Cafe versus Perspectives and ISB

[chewza]

Hi guys

I would like to know what the current thinking is on this.

We have a client who has a large users base on perspectives, and they do not have any cognos bi tools. Someone has heard about cafe and latched onto it. Quite frankly, From what I have seen, there is no real value add that cafe brings to the party versus perspectives (especially with isb).

I know that integration with BI is a positive, but this is not relevant as client uses QV for BI. Performance is also mentioned as a positive, but in this environment users have terminal services sessions running directly on the tm1 server.

So my view is that adding cafe into the mix in this context and for users who are already familiar with Perspectives will add no values and only cause confusion.

Your thoughts would be appreciated!

Many thanks
Chris

[Alan Kirk]

I would like to know what the current thinking is on this.

We have a client who has a large users base on perspectives, and they do not have any cognos bi tools. Someone has heard about cafe and latched onto it. Quite frankly, From what I have seen, there is no real value add that cafe brings to the party versus perspectives (especially with isb).

I wouldn't rely on ISB too much, because IBM has put that back on death row. Again. Unless IBM has changed its mind about that since the most recent time they declared it to be depreciated. Again.

If the ISB was a federal prisoner the Supreme Court would have rapped IBM over the knuckles for cruel and unusual punishment by now.

IBM Depreciated Software Warden: "OK ISB, tomorrow morning at sunrise, you're gonna fry."

Sunrise comes...

IBM: "Ah, just kidding, we're including you in 10.1. But hey, you should have seen your face last night, bwaaa-ha-ha!, it was hilarious, man!"

Pause

IBM: "But seriously, we're executing you at noon."

Noon comes...

IBM: "Bwaaa-ha-ha! I can't believe we gotcha again! No, you'll still be in 10.2."

ISB slumps into the corner crying...

IBM: "But then we're gonna kill ya in the next release."

ISB wails pitifully...

IBM: "Hey man, what's your problem? I mean, we killed the .Net API and didn't even tell anyone about that until someone kept asking where the body was!"

So my view is that adding cafe into the mix in this context and for users who are already familiar with Perspectives will add no values and only cause confusion.

I don't think you're far off the mark. I don't have anything against Cafe as such, but I agree that users who know Perspectives probably don't need yet another interface to learn. In regard to this Mike Cowie wrote a very good article looking at this exact issue, both the pluses and minuses of Cafe and Perspectives, when 10.2.2 first came out. It's well worth reading, and you can find it here.

One important point to note is that IBM is clearly developing Cafe, but have indicated that they have no plans to do anything with regard to developing Perspectives. Not even something as trivial as changing the damn chore icons back to something legible. (Though they're ostensibly "delivering" that change by "considering that issue for future interfaces", or some such thing. That's not a direct quote, it's paraphrasing. I can't get the direct quote because the gorram RFE site has been broken for WEEKS now. "Navigate to the Business Analytics RFE Community to interact with Business Analytics product development teams and other product users." {Click}. Error 500: java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: org/apache/commons/codec/binary/Hex . Literally weeks, this has been coming up. Yeah, let's put our faith for the future into IBM's Java web coding.) That being the case it may be that Excel users will have to migrate to Cafe eventually. It's just that eventually isn't yet.

The other joker in the pack is the upcoming TM1 Prism interface. (Seriously, IBM needs to rethink that name. I made a tongue in cheek reference to the name being the same as that of a certain NSA snooping program, but do a Google search for "IBM Prism" and see how many hits come up about whether IBM is or isn't cooperating with the NSA in harvesting customer data, and how few come up about a kewl new web interface. That may change over time, but right now it only serves to put thoughts in potential customers' heads that IBM would probably prefer that they not have. IMHO someone in the marketing department didn't think that one all the way through.) Anyway, the point is to what extent the development of that will affect the future of TM1 interfaces in general. I don't think it's any secret that IBM would dearly love to screw over Excel if it can, but that it certainly won't be able to do that in the near future.

[gtonkin]

@Alan - Regarding the RFE site (and other IBM sites) when you start getting 500 errors etc. it seems that deleting IBM related cookies sorts this out.

[Alan Kirk]

@Alan - Regarding the RFE site (and other IBM sites) when you start getting 500 errors etc. it seems that deleting IBM related cookies sorts this out.

Huh. Useful information, thank you.

But how bad does one have to be at designing web sites that one's own cookies (on multiple machines in my case) can break the usage of them?

Don't answer that, I already know the answer. Thanks again.

I was going to use the opportunity to vote for your RFE73332-Filter TM1 objects in Perspective, PM and TM1 Web request, which I had tried to do (unsuccessfully, obviously) last week.

And so I went to the post, clicked on your link, and even after the cookies were deleted...

The content you are trying to access is not available. Please try again later.

500 Internal Server Error

{Face over hands, "Oh you sonofab****}

OK, screw it, I'll just go through the full list of enhancement requests that I managed to bring up after deleting my cookies. OK, that's the list of the top ones, but what I need is... {clicks on the link to show all of them}.

