| Oracle® Business Activity Monitoring Active Studio User's Guide 10g (10.1.3.1.0) Part Number B28990-01 |
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View PDF |
| Oracle® Business Activity Monitoring Active Studio User's Guide 10g (10.1.3.1.0) Part Number B28990-01 |
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|
View PDF |
This chapter introduces the Oracle Business Activity Monitoring Active Studio application.
This chapter contains the following topics:
The Oracle Business Activity Monitoring Active Studio application is a robust web-based tool for creating and delivering reports. Once created, reports can be viewed in Active Viewer. From Active Studio, power users share reports with other users and create alert rules for report delivery. Reports are either real-time reports, with live data updating on screen, or point-in-time (snapshot) reports.
Creating reports includes actions such as data object and field selection, formatting, filtering, and summaries. Reports can be shared with other users and alert rules can be created for determining the scheduling and delivery of the reports. Report types include charts, lists, key performance indicators (KPIs), crosstabs, spreadsheets, and more.
This section helps you become familiar with Active Studio terms and user interface elements. It contains the following topics:
Always use the start page to start Web applications. Do not start Web applications from a direct URL to the application. This ensures that caching works correctly. Also, do not use localhost in the URL instead of the host name.
In Microsoft Internet Explorer, go to http://<host>:<http_port>/oraclebam, where host is the name of the server where Oracle Business Activity Monitoring is installed.
The Start Page opens.
Click Active Studio.
Active Studio launches in a new browser window.
Use the tabs at the top of the screen to navigate to different areas in Active Studio.
Home is your starting point to view most recently used reports and reports recently shared with you.
My Reports is where you save reports you create and own.
Shared Reports contains reports created by other Active Studio users that they have shared with you.
Alerts is for creating new alert rules and viewing alert history. You can also change alerts from being active to inactive to temporarily disable them.
The toolbars shown on each tab of the Active Studio interface change to indicate what actions you can take. Not all actions have toolbar buttons.
Reports display single or multiple views. Each view in a report can be a different type and contain different data. When creating reports, you can choose a tiled template containing a combination of views, a single view, or a continuous Columnar report. Continuous Columnar reports contain the single Columnar view and provide more formatting features for this type of report. See Chapter 2, "Using Reports" for more information.
Alerts are launched by alert rules that you can create and manage from the Alerts tab. See Chapter 6, "Using Alerts" for more information.
Create folders to organize, manage, and share your reports. Set permissions on folders in the Shared Reports tab to grant access to other users. See Chapter 9, "Organizing and Sharing Reports" for more information.
Actions are tasks you can do with reports and alerts. Examples of actions include creating, viewing, and editing reports and alerts. Actions in the Actions list change depending on if you are editing reports or working with alerts.
Clicking the arrow in the upper right corner of the Actions list collapses the list.
The View Tasks/Options presents tasks and options for views. Clicking the arrow in the upper right corner of the View Tasks/Options list collapses the list.
The Guide text provides tips as you use Active Studio. Clicking the arrow in the upper right corner of the Guide box collapses it.
The View Editor contains a set of tabs to select data and data modifiers and format the views in your reports. When you create reports, the View Editor provides a wizard format to lead you through the steps. When you edit views, you can click the tabs for the formatting or data functions you want to change.
Personalize your Home tab display, print settings, and alert delivery settings. See Chapter 10, "Personalizing Your Active Studio Settings" for more information.
You create reports in Active Studio for viewing, sharing with other users, and for delivery by alerts based on information or conditions changing. Reports contain one or more views of active or static data. Each view is formatted to show information from a data object in a view type such as a list, chart, or KPI.
You can share reports with other Active Studio users by creating folders containing reports in the Shared Reports page. Assign permissions to allow users to view, create, or delete reports in a particular folder. Create alert rules to automate report delivery to users. Alert rules can include conditions to launch the alert when data in a report changes, when its a certain time, or when other events occur. You can deliver reports through alerts to users by email.
The information displayed in a report is from data currently in the data object used in the report. Data objects are created in Architect and stored in the Active Data Cache. The data designer manages data objects using Architect. The Architect creates Enterprise Message Sources and manages Plans to load data into data objects.
Access to applications, permissions to create reports, alert rules, and data objects, and other user information is managed from the Administrator application.
This section describes Oracle Business Activity Monitoring features and components.
