Considerations
- With the latest release of OBIEE 11g (11.1.1.6.6), Oracle Business Intelligence Technology Foundation become best in class in SMB as well as Enterprise organization
- Some new key features that will benefit OBIEE guys in pursuing for OBIEE 11g Upgrade
- Upgrade of an existing OBIEE 10g system to OBIEE 11g requires careful planning, preparation, setup and testing.
- Upgrade of RPD (Repository/Business Model Metadata)
- Upgrade of Webcat (User Interface Metadata)
- Upgrade of BI Pub (BI Publisher)
- Upgrade of BI Security
- Upgrade of BI Delivers (iBots/Agents)
Steps for
OBIEE 11g Upgrade
- OBIEE 11g Upgrade in non-invasive to the current production setup, as it does not overwrite the existing 10g architecture
- OBIEE 11g will be installed a-fresh on Dev/QA and Production instances
- Pre-requisites checklist
- Installation architecture – decisions
- Production architecture – decisions
- Installation of OBIEE 11g on Dev/QA Environment
- Upgrading the OBIEE Metadata Repository and Web Catalog
- Importing Security Credentials (Users/Groups) Setup
- Modifying Security Set Up as per 11g Architecture
- Testing the installation set up and all components
- Testing the OBIEE Metadata repository consistency
- Validating ‘select’ OBIEE 10g reports for any errors
- Validating Security Setup and Users/Groups Mapping
- Installation of OBIEE 11g on Production System
- Code Migration to Production
- Smoke Testing on Production System
- Availability of OBIEE 11g on Production
Analyze
Existing 10g For Upgrade
- Analyze existing 10g System on following key things
- Hardware including Sizing
- Operating System
- Security data model
- RPD Size
- Web Catalog Size
- Reports – Majority views used (Ex: Pivot, Charts etc)
- Custom UI configuration (Style Sheets / Logos / Messages / Web Templates)
- iBots if any
- Total number of users and Concurrent users of the Application
- External Systems involved for Security of BPEL
- Warehouse Database Schema and Scheduler Schema
- Configuration Files (instanceconfig.xml, NQSConfig.INI, etc)
- Compare existing 10g Environment with System Requirements and Certification documentation of 11g
- Custom Date formats
Pre-Upgrade Steps
- Install and Configure OBIEE 11g System
- System Requirements and Supported