0. Correctly Sizing Your Landscape for Scalable, High-Performing Dashboards
Dr. Bjarne Berg
Comerit

1. Day 1  14 1 13
Seminar Roadmap
Deployment, Testing & Change Management
Best-in-Class Dashboards 2 12
Dashboards vs. reports
Answers to dashboard FAQs
SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards 4.0 overview
Product updates and implementation criteria
Recent changes to dashboard terms
Key dashboard roll-out decisions
Mobilizing your dashboard
Support organization
Volume, stress, and UAT
Training and change management
Day 3  11 3
Performance & Security
Options & Prototyping
Common causes of poor dashboard performance
Effective performance testing
Performance-enhancing design techniques
Preventing unauthorized access to dashboards
Password protection and SSO
Scoping vs. requirements gathering
KPI definitions
Required skills and resources
Data connectivity deep dive
Key criteria to retrieve data sets 10 4
Customization, Branding & Governance
Landscape, Connectivity & Sizing
Hands-on lab: Advanced techniques
Web service integration and Adobe Flex Builder
Panel discussion: Dashboard Projects
Ownership and branding
Post-production changes
Hands-on lab: Build a dashboard with BOBJ Dashboards 4.0
Sizing and scaling recommendations
User management and access control
SAP NetWeaver® BW Accelerator and SAP HANA 5 9 8
 Day 2 7 6
© SAP AG 2009 / 1
We are here

2. In This Session …
We’ll start by doing a step-by-step sizing effort of a dashboard project and look at five real-world sizing examples
Then we will conduct a structured walkthrough of compatible and required software components
We’ll end by taking a quick peek at dashboard performance options with in-memory processing from SAP NetWeaver BW Accelerator and SAP HANA

3. What We’ll Cover …
Sizing environment for SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 and SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards
Core components of SAP BusinessObjects Dashboard and SAP BusinessObjects BI
Compatibility requirements
In-memory performance options
Wrap-up

4. The Sizing Tool — Getting Started
SAP has provided a sizing tool for the SAP BusinessObjects BI environments. It is based on Flash and is actually a dashboard itself. Download it:
Output Area (Sizing Results)
Input Areas (items and users)
This tool can help you size your SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 environments with a few key assumptions and inputs

5. The Sizing Tool — Entering Users
First, you have to enter the estimated Active Concurrent Users (ACU) for the following user types:
Information Consumers
Business Users
Expert Users

6. The Sizing Tool — Online Help User Definitions
The tool provides online definitions of the user types and guidelines on how to determine Active Concurrent Users (ACU). This is defined as approximately 10% of the active users.
Many dashboard users in large organizations may be classified as Information Consumers. They may not wait five minutes between clicks, but typically do little drill down and filtering.

7. The Sizing Tool — Assumptions
The next step is to make an assumption on size of the dashboards
The sizing tool classifies small dashboards as having 25 rows in the result set; medium having 250; and large dashboards having 2,500 rows
Assumptions: The tool was based on supporting two queries per dashboard and benchmarked for accessing two relational data sources — One with 6 dimensions with 77,000 entries and 400,000 line items, and one with 6 dimensions with 7,000 rows and 40,000 line items

8. The Sizing Tool — Output
The output of the tool is measured in SAP Application Performance Standard (SAPS). 100 SAPS is defined as 2,000 fully business-processed order line items per hour. It is a measure that hardware vendors can use to decide which of their configurations can meet your performance requirements. All hardware vendors are familiar with this measure and this is what you will provide them when requesting a hardware quote.

9. The Sizing Tool — Memory Requirements
The sizing tool also provides a sizing estimate for the hardware memory required for each of the tiers. This is measured in Gigabytes.

10. The Sizing Tool — Terminology
If you get stuck on the terminology used in SAP sizing and performance benchmarking, there is a link to the SAP benchmark glossary in the tool
There are also performance benchmark and installation guides available on the SAP Service Marketplace for individual software components

11. The Sizing Tool — Saving Your Sizing Example
Your BI and dashboard sizing effort can be saved or printed from the tool and you can have many scenarios

12. The Sizing Tool — Demo

13. The Sizing Tool — Companion Guide
With the BI sizing tool, there is also a sizing companion guide written by Jason DeMelo
This document explains how each tool was benchmarked and the assumptions made when building the sizing tool
You can download it from:
E/SBO_BI_4_0_Companion_V4.pdf
Requires login credentials for the SAP Service Marketplace
Involve your basis team in the sizing effort and also make sure that the assumptions you made are realistic from a functional standpoint (i.e., how complex and intensive are your dashboards)

14. PC Hardware Requirements for Client Side: SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0
From a PC client perspective you need:
Memory
Minimum of 2.0GB memory (really want more in practice)
I recommend 4.0GB (or more if you can afford it)
Processor
Minimum of 2.0 GHz core (more cores the better)
Disk Space
Min of 3.5GB free space if you only install English
Min of 7.5GB free space if you install all languages
Screen Size
Recommended resolution size is
Make sure you build dashboards on a standardized screen resolution and size so that everyone sees the same images

