Considerations for Enabling Key Flexfield Segments for Business Intelligence
A key flexfield registered in the database as enabled for Oracle Transactional Business Intelligence (OTBI) includes a BI Enabled setting for each of its segment instances. When a segment instance is BI-enabled, it's available for use in Oracle Transactional Business Intelligence.
The following aspects are important in understanding BI-enabled key flexfield segments.
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Flattening business components to use BI-enabled segments in Oracle BI
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Equalizing segments to prevent duplication and complexity in the flattened component
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Mapping attributes of flattened business components to logical objects in Oracle BI
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Managing the labels that map segments to logical objects in Oracle BI
After you deploy a business intelligence-enabled flexfield, use the Import Oracle Data Extensions for Transactional Business Intelligence process to import the flexfield changes into the Oracle Business Intelligence repository. Users can make use of the newly-generated attributes in business intelligence applications. For information about logical objects and import, see the Creating and Administering Analytics and Reports guide for your products.
Flattening
When you deploy a business intelligence-enabled key flexfield, the deployment process generates an additional set of flattened business components for use in business intelligence. The flattened business components include attributes for business intelligence-enabled segment instances only.
If you assigned a label to a segment, the flattened components include a single attribute representing all segment instances with that label. If you didn't assign a label, the flattened components include a discrete attribute for each BI-enabled segment instance in each structure.
Mapping to Logical Objects in Business Intelligence
You can simplify reporting by representing similar segments as a single logical object in Business Intelligence. If you assign a label to segments that serve the same purpose in different structures, you can consolidate the segments into a single attribute. This prevents duplication and the extra workload and complexity that result from the flattening process. For example, an organization may have more than one definition of its key accounting flexfield to support different requirements for accounting reporting. A US Accounting Flexfield structure may have a segment called Subaccount to track project expenditures. The same type of information may be tracked in a UK accounting flexfield structure with a segment called Project. Equalize these two segments to create a single list of values for reporting.
Non-labeled segments aren't equalized across context values, so the flattened components include a separate attribute for each segment for each structure. It may not be possible to equalize similarly labeled segments if they have incompatible data types or value set types.
Assign a label to a segment to map the corresponding attribute in the flattened components to a logical object in Oracle Business Intelligence. Using labels to map segments to BI logical objects minimizes the steps for importing the flexfield into Oracle Business Intelligence. Assigning a label to a segment serves to equalize the attribute across structures, as well as map the equalized attribute to business intelligence.
Managing Labels
You may assign a predefined label (if available) to segments or create labels for assignment, as needed. Specify a code, name, and description to identify each label. In the BI Object Name field, enter the name of the logical object in Oracle Business Intelligence to which the segment label should map during import. Specifying the BI logical object minimizes the steps for importing the flexfield into Oracle Business Intelligence and helps to equalize context-sensitive segments across structures.
If no labels are assigned to a BI-enabled segment, or the BI Object Name on the assigned label doesn't exist in business intelligence, you must manually map the segment to the required logical object when importing into Oracle Business Intelligence. In addition, segments without labels can't be equalized across structures. The flattened components include a separate attribute for each non-labeled segment in each structure.
Importing to Oracle Business Intelligence Repository
After you deploy a business intelligence-enabled flexfield, import the flexfield changes into the Oracle Business Intelligence repository to make use of the newly flattened business components in business intelligence. Then propagate the flexfield object changes. When you import the metadata into the Oracle Business Intelligence repository, you must do so as the FUSION_APPS_BI_APPID user.
To import flexfield changes into the Oracle Transactional Business Intelligence repository in Oracle Cloud implementations, run the Import Oracle Data Extensions for Transactional Business Intelligence process. For information about logical objects and import, see the Creating and Administering Analytics and Reports guide for your products.
<name>_ and <name>_c attributes for each
segment, along with some other optional attributes. The <name>_ attribute contains the value. The <name>_c attribute contains the code of
the value set that the value comes from, and is used for linking to
the value dimension. You must import both attributes.