Oracle Business Activity Monitoring includes the following features:
Active Data Architecture. Oracle Business Activity Monitoring provides an active data architecture that dynamically moves real-time data to end users through every step of the process. This solution actively collects data, applies rules designed to monitor changes, and delivers the information in reports to users.
Real-time Reports. Real-time reports containing current data are delivered as soon as data changes occur. This is possible because of data in the Active Data Cache and the connections to real-time transactional feeds.
Active Presentations in Reports. Reports display active data presentations where data continuously updates, formats, and displays. When data changes, the display changes in real-time.
Instant Alerts. Alerts, based on rules and events occurring in real-time, are delivered through email.
Rules-Based Active Delivery. In an event-driven solution, the information finds the target users instead of requiring users to query for the information on their own initiative. The reports are initially designed for delivery to end users based on data changing or events triggering. For the end user, the result is zero-click reporting that is always relevant.
High Performance, Scalable Architecture. Oracle Business Activity Monitoring is scalable to handle large amounts of complex, real-time enterprise data. Enterprise Link uses data flow technology to select the correct raw data and then transform and perform calculations required by the data designer. The transformed data is delivered to the Active Data Cache in a ready-to-use state for fast access.
Oracle Business Activity Monitoring includes the following architectural components and applications:
Active Data Cache is designed and optimized to handle large amounts of data in a real-time solution. To make data readily accessible and deliverable, it maintains real-time views of the data. The data feed to the Active Data Cache is a combination of business data sources, from data warehouse information to transactional feeds and other enterprise sources. Enterprise Link sends this information to the Active Data Cache in a continuous stream as data changes occur.
Enterprise Link connects Oracle Business Activity Monitoring to real-time data with message queues and also to other information sources such as database servers, flat files, and XML sources.
Event Engine monitors complex data conditions and implements specified rules. Rules can include a series of conditions and actions attached to an event. The Event Engine continuously monitors the information in the Active Data Cache for certain conditions and executes the related actions defined in associated rules.
Report Engine applies the report definitions to the data sets retrieved from the Active Data Cache for presentation in a browser. It manages information paging for viewing and printing reports. After reports are created, they are stored in the Active Data Cache so that report creation is not repeated each time. Most reporting views are designed to support live, active displays of data changing in real-time.
Active Viewer is the thin user interface for viewing reports. Active Messenger is client-side notification software. When new information is available, the user receives an email that contains a link to the information. The user clicks the link and the report is displayed in Active Viewer. Report formats include charts, lists, KPIs, crosstabs, spreadsheets, and more.
Active Studio is the thin user interface for the power user. Through Active Studio, the power user can create and edit reports. Reports can be shared with other users and rules can be created for determining the scheduling and delivery of the reports. Report types include charts, lists, KPIs, crosstabs, spreadsheets, and more.
Architect is the thin user interface for the data designer. Through Architect, the data designer creates and manages data objects in the Active Data Cache and manages real-time message processing.
Administrator is the thin user interface for the system administrator who is responsible for user management and overall server management. Using Administrator, the system administrator manages users and security levels, monitors loading to the Active Data Cache, and configures Oracle Business Activity Monitoring services.
The following settings are recommended for your Internet Explorer browser.
Popup blockers should be disabled when using Active Studio.
As a default behavior of Internet Explorer, if the browser is displaying a web page, and you click a link in an email or an alert, the new page displays in the most recently used browser window. You can change this behavior so that a new browser window opens each time a link outside of the current browser is clicked.
It is recommended to change this setting if you often have browsers open that you want to maintain when you click links in emails or alerts.
To change the setting to open a new browser for links in alerts or emails:
In Internet Explorer, select Tools > Internet Options.
Click the Advanced tab.
In the Browsing settings, make sure that the Reuse windows for launching shortcuts checkbox is deselected.
Click OK.
Better quality printing results if the Print background colors and images option is selected, which is not a default setting. This setting provides increased quality printing, especially for Crosstab views.
To change the setting for printing backgrounds:
In Internet Explorer, select Tools > Internet Options.
Click the Advanced tab.
In the Printing settings, select the Print background colors and images checkbox.
Click OK.
To make sure that new files are always viewed, set the Internet Explorer option to automatically check for updated files.
To change the cached files setting:
In Internet Explorer, select Tools > Internet Options.
On the General tab, click Settings.
Select Automatically.
Click OK.
