IBM Cognos Express Virtual Launch Event

[rfielden]

Anybody attend yesterday? Any thoughts? Our dozen or so questions went unanswered. My take is that CX is 80+% std Applix, thus why can't they respond regarding license swap. Guess other option as others have noted is just stop maintenance as it is adding no value.

[rodrigo]

The price of the new product seems to be quite interesting against midmarket competitors, Xcelerator also seems to be the TM1 midmarket edition and executive viewer was around there in the analysis module. I downloaded the free trial, lets see what is this about.

[frosterrj]

nothing worked for me so I got only to download the slides, but could not hear a word in the presentations. Anyone know if there are dowloadable mp3's or something?

[rfielden]

My take is Cognos Express, as presented, was 80+% TM1. Again, my take is IBM is leaving the legacy Applix customers hanging.

[Martin Ryan]

What do you get in the free trial? Everything, but it stops in 30 days? Or is some of the functionality limited, but you get it forever? What's the link for the download? Rumour has it the IBM website isn't that easy to get around

Martin

[Alan Kirk]

What do you get in the free trial? Everything, but it stops in 30 days? Or is some of the functionality limited, but you get it forever? What's the link for the download? Rumour has it the IBM website isn't that easy to get around

I read it as "fully functional for 30 days, then stops working".

Download IBM Cognos Express V9, and try one or all of its modules for 30 days. See for yourself how IBM Cognos Express Reporter delivers complete, self-service reporting capabilities. Looking for analysis features only? Try IBM Cognos Express Advisor. Or test IBM Cognos Express Xcelerator and see how you can improve your Microsoft® Excel-based planning processes. Download the software now and fully evaluate the reporting, analysis or planning capabilities you need.

This part is interesting:

Note: IBM Cognos Express is a 64-bit product. For the trial you can use a 32-bit or 64-bit environment. When you decide to purchase Cognos Express, you will need to build and deploy your solution in a 64-bit environment, leveraging the files you built with your trial version.

Yeah, that's hardly surprising considering that post 9.0 a 32 bit environment is {cough} limiting.

Anyhoo, the link can be found at:
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/downl ... learn.html

[rfielden]

http://www.ibm.com/cognos/express/trial

[Alan Kirk]

http://www.ibm.com/cognos/express/trial

That link gets redirected to the same place as the link I gave in the earlier posting. Though I note that it requires you to either log in or create a new IBM login if you don't have one. In my case I hit a page telling me that:

This offering requires information that you have not yet provided in your user profile.
To update your profile with this required information, click continue below and log in again. Then click continue to update your profile. After you update your profile, you will be returned to this offering. If you receive this error twice, it may be due to one of these problems:

(a) We couldn't design a user-friendly web site if our lives depended on it.
(b) We like to jerk you around relentlessly and take you through a ridiculous number of web pages every time you go to download software.
(c) The day has a "y" in it.

No, I'm kidding, I just made those reasons up.

Maybe.

As it turned out my profile was missing address information and my job title which I was required, required, I say, to give them. They may not, however, like the one that I gave them.

I would have thought that that data would already be in their systems but oh wait, I forgot:
(d) We don't use SQL Server for data storage.

There are some really interesting conditions in the licence agreement too:

The evaluation period begins on the date Licensee agrees to the terms of this Agreement and ends upon the earliest of 1) the end of the duration or the date specified by IBM either in the License Information or a transaction document or 2) when the Program automatically disables itself. Licensee will destroy the Program and all copies made of it within ten days of the end of the evaluation period.

Must... suppress... thoughts... of a CD-ROM disk, and me with a 92FS Beretta with about 4 spare clips...

Licensee agrees to create, retain, and provide to IBM and its auditors accurate written records, system tool outputs, and other system information sufficient to provide auditable verification that Licensee's use of all Programs is in compliance with the Evaluation Program Terms, including, without limitation, all of IBM's applicable licensing and pricing qualification terms. Licensee is responsible for 1) ensuring that it does not exceed its Authorized Use, and 2) remaining in compliance with Evaluation Program Terms.

