Log Management for PA

[mars_22]

Hello all,

I was wondering, how are you usually dealing with Log Management for Planning Analytics (2.0.6)?
We're currently using PAW (2.0.46) as an interface for users. When the user is running a process from there, he's getting only basic info about the process run - basically if it was successful or not. Some of our processes then generate quite extensive log files with information (e.g. list of rejected rows from database/file when it is process for data upload etc.) We're of course saving these log files on the server (RHEL 7.5). Then, when the user want's to see the log, he has to use FTP client and retrieve the log from the server, but our users are not happy with the FTP solution. I was wondering if there's a better way we didn't think of.
I know that there's this "Download log" functionality in PAW Administration now, but that only lets the user download general system logs, not the custom ones (also you have to be administrator in PAW which means you can freely restart instances etc., not a good idea).

Just wanted to know how are other companies usually handling this. Will be thankful for any idea or comment.

Thanks a lot in advance!

[tomok]

The only option that I know of is to roll your own solution. The three that come to mind are:

1. Copy the log files to a share on the network that people have access to.
2. Write a process to upload the log transactions to a SQL table
2. Write a Powershell script to email the file to the user.

All of these are possible since you can call external routines from a TI process. Good luck.

[Steve Rowe]

and option 4, load the log files back into TM1 again.

Unless the logs are huge there's no reason why you can't load (or even write them in the first place) to a TM1 cube fir easy viewing by the end user.

[mars_22]

Thank you both for the comments!
@Steve, we're using the option to write them back to the cube for the short logs already, but, as you mentioned, I was asking mainly because of the huge logs we're generating.

Then we will probably use the emailing option. It is actually something that was kind-of already suggested by the users, but I wanted to explore all possibilities first.

There's one related thing though - we're using CAM for authentication. Then, of course, in Cognos we can see the users email addresses as they are taken from LDAP. But in TM1 we do not have this information, we basically get only the user ids from Cognos. I wasn't able to think of an easy way how to get the email addresses from Cognos to TM1. Any ideas there? The rest (trigger the script to email the file to the user) is easy.

Thanks!

[tomok]

I wasn't able to think of an easy way how to get the email addresses from Cognos to TM1. Any ideas there? The rest (trigger the script to email the file to the user) is easy.

Just create an attribute on the }Clients dimension called "EmailAddress" and store them there. Of course you'll have to figure out a way to keep those values updated......

[lotsaram]

There's one related thing though - we're using CAM for authentication. Then, of course, in Cognos we can see the users email addresses as they are taken from LDAP. But in TM1 we do not have this information, we basically get only the user ids from Cognos. I wasn't able to think of an easy way how to get the email addresses from Cognos to TM1. Any ideas there? The rest (trigger the script to email the file to the user) is easy.

If AD is the source for CAM it is actually quite easy via PowerShell to query AD and retrieve AD attributes of the user name. Matching the user name to the CAM ID is also relatively easy (concatenate NamespaceID back- or forward-slash with windows user name = the display alias in TM1) in order to know which users to send the emailaddress to.

[mars_22]

Just create an attribute on the }Clients dimension called "EmailAddress" and store them there. Of course you'll have to figure out a way to keep those values updated......

Exactly, it is not an issue where to store them but what's the best way to get them/keep them updated.

If AD is the source for CAM it is actually quite easy via PowerShell to query AD and retrieve AD attributes of the user name. Matching the user name to the CAM ID is also relatively easy (concatenate NamespaceID back- or forward-slash with windows user name = the display alias in TM1) in order to know which users to send the emailaddress to.

We will probably do something like this, yes. I was just wondering if there's an easy way how to get them directly from Cognos as we have them there already.

Thank you all for the inputs.

[tomok]

Exactly, it is not an issue where to store them but what's the best way to get them/keep them updated.

How often does someone's email address change? Seriously. We have approx 250 users and we had one person last year that had a name change and thus email address change. I wouldn't spend any time automating that update. The only time you'll really have to edit an email address is for a new user. Make that part of the new user routine and be done with it.