SAP Analysis for Office for SAP Analytics Cloud – Observations

Introduction

This blog post shares the initial observations on accessing SAP Analytics Cloud content via SAP Analysis for Office.

Landscape

SAP Analysis for Office: 2.8.100.92864

SAP Analytics Cloud: Version: 2020.21.14 / EPM library version: 1.00.202021.03.1604608439

Microsoft Office 365ProPlus

Observations

• Both Regular and Live Data connections are available for creation
  

• Only SAC models are available as DataSource not the Stories

• Model level variables, if any, show up upon selecting the model. Variables can also be called and updated by clicking on “Prompts” button in the ribbon. Variants cannot be saved.

• Version and Account are displayed by default in the output. Both the dimensions can neither be removed from output nor can be moved to Filter

• As shown in the output above, only Measures’ description cannot be changed

• Only booked data can be analyzed. There is no provision for planning on unbooked data.

• Members, properties(attributes) and associated hierarchies show up and are available for selection and output display

• Version dimension cannot be removed from the output but can be set to “No display”

• When data is changed, unlike regular input forms, only “Recalculate” icon is activated and not the “Save Data” icon. The reason being that SAC-P expects input at any level and will need to check once for disaggregation and hence need to be recalculated first. However, if you change data and recalculate but do not save it and change the numbers again and hit “Save Data” instead of “Recalculate”, the system will recalculate as part of save. Hence, the last value will show up after save.

• When clicked on “Save Data”, it triggers the save but no success/failure message is being displayed. However, data did save.

• Data input is supported at node level. Value can be entered in the “Result” column or a node in the hierarchy. “Save Data” in SAP AO is equivalent of “Publish Data” in SAC-P. When a value is entered and recalculated, the recalculated numbers reflect in SAC-P as well

• The above behavior is the reason that in SAP AO, there is no option to revert input back to saved state but to the previous consistent client state.

• The story in SAC-P and the SAP AO workbook both were open at the same time for same data scope and no data locking happened.

• In terms on key-figures, you cannot add Calculation, Advanced Calculation or Dynamic Calculation. However, you can add Restriction.

• Comments are not supported. The comments entered in SAC-P story do not show up in SAP AO and comments entered in SAP AO are read only and restricted locally to the document.

• There is no provision to call a Data Action configured in SAC-P. Since it is an equivalent of Planning Function/Planning Sequence, it seemed possible but then the options were greyed out and it did not allow to add any.

• The other features seemed to work fine in the present case. This included:
  • Refresh/Reset and Pause Refresh
  • Filter
  • Style
  • Chart
  • Add New Lines (Read only) – New members cannot be added via SAP Analysis for Office. Do so in SAC-P
  • Smart Copy/Paste
  • Prompts, Filter, Sort, Hierarchy and Calculations (Only Restriction)
  • Undo/Redo
  • Design rules
  • VBA works fine (Only basic APIs were tested)

• There is no Lifecycle Management for SAP AO workbooks. It remains a local document only and cannot be transported.

Final thoughts

• This is a good offering and could address the planners’ need for Excel front end to enable them to perform data input by leveraging their local spreadsheets
• Following features could be a nice addition:
  • Provide an option to launch a story in SAP AO directly from SAC-P
  • End to end comments integration
  • Change of cell color upon data change in SAP AO same as in SAC-P
  • Ability to call Data Actions from SAP AO