Boom, I'm logged out and have to log in again. To cut a long (long, long) story short, I finally found it. If my experience is any indication, I know why you have only 2 votes for it.

Y'know the funny part? Over the last few weeks the mainstream electronic media down here has been pumping up the "driverless car" BS again. The one that performs really well on race tracks where there is nothing to hit and no other traffic. Why? No idea, maybe Google issued another press release and it's easier than seeking out real news.

Still, I look at multinational software companies like IBM who can't even get a freaking web site to work properly, and think, "Yeah, I really want to be in 2 tonnes of metal hurtling down the freeway at 110 km/h and hoping to the gods that some distracted coder hasn't screwed up the placement of cookies into the damn navigation system. Because life really just isn't short enough."

[gtonkin]

Thanks for your determination in getting your vote in - would appreciate it if other readers could give it a vote!

[moby91]

Y'know the funny part? Over the last few weeks the mainstream electronic media down here has been pumping up the "driverless car" BS again. The one that performs really well on race tracks where there is nothing to hit and no other traffic.

Real car makers like BMW pulled that stunt years ago:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsnKzK6dX8Q
Top Gear
New Self-Driving BMW 330i

Why? No idea, maybe Google issued another press release and it's easier than seeking out real news.

Why german premium car makers like BMW and Mercedes are heavily investing into self driving cars ?

Pretty much everywhere else except China and the USA the average age of their buyers is above 50, the older buyers tend to spend more than EUR 80K on a new car, and the EU is considering to introduce mandatory periodical health checks for older car drivers like Italy or Switzerland already did. The baby boomers are retiring now. And they have money.

Still, I look at multinational software companies like IBM who can't even get a freaking web site to work properly, and think, "Yeah, I really want to be in 2 tonnes of metal hurtling down the freeway at 110 km/h and hoping to the gods that some distracted coder hasn't screwed up the placement of cookies into the damn navigation system. Because life really just isn't short enough."

Only 2 tonnes of metal hurtling down the freeway at 110 km/h !?

Always the optimist, Mr Kirk, always the optimist ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdSRUG4KTPA
CarJam TV
Watch Daimler's Self Driving Truck Freightliner Inspiration in Nevada become the world´s first licensed autonomous heavy-duty truck allowed to use public roads

Now imagine this combined with an australian road train of 200 tons.

[moby91]

Anyway, the point is to what extent the development of that will affect the future of TM1 interfaces in general. I don't think it's any secret that IBM would dearly love to screw over Excel if it can, but that it certainly won't be able to do that in the near future.

IBM seems to understand the importance of the Excel Client for TM1, judging by their latest marketing flyers published two weeks ago:


http://www-01.ibm.com/common/ssi/cgi-bi ... 78CAEN.PDF
Budgeting: Beyond spreadsheets - Address the shortcomings of spreadsheets — while retaining the Microsoft Excel interface

Through this whitepaper, learn how finance gurus across the world, are automating critical processes of Corporate Planning, budgeting & forecasting by supplementing their spread-sheet based processes with IBM performance Management.


http://www-01.ibm.com/common/ssi/cgi-bi ... 21USEN.PDF
Spreadsheets for planning? A popular tool needs help - mitigating the hazards while maximizing the value of your Microsoft Excel spreadsheets

Read this new whitepaper that describes errors common to MS Excel spreadsheets and how IBM solutions can help.


Nevertheless as TM1 customers you should remind the IBM people on the importance of the Excel Client everytime you meet them.

[tm1ist]

According to what IBM guys said, eventually (i am not sure how soon or far) there will be only one interface for browsers (Prism) and only one interface for Excel (new CAFE). This new CAFE will incorporate Perspectives functionalities as well, so it should be somehow different from what is CAFE right now. So, at some point you will need to consider switching to CAFE (but maybe the new CAFE will be compatible only with new version of TM1 and that will be a different story). Just keep in mind that IBM is investing in CAFE, not in Perspectives.

Moving to CAFE from Perspectives, or starting to use both is a decision to be given according to the needs of the business case. CAFE has some advantages over Perspectives such as better performance in WAN, data entry(paste values to multiple cells, typing formulas in the cells and results are transfered to TM1 etc.) and so on. Before making a decision, you need to identify what will CAFE bring you in value and what will be the cost of switching considering your specific business needs and environment. You can make a little search on the internet or in this forum, and use CAFE on your own to get to know it.

If you can tell us what are the things that your users want to accomplish but cannot accomplish in Perspectives, what are the issues they face while using Perspectives, what would be good for your users if they can do it on Excel, number of users and their profile(Excel lover, too busy to learn sth, just needs perspectives once in a month) etc., then you might get a better answer. If the advantages of CAFE are not needed, why would one takes the cost of switching and disadvantages of CAFE.

[chewza]

Hi Guys


Thanks very much for all the feedback very helpful

Regards
Chris