15. Real-World Examples
These are real examples from companies that have been using SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 for at least six months

16. What We’ll Cover …
Sizing environment for SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 and SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards
Core components of SAP BusinessObjects Dashboard and SAP BusinessObjects BI
Compatibility requirements
In-memory performance options
Wrap-up

17. The Different Tiers in SAP BusinessObjects BI
First we have the application tier. This includes the Web Application Services such as the Central Management Console (CMC) and the BI Launch Pad.
SAP recommends adding a Web application server for each 500 ACUs and that at least 5GB heap memory is assigned and 900 threads are configured
The next is the intelligence or management tier. This includes the dashboard cache service, File Repository Service (FRS), and the CMS.
Only the first File Repository input and output service pair (FRS) to register in the CMS is the active pair. If you add more FRSs, these are assumed to be passive backups for fault tolerance and failures.
Lastly, we have the processing tier. This includes the Adaptive Job Service and the Processing Services for the various BI tools.
Each BI tool has different memory and processor requirements

18. The SAP BusinessObjects BI Scalability
SAP BusinessObjects BI is highly scalable If you have a high number of users, you can split the application, processing, and intelligence layers on separate hardware servers You can also horizontally partition the processing and intelligence layers on several servers
Tier Components for Intelligence
Tier Components for Processing
If you split the Web application components on multiple servers, make sure you also deploy a hardware load balancer

19. Dashboard Performance — Some Recommendations
You can scale the number of instances based on the Active Concurrent Users (ACUs), and SAP has made some recommendations:
The CMS can handle up to 500 ACUs per instance and you can currently scale this to eight instances (will be increased in next release). You can add more CMSs if you see over 80% utilization of the CPUs.
The dashboard cache can handle up to 400 ACUs per instance and you can add as many instances you want (no limitations), but you are unlikely to need more than one.
The dashboard processing is normally one per machine with no limitations (the server automatically spawns and manages child processes). If you need more, add more instances.

20. More Key Factors That Determine Dashboard Performance
Concurrent number of users during peak load times of system
Logical design of dashboards
Simple, complex, and incredibly complex
Number of records retrieved by the dashboards
Network capacity
Database speed of source data
Number of instances
This is used for spreading service loads on multiple nodes
Number of CPUs and available memory of each server

21. What We’ll Cover …
Sizing environment for SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 and SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards
Core components of SAP BusinessObjects Dashboard and SAP BusinessObjects BI
Compatibility requirements
In-memory performance options
Wrap-up

22. The Components of SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0
The complete components of the BI landscape consist of a variety of software Each of these components have their own requirements
We will now look at each of these components and their respective size and version requirements

23. Compatibility Operating Systems: SAP BusinessObjects BI 4
Compatibility Operating Systems: SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 Server Side
All server components only support 64-bit operating systems. The mobile server is currently only supported on Windows operating systems.
For others, the following versions are supported:

24. Compatibility: SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 and Database Servers
Microsoft SQL Server Express 2008 is included with SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0, but you may also use databases from SAP, Oracle, Sybase, IBM, and MySQL
The database is used for storing CMS and the audit repository
Using the SQL Server database that comes bundled with SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 may save you a lot of money

25. Compatibility: SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 and Application Servers
The application server handles the logic of SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.x and can run on a variety of hardware
The supported Java application servers include:
Sizing the application server is based on SAP Application Performance Standard (SAPS) instead of CPU and Memory
Note: WebSphere uses IBM Java SDK for all operating systems and v6 is not supported for Analysis, OLAP edition

26. Hardware: Server-Side Requirements
From a server sizing perspective, you need:
Minimum CPU
4 x 2.0 GHz Core CPU
Minimum Memory of Server
Min of 8.0GB memory – 16GB recommended (but more based on number of users)
Minimum Disk Space
If you only install English: 11GB Windows; 13GB AIX/Solaris; and 14GB for Linux
If you install all languages: 14GB Windows; 15GB AIX/Solaris; and 16GB for Linux

27. Compatibility: SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 and Web Portals
The Web Portal supported by SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 is extensive and covers all major portal servers and their latest versions
Note:
Microsoft’s SharePoint portal product only runs on the Windows operating system

28. Compatibility: SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 and Clients
Most Windows operating systems are supported by SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.x at the client side
All desktop components of SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.x are 32-bit
Mac OS X is currently not supported except for the SAP Crystal Reports Viewer

29. Compatibility: BI 4.0 and Web Browsers
There are various browser and Java requirements for SAP BusinessObjects BI depending on the type of operating system you are using
PS: On server side, IIS is supported as Integration option in MS SharePoint
V6 for Server 2003
V7 for Server 2008
V7.5 for Server 2008 R2
The Safari browser 5.1 is supported only by the Mac OS X operating system
Internet Explorer 8/9 standards mode is currently not supported by BI Launch Pad
For Firefox usage, you need the Extended Support Release (ESR)

30. Other Software Requirements
To run the system correctly, there are several components needed on the client side
While SAP BusinessObjects Explorer requires at least Flash player 10.1, there have been some issues with large Flash files in SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards
For example: Flash v10.1 seems to be stuck in “initializing” phase when files are over 2MB. This seems to be less of an issue for smaller files and we have seen no significant issues in version 11.

