Studio that is currently not alterable). Since we create and publish these to the bi repository for our customers, they would not have
the access rights to modify/save the bookmarks, and different users could have their own bookmarks. We are in the process of the security requirements to allow
bookmarks and am looking for guidance. We are on the latest version of Design Studio and plan on migrating when 2.0 is released.
A: Bookmarks continued to be stored in the hidden application folder with no possibility to change the location.
In future releases we plan to deliver the capability to save the bookmark as hyperlink object anywhere in BI Platform (of course based on security)
In 2.0 we are planning to also provide the possibility to store bookmark with application together in Repository folder, but unfortunately we must skip this item
because of other high priority features.
So in Lumira 2.0 , Bookmarks are still stored in CMC Bookmark folder as in Design Studio 1.6.
With Lumira 2.0 user can define personal (only user itself can see this bookmark) or global bookmarks (everyone who has the authorization for the folder can see this
bookmarks) and they can be assigned to bookmark folders.
The authorization /Administration of Bookmarks in 2.0 stays the same like Design Studio 1.6.
- SAP Managed Tags:
