Discover how you can provide a superior business intelligence platform for your analysts and business users, giving them immediate access to trusted business information. SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 delivers a full spectrum of solutions for information discovery, delivery, management, reporting, and analysis.

1. SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1
ALL INFORMATION,
ALL PEOPLE, ONE PLATFORM
WHAT’S NEW IN
SAP® BusinessObjects™ XI 3.1

2. NEW FUNCTIONALITIES
BROADER DATA ACCESS, IMPROVED USABILITY,
GREATER FLEXIBILITY
SAP® BusinessObjects™ XI 3.1 solutions SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 helps you unlock and access
are the next major release of business
intelligence (BI) software from SAP. all corporate information, both structured and unstructured,
SAP BusinessObjects XI provides a full and provides a unified view for more confident decision
spectrum of BI functionality. Functions
range from reporting, query and analysis, making. It includes a complete suite of BI tools required
and dashboards and visualization, to for strategic, corporate BI initiatives and for more aligned
intuitive discovery and advanced pre-
dictive analytics capabilities, as well teams and business networks, and it brings all this function-
as data quality and extract, transform, ality integrated on one flexible, unified BI platform.
and load functionality.
SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 delivers: This document provides a high-level • Data access and supported
• A superior BI platform for hetero- overview of the new functionalities platforms
geneous environments, so your offered in SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 • Native 64-bit architecture
organization can provide a trusted, and covers the following product areas: • Information discovery and delivery
complete view of all information • Integration with IT environments en- solutions
assets abled by Microsoft software • Content life-cycle management
• Improved usability for analysts and • Integration with Oracle enterprise • Platform administration
business users, allowing greater self- applications
sufficiency and faster, better-informed
decisions
• Real-world BI deployment flexibility,
allowing IT to deliver and maintain BI
applications to more users across
your organization
Figure 1: SAP® BusinessObjects™ XI 3.1 Functionalities
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3. INDUSTRY-LEADING BI FOR ALL IT
ENVIRONMENTS
SUPPORT FOR MICROSOFT AND ORACLE
SOFTWARE
Integration with IT Environments
Enabled by Microsoft Software
Microsoft recently refreshed many
components of its technology platform:
Microsoft Windows Server 2008,
Microsoft SQL Server 2008, Internet
Information Services 7.0 (IIS 7.0), and
Microsoft Visual Studio 2008. SAP
BusinessObjects XI 3.1 supports all
the latest releases of that technology
platform and offers native Microsoft .NET
Framework support for SAP Business-
Objects Web Intelligence® software,
SAP BusinessObjects Desktop Intelli-
gence™ software, and the business Integration with Oracle Enterprise format or location. Broader data access
intelligence portal. For the business Applications ultimately means that users can make
intelligence portal, the SAP Business- decisions more confidently, because
Objects XI 3.1 release maintains existing SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 introduces they know that SAP BusinessObjects
parity between Microsoft .NET Frame- direct connectivity to Oracle E-Business XI 3.1 delivers a consistent user experi-
work and Java versions by supporting Suite – enabling organizations to con- ence – no matter what the data sources
the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 solidate and transform vast amounts of are (see Figure 2).
and 3.5. Oracle application data into reports,
analyses, visualizations, and dashboards.
SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 supports Single sign-on and direct access to rel- New Data Sources
Microsoft SharePoint Services and evant insight also contribute to increased HP NeoView 2.3
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 end-user productivity. SAP Business- Microsoft SQL Server 2008
and benefits from a number of architec- Objects software delivers connectivity
Microsoft Analysis Services 2008
tural changes. SAP BusinessObjects to other Oracle applications, so users
XI 3.1 is also the answer for organiza- can make the most of information stored Netezza 4.0
tions wishing to extend insight from BI in PeopleSoft Enterprise, JD Edwards Oracle 10g RAC
to any Web or Microsoft .NET applica- EnterpriseOne, and Siebel applications. Oracle 11g
tion. IT departments and developers Oracle 11g RAC
can reuse the functionalities of the Data Access and Supported
PostgreSQL
BI platform, such as scheduling and Platforms
security, or embed the existing content Progress OpenEdge
in applications by using the updated SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 provides Teradata 12
Microsoft .NET BI platform software even more flexibility and the power
development kit. to connect to all data – regardless of Figure 2: Some New Data Sources You Can
Access with SAP® BusinessObjects™ XI 3.1
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4. SAP BusinessObjects XI and technology agnosticism by expand- Information Discovery and
ing the number of operating systems Delivery Solutions
3.1 gives you flexibility and supported, such as Red Hat Enterprise
power to access all informa- Linux 5, Microsoft Windows Server Information discovery solutions provide
2008, and Microsoft Windows Vista analysts and business users with query,
tion – regardless of format, Service Pack 1. reporting, analysis, dashboard, and
shape, size, or location – user-friendly information search and
Native 64-Bit Architecture navigation functionality, giving them
enabling everyone in your quick access to the information they
organization to make more SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 represents need to make enlightened decisions.
the first time SAP BusinessObjects
confident decisions based Enterprise software is offered as a 64-bit SAP BusinessObjects Voyager
on trusted, reliable infor- application for high-performance BI on SAP BusinessObjects Voyager soft-
HP-UX Itanium systems. All platform ware continues to build on its first two
mation. It provides broad services associated with SAP Business- releases and offers a number of im-
and flexible support for Objects solutions – Crystal Reports® provements that enable analysts and
software, SAP BusinessObjects Web business users alike to discover data
standard industry applica- Intelligence software, SAP Business- using new data visualizations and
tions and solutions from Objects Voyager software, and exception highlighting. Visualization
others – benefit from a native 64-bit options include box plots, scatter
SAP, Oracle, PeopleSoft, implementation. plots, radar charts, and bubble plots,
Microsoft, Siebel, JD as depicted in Figure 3.
