TM1 9.5

[Paul Segal]

It doesn't appear to be available for download yet, but:

http://www-01.ibm.com/software/data/cog ... web_ibm_hp

Best

[Jan]

I can't read anything about the new feautures compared to 9.4

[Steve Vincent]

IBM need to wake up and understand that TM1 is not solely used for Finance as well

[George Regateiro]

IBM need to wake up and understand that TM1 is not solely used for Finance as well

Sadly that will never happen. Having been to one of their recent lunch pitch things just to see what Express was all about they are still pushing TM1 as something that can run on a machine under a finance person's desk with no IT required. Given that I am in a comparatively large organization to most I was hoping that some of this mentality would have died with the IBM purchase but sadly it has not. I know there are some people that the pitch applies to, but at some point they need to realize they are IBM and start being an enterprise wide app.

[Solanna]

I attended one of the IBM COGNOS Performance events in L.A. on Tuesday... it was an all day event with 8 breakout sessions focusing on either BI or Performance Management

Having been a TM1 developer since Perspectives 2.0 I was curious to see what was happening with the little TM1 engine that could but had never been given the time of day

TM1 9.5 - I was able to see a live demo of the product in one of the breakout sessions
According to the sales people attending, the product will be available within the next 30-60 days
COGNOS is taking an interesting approach by combining COGNOS Planning and TM1
They are taking what they consider the best of both products and combining it into one
The presenter was strictly in the web interface which from my perspective was a good thing since it seems to me that TM1 can actually perform quite well in this environment
Also, having worked with COGNOS Planning in the past (Adaytum to some of you that go back that far), I can see where some of the features from that product are being included
However, realize the product is called TM1 9.5 and NOT Cognos Planning 9.5... that to me is a big win in my books
FYI, not once all day did I see any presenter use a spreadsheet... while I am a huge spreadsheet advocate it shows me that they are taking TM1 seriously and not just focusing on Finance
Also, they now refer to the TM1 engine as the "In-Memory Analytics Server"
One of the best features was the ability to create "sandboxes" on the fly
Users are always looking for this feature and now it's available
I believe the TM1 engine is also the backend for the new COGNOS 8 Controller 8.5 product

Cognos Express - I was also very interested to see what this looked like since there is still a HUGE need to have a product for the small to mid-size organization
Since all the acquisitions by IBM, SAP, and Oracle these smaller organizations are really being ignored so while Cognos Express may not be the perfect solution yet they at least understand the need in the market place

15 years ago a TM1 Server would typically sit in the Controllers office and maybe there would be 5 users connected
This is where the product started so there is no reason why it should not be available for small workgroups and not always Enterprise wide implementations
Big is not always better

So from my perspective I believe they definitely are focusing on the Enterprise Wide implementations but are still dedicated to support the little guy as well

Having worked with OutlookSoft and now SAP BPC for the past 4 years, I was very pleased at what I saw... SAP could care less about the little guy and there certainly isn't a robust web interface in BPC as of yet so for me the whole expericence was extremely positive... GO TM!! GO TM1!

[Alan Kirk]

According to the sales people attending, the product will be available within the next 30-60 days

I received an interesting e-mail about a bug report yesterday. It read in part:

All engineering work on 9.5 has completed, so any issues that remain targeted to 9.5 and are in an open state will be getting moved out to a future release.

So the timeframe sounds about right. Although that was then and this is now, it wasn't unknown for Applix to do new releases right at the start of the holiday season. Whether IBM will continue to do that we shall see.

[Paul Segal]

It's due for release mid-December, apparently.

[John Hammond]

Code: Select all

It doesn't appear to be available for download yet, but:

http://www-01.ibm.com/software/data/cog ... web_ibm_hp

I appreciate the thought behind the link, but this article is not even worth downloading. A buzzword bingo of management speak, it fails to convey any information about the product.

Why do software vendors target their products towards the 9-12 year old mentality? Or do they just assume that the directors/CIOs are as gullible and shallow as junior schoolers?

[George Regateiro]

The IBM RSS feed actually provided something useful. 9.5 is available for download now

[Martin Ingram]

Yep - it's on there. Downloading it now for a play on our test server.........

[rkaif]

Yeah, its available on IBM Passport Advantage site for download

[Alan Kirk]

Please provide a link to download TM1 9.5

The link that I quoted in an earlier deleted post is the one from the notification that IBM sent. Needless to say, that does not provide a direct link to log in to get the download, much less to the download itself.

This is as close as I can get you. After that, you need to log in and go through page after page after page after page until you finally reach the download.

