Inventory Planning Optimization Cloud Service

Application Navigator Links

IPO cloud services support configuring a task panel entry and associated dashboard tile to allow users to launch into the individual modules from Retail Home. This will allow your users to have a single place to access all their Oracle cloud service links, as well as any other links configured. To do this, an entry must be configured in the Application Navigator section of Retail Home. IPO CS uses the following application codes for this purpose: IPO can be used to launch directly into Inventory Planning Optimization, and IO can be used to launch directly into the Inventory Optimization module.

Two Application Navigation links can be added during provisioning into Retail Home.

Inventory Planning - Clicking on this link opens the Inventory Planning application
Oracle Analytics - Clicking on this link opens the Oracle Analytics application. This link will only be shown if a user has the 'IP_DV_VIEWER' role.

Additional Application Navigator Links are not currently supported by Inventory Planning.

Please refer to Oracle Retail Home Administration Guide for more information on this screen.

Notifications

All IPO cloud service modules support displaying user notifications in Retail Home. This will allow your users to view their workflow and task notifications across all modules without having to navigate into each module individually, allowing them to better prioritize their work. Notifications are enabled for each module by first adding the Application Navigator entry for the associated application code, and then accessing that application from the Manage Notifications screen.

Notifications in Retail Home are not currently supported by Inventory Planning.

Favorites

Favorites are not currently supported by Inventory Planning.

Resource Bundle Customization

Resource Bundle Customization is not currently supported by Inventory Planning.

Customer Module Management

Customer Module Management is used for the Inventory Optimization module for controlling the enablement of certain batch configurations. For more on controlling batch modules in Retail Home, see the Process Orchestration and Management section of this document. The Retail Analytics & Planning Implementation Guide provides more detail on how to use Customer Modules as part of a RAP implementation. Customer modules are only used for batch configuration, access to the applications themselves is not managed from Retail Home.

Customer Module Management is not currently supported by Inventory Planning.

Dashboards and Tiles

The IPO-Demand Forecasting module provides support for Retail Home tile content. Tiles can display information to provide a picture of the performance of a user’s forecasts and metrics about the overall health of the business as a whole.

Demand Forecasting also supports the use of Retail Home’s resource bundle customization (RBC) to allow customization of many of the labels displayed within the application. Additionally, the solution supports attaching Data Visualizer (DV) reports to tiles to allow users to launch into reports relevant to the metrics displayed. Users may also display Assortment Planning data that is integrated into DV via custom BI template reports as detailed in the Retail Home Templates from RI section above.

The content of the tiles displayed in Retail Home for the Demand Forecasting application are determined by a set of configuration resources. These resources are created as a part of the configuration of the application and allow for the same level of flexibility and configurability as the overall application.

The data values displayed within the Demand Forecasting tiles in Retail Home are not pulled in real time from the live data stored within the Planning Data Store. The data is instead drawn from the same source as the data displayed in the in-app dashboard for the solution. This means that the values displayed in Retail Home will be synchronized with the values within the dashboard; allowing users to launch into the solution and gain more insight into the displayed metrics. It also means that the values displayed within Retail Home will not update automatically; they will only update when the in-app dashboard is refreshed.

Customers using the Demand Forecasting Template application will find a set of pre-configured tiles available for their use. These tiles states associated with a tile correspond to pre-defined business roles within the Template application and provide a set of metrics appropriate for that business role. The template application has also been pre-configured with the measures and rules necessary to provide the information used by the template tile states to Retail Home. Information on these pre-configured tiles and their contents can be found in the Retail Home section of chapter 1 Batch Task Administration of the Inventory Planning Optimization Cloud Service Administration Guide.

Dashboards and Tiles are not currently supported by Inventory Planning.

Seeding Retail Home Data

Only the Demand Forecasting module of IPO supports seed data. The Demand Forecasting module does not make use of the Refresh Seed data task in Application Navigator. Instead, an Administration task must be run within the application by a user with Demand Forecasting application administrator privileges. The Retail Home Seeding task provides Retail Home with information about the tiles as well as configuring metadata within the application to allow the solution to provide the correct application data to Retail Home. For information about the Retail Home Seeding task, please consult the Batch Administration chapter of the Oracle Retail Predictive Application Server Cloud Service Administration Guide.

Additionally, it is required for a user to have a built an application dashboard workspace within the Demand Forecasting user interface for that user to see information within the Demand Forecasting tile of Retail Home. The dashboard workbook is used to calculate and return the values requested by Retail Home. Therefore, when the domain is first built, the “Schedule Dashboard Build” task must run the application for all users. The Schedule Dashboard Build task must also be run for new users when those users are registered in the application. For information on the Schedule Dashboard Build task, please consult the System Administration chapter of the Oracle Retail Predictive Application Server Cloud Service Administration Guide.

Administration Tools

Resource Bundle Customization

IPO supports the use of the Retail Home Resource Bundle Customization framework for the customization and translation of some but not all labels and messages seen within the solution. The resources are listed under their associated module (for example, Inventory Optimization and Demand Forecasting). The administrative task is available in Retail Home to allow searching for and viewing supported strings, customizing strings, and restoring customizations to default values.

Specific to Demand Forecasting, other labels and messages seen within the product such as those based upon metadata of the application, or error messages reporting a problem performing an activity on the server such as a custom action, are managed through the in-application Translation Administration administrative task or batch uploads of translated content.

Strings supporting Resource Bundle Customization include:

Labels for controls such as menus, buttons (but not custom actions), etc.
Messages displayed in toast and snackbar notifications in response to user actions
Validation messages provided within the UI

For these strings, customization of individual strings and for large numbers of strings can be achieved using the Resource Text Strings and Import Management tasks in Retail Home.

Strings not managed through the RBC framework include:

Labels of dimension, measures, and positions
View and Dimension labels
Custom action button labels
Messages received from the server detailing failures in submitted actions

These strings are managed internally by the Demand Forecasting module, as detailed in the Internationalization chapter of the Oracle Retail Predictive Application Cloud Service Administration Guide.

Resource Bundle Customization is not currently supported by Inventory Planning.

Email Notifications for Batch Tasks

Retail Home supports the configuration of email notifications in response to activities like the success and failure of Online Administration Tools tasks. Information on the process of setting up such notifications can be found in the Online Administration Tools chapter of the Oracle Retail Predictive Application Cloud Service Administration Guide.

Subscription Metric Report

IPO Cloud Service provides reporting on subscription usage metrics through Retail Home. The Subscription Metric report provides information on annual sales units (last 12 months) under management of the system.

This report is visible by navigating to Settings -> Application Administration -> Application Dashboard. Additional details for using the subscription metrics report, such as inputting or editing the subscription start/end dates and the subscription quantity, can be found in the Retail Home Administration Guide.

IPO Cloud Service Subscription Metric Report