Edwards, salesforce.com, Box Plots Scatter Plots
and hundreds of other
environments.
SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 also meets
the needs of a truly heterogeneous
system and business environment by
Radar Charts Bubble Plots
offering organizations the ability to mix
operating systems and servers and to
meet ever-changing business needs.
SAP continues to demonstrate its
commitment toward heterogeneity
Figure 3: New Visualization Options for SAP® BusinessObjects™ XI 3.1
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5. • Expanded Microsoft Excel export
functionalities – SAP Business-
With SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1, you can provide Objects Web Intelligence documents
the right role-specific BI functionalities to everyone can be saved as comma-separated
values (CSV) files and multiple
in your organization – ranging from reporting, query Microsoft Excel sheets if they have
and analysis, and dashboards and visualization, to more than 65,536 rows
• Option to cancel refresh on open
intuitive discovery and advanced predictive analytics. • Automatic loading of list of values
All users, from the high-end analyst to the casual
In this release, SAP BusinessObjects
information consumer, have access to the information Web Intelligence also offers additional
they need while requiring minimal dependence on IT safeguards designed to manage memory
consumption by applying a number of
resources and developers. measures when user demands reach
certain thresholds.
Other noteworthy improvements to SAP BusinessObjects Web Intelligence
SAP BusinessObjects Voyager include: In SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1, SAP
• Microsoft Analysis Services 2008 as BusinessObjects Web Intelligence
a supported data source software delivers several interface
• Drill-through to SAP BusinessObjects improvements that provide a more
Web Intelligence or Crystal Reports, powerful analysis experience for busi-
enabling context (row and column ness users and analysts. Enhancements
headings) to be passed to an existing include:
report or analysis • Flexible comparisons between data
• Personalized favorite members, so sets – onward, backward, in blocks,
users can define a group of favorite sections, breaks, and over any
members from any dimension and number of dimensions
then use that metadata selection to • Convenient and simple data filtering
quickly get a personalized view of with new report filter bar
the information
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6. SIMPLIFIED DEPLOYMENT
BROADER RANGE OF CONFIGURATION OPTIONS
Content Life-Cycle Management Platform Administration authentication across multiple domains
within a company’s network. Using
SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 offers a SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 includes the central management console,
new life-cycle management application many improvements that simplify plat- BI system administrators can set up
to manage the promotions of BI content form deployment and administration Microsoft Active Directory authenti-
between environments (see Figure 4). while retaining the granularity and cation with either the Kerberos or
This application simplifies BI content flexibility required by complex or global NT LAN Manager (NTLM) protocols.
management throughout its typical deployments.
life cycle (development, testing, and Repository Diagnostic Tool
production) for all organizations. Internet Protocol Version 6 The repository diagnostic tool scans
SAP BusinessObjects clients and for and repairs inconsistencies that may
Based on extended customer feedback, servers will support 128-bit Internet pro- occur in the metadata in your repository,
the application reduces maintenance tocol version 6 (IPv6) address syntax. in addition to inconsistencies that may
and maximizes platform utilization by They will be able to work in IPv4-only occur between the file repository
providing: environments, IPv6-only environments, servers and the central management
• Complete granular control over any or a combination of both. server database.
content or objects
• Dependency check and analysis Microsoft Active Directory Translation Manager
• Auditing and scheduling SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise In SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1, the
• Delegated administration software enables administrators to translation manager user interface is
• Rollback support Microsoft Active Directory more intuitive to use while maintaining
all the existing functionality. User
interface enhancements include new
menus and toolbars, updated wizards
for importing and exporting XML
Localization Interchange File Format,
and streamlined views for improved
translation workflow.
Languages
SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 supports
a total of 17 languages – including
three new ones: Norwegian, Danish,
and Thai.
Figure 4: Visual of Life-Cycle Management Application
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7. Summary
By providing one of the best platforms
for heterogeneous environments, a
refined user experience for analysts
and business users, and real-world BI
deployment flexibility, SAP Business-
Objects XI 3.1 delivers insight through a
single, trusted BI platform. And it rede-
fines the way information empowers
users. SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1
delivers on the promise of a true intelli-
gence platform – one that gives cus-
tomers the best of execution and the
best of strategy. Most important, it
provides the means to align and connect
strategies in a closed-loop system.
To Learn More
To find out more about SAP Business-
Objects XI 3.1 and other SAP
BusinessObjects solutions, call
your SAP representative or visit SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 offers an easy-to-use
www.sap.com/sapbusinessobjects. data integration environment with integrated data
quality, data lineage, data auditing, and data access
and movement. It helps ensure that your business
data is correct, consistent, and complete and allows
for better staff utilization, more effective project
management, and lower cost of ownership.
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