IBM's web site is rather similar to one of those Leisure Suit Larry games of the '90's, only with anything approaching a fun factor removed.

[standtrue]

Here's the fix list for those who don't feel like navigating the IBM Support site maze:

Issues corrected since TM1 9.4.1 FP2

- Export to PDF did not work when using a private subset from a worksheet.
- The User Interface for the Attachments button in TM1 Workflow for the All Tasks button did not operate in a manner consistent with other kinds of task buttons.
- Korean XP: TM1P crashes Excel 2003.
- Reordering dimensions caused a loss of rule-derived data.
- Leaving an element name blank caused the server to crash.
- TM1 Web: Enhanced security on the TM1 server drop down list.
- TM1 Server crashed when adding a blank alias value.
- Unable to connect to Tm1top when TM1 server is using CAM authentication Cognos Series 7 ldap and integrated login.
- TM1 Server potential deadlock prevented from occurring.
- TM1 Server crash from unsafe stargate access fixed.
- Security was not properly applied on named subsets.
- Updated C8ITK with version 8.4.3071.0 which ensures data returned is UTF-8 encoded for group names.
- ISB Client problem with Cube Level Security.
- Fix to prevent deadlock problem.
- Syncfusion library missing.
- Fixed a locking/race mdx condition.

[Alan Kirk]

There's a lot to absorb here. Contributor is obviously going to be a big thing and suggests that Iboglix sees TM1's future being a web interfaced one, gods help us. Of course it may be better than Web... speaking of which, if I was on the TM1 Web development team I think I'd most likely be looking for alternative job openings.

Hey John, d'ja see this one from the new features guide?

This one's for you.

Undo/Redo
IBM® Cognos® TM1 introduces an extensive Undo/Redo capability that allows users to store a
collection of data value changes and walk back through the actions to undo them. In combination
with color change indicators, Undo/Redo offers users a temporary assessment period before
committing data changes to the TM1 server. Used with Data Spreading and the new Sandbox
feature, Undo/Redo becomes a powerful data evaluation tool.
Here are some of the major features of the TM1 9.5 implementation of Undo/Redo:
● Undo/Redo can be used in conjunction with Data Spreading to change values across multiple
screens, including screens not currently active.

Of course, best to see whether / how it works first.

No sign of being able to schedule chores in local time though

I was surprised to see this in the Fixed Issues list:

COGCQ00202632 ISB Client problem with Cube Level Security.

That's assuming that "ISB" means In Spreadsheet Browser, and if it's not I can't see what it is. As previously indicated, the 9.4 Read Me document stated that 9.4 would be the last version to support the ISB so I don't see why they'd fix it. I haven't been able to find any end of life statements in the various 9.5 files that I've obtained so far.

I surely could do with the .pdfs of the full documentation, but thus far I can't find them on the IBM site. I think I shall whack a copy of 9.5 onto a spare PC just to get to the accursed HTML documentation. (Not that I have anything intrinsically against HTML documentation, just when it's implemented the way it was in later editions of 9.4...)

[John Hobson]

Hey John, d'ja see this one from the new features guide?

No - I no longer bother to look Alan

TM1 is so far behind the curve here (2 years since I found a product that had this feature for free, and over 5 years since I first asked Applix for this feature) that I moved on I'm afraid. I still support existing clients, but I haven't recommended TM1 for some time now.

All the innovation seems to happening elsewhere, and IBM still seem to be playing catch up / stitch together with TM1 and Adaytum.

As a consultant I'm focussed in the bang for buck that my clients get - that's not an altruisitic thing btw, as that leaves them more money to spend on consultancy.

I'm still fond of TM1 - I wouldn't have my business now if I hadn't stumbled upon it back in 1995 - but business models change and the OLAP market now is a totally different beast than it was back then.

[George Regateiro]

Alan try this out. It does not have all the docs that their web documentation has but it is most of them.

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.w ... -8&lang=en

[Alan Kirk]

Alan try this out. It does not have all the docs that their web documentation has but it is most of them.

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.w ... -8&lang=en

Thanks for that George; they may have been updating that over the course of yesterday because it looks like the full set is there now except for the Rules and API Guides, if they're doing 9.5 versions of those. (Not that I expect much to change in those.)

I still can't fathom how a company which makes its business from information systems can have such an impenetrable web site. I did note some banner ads for a new portal coming in 5 (picture of hand) weeks, some time in January but I'll believe it when I see it; when it comes to site navigation these guys just don't seem to know how to do "simple, straightforward and easy".