31. Compatibility — Connections to SAP NetWeaver BW
There are many ways to connect the BI tools to an underlying SAP NetWeaver BW system
The following SAP NetWeaver BW versions are supported with SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0:
Dashboards can also be built on SAP NetWeaver BW systems on SAP HANA through a relational universe if you have applied SAP HANA service pack 3 or 4

32. What We’ll Cover …
Sizing environment for SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 and SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards
Core components of SAP BusinessObjects Dashboard and SAP BusinessObjects BI
Compatibility requirements
In-memory performance options
Wrap-up

33. Why In-Memory Processing?
Technology
Focus
1990
2012
Improvement
0.05
MIPS/$
304.17
MIPS/$
6083x
CPU
0.02
MB/$
79.15
MB/$
3508x
Memory
216
264
248x
Addressable Memory
100
Mbps
100
Gbps
1000 x
Network Speed 5
MBPS
702
MBPS
140x
Disk
Data Transfer
Source: 1990 numbers SAP AG, 2012 numbers, Dr. Berg
Source: BI Survey of 534 BI professionals, InformationWeek,
Disk speed is growing slower than all other hardware components, while the need for speed is increasing

34. In-Memory Processing — SAP NetWeaver BW Accelerator (BWA)
SAP NetWeaver BW Accelerator is a tool that has been available for almost six years and is being used by hundreds of companies
It can load data in-memory from SAP and non-SAP sources and you can build dashboards on the data using standard BEx queries and BICS connections (as covered earlier)

35. An Example of an SAP HANA System We Installed Recently
The long-term idea with SAP HANA is to replace the databases under SAP NetWeaver BW and SAP ERP with in-memory processing databases, instead of traditional relational databases. This means much faster query response time and a smaller database.
SAP HANA is an appliance that can be implemented fast, is cost effective, and can super-charge the data delivery and calculations in your dashboards!

36. Looking Inside SAP HANA — In-Memory Computing Engine
Vs.
We can also move the whole database that has the source data for your dashboards to the in-memory platform of SAP HANA. This makes the system much faster! (SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards can consume data from SAP HANA right now)
BusinessObjects Data Services

37. What We’ll Cover …
Sizing environment for SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 and SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards
Core components of SAP BusinessObjects Dashboard and SAP BusinessObjects BI
Compatibility requirements
In-memory performance options
Wrap-up

38. High-Volume User Management and Access Control
Plan for a gradual rollout to a limited number of users
Keep the numbers comparable, if possible
This will allow you to predict system loads and performance issues by stipulations from real performance data
I.e., roll out to 50 users each week
Simplified versions of high-impact dashboards may be created for casual users
I.e., a dashboard with only one query and summarized data with limited navigation and passing of variables
Create a hardware contingency plan and budget accordingly
Only in rare cases should you use a big-bang approach. Since user patterns are hard to predict, this may cause significant performance issues.

39. Where to Find More Information
SAP Sizing tool
Evan Delodder and Ray Li, Creating Dashboards with Xcelsius: Practical Guide, (SAP PRESS, 1st Edition; 1st New Edition, 2010).
David Lai and Xavier Hacking, SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards 4.0 Cookbook, (Packt Publishing, 2011).
Dashboard and Presentation Designer (Xcelsius) forum on SDN
SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards 4.x tutorials on SDN

40. 7 Key Points to Take Home
Use the SAP Sizing tool for initial sizing estimates
Size your system based on concurrent users and SAPS
Use realistic data volumes, users, and dashboard complexity in your assumptions
Use the SAP system guides on the SAP Service Marketplace, but plan to operate your system at max. 70% load for “spare capacity”
Keep the SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 environment on a separate stack from SAP NetWeaver BW
Make sure the PCs have enough memory
Examine the “standard” PC of the users and developers; pay attention to connectivity, screen size and resolutions, CPUs, and all software release versions to assure compatibility

41. Your Turn!
How to contact me:
Dr. Bjarne Berg

42. Disclaimer
SAP, R/3, mySAP, mySAP.com, SAP NetWeaver®, Duet®, PartnerEdge, and other SAP products and services mentioned herein as well as their respective logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP AG in Germany and in several other countries all over the world. All other product and service names mentioned are the trademarks of their respective companies. Wellesley Information Services is neither owned nor controlled by SAP.