I feel a new business motto coming on: "Our paperwork. Your priority."

I did eventually make it to the download page itself but by that time I was feeling quite bored with the whole process, I didn't feel like agreeing to the licence yet again, and it was time to do some actual work. I therefore haven't downloaded it yet, and will leave the initial impressions to others.

[FARGEADX]

My company is using TM1 9.1 for 5 concurrent users and I wonder since few weeks about going to planning software .
Would it make sense to use the new offer from IBM Cognos Express which inlcude Express Advisor (like executive viewer ) and planning functions in Xcelerator

Does it make sense for a small amount of user to use IBM Cognos Express vs TM1 9.1 ?
Is there a comparison between TM1 9.1 and Xcelerator ...?
If we download the trial version can we use the 2 software on same computer without messing all ?
Any idea of the price I try to download but seems I am blocked for download on even after created a USER ID , and IBM support does not answer on why I am not recognized

thanks in advance

[kangkc]

My company is using TM1 9.1 for 5 concurrent users and I wonder since few weeks about going to planning software .
Would it make sense to use the new offer from IBM Cognos Express which inlcude Express Advisor (like executive viewer ) and planning functions in Xcelerator

Does it make sense for a small amount of user to use IBM Cognos Express vs TM1 9.1 ?
Is there a comparison between TM1 9.1 and Xcelerator ...?
If we download the trial version can we use the 2 software on same computer without messing all ?
Any idea of the price I try to download but seems I am blocked for download on even after created a USER ID , and IBM support does not answer on why I am not recognized

thanks in advance

Cognos Express Xcelerator is TM1. However, TM1 users are created using Express Manager and the default Cognos authentication and that can be changed. Informix is in the picture and I believe it's being used as a content storage (if you are familiar with Cognos).
It will be interesting to find out whether a Cognos Express customer can choose to just install TM1 without all the add on components like Express Manager, informix etc etc, and still get supported.

I have the trial version running for a week now, bottom line, it's still TM1.

[lotsaram]

1/ My company is using TM1 9.1 for 5 concurrent users and I wonder since few weeks about going to planning software .
2/ Would it make sense to use the new offer from IBM Cognos Express which inlcude Express Advisor (like executive viewer ) and planning functions in Xcelerator?
3/ Does it make sense for a small amount of user to use IBM Cognos Express vs TM1 9.1 ?
4/ Is there a comparison between TM1 9.1 and Xcelerator ...?

1/ I'm confused, TM1 is planning software, or at least is is if configured and used appropriately, you would probably just need to look at expanding the user base for "planning" purposes.
2/ CX Xcelerator is TM1 9.4. Which one to use really depends on the size of your company and number of users. CX is limited to 100 users per component and comes at a cheaper price point, TM1 has no limit to number of users (or number of servers on the new licensing model.)
3/ For a small number of users CX makes more sense than TM1 due to price point. There is a (supposedly cost free) conversion path from TM1 mid-market to CX but no conversion from TM1 Enterprise to CX.
4/ See pt. 2. Xcelerator is basically TM1 9.4. The shared admin console aside it is all pure TM1. You could drop any existing TM1 data base directory into Xcelerator and load it without any conversion and it would be TM1 as you know it.

[Andy Key]

A couple of points to add:

The installation routines for Cognos Express will not let you install on a machine that already has TM1 on it. Although I believe this only applies to TM1 versions 9.1 and 9.4 and assumes that you installed it properly and didn't just copy the bin directory around.

As lotsaram says, Xcelerator is TM1 9.4 (MR1 FP2 in my build). So if you are thinking about removing TM1 9.1 so that you can trial CX with your 9.1 server directory with the intention of reverting to 9.1 at the end of the trial period - Don't. Remember that 9.4 servers (which yours will be once you open it with CX) are not backwards compatible with earlier versions. (Unless you are one of the few people with a Unicode version of 9.1).

Also, the retail version of CX will only be available for 64-bit hardware (on the server side - clients can still be 32-bit), so depending on your current machine, this may incur another cost for you to bear in mind when making your comparisons.

[FARGEADX]

Thanks all
This was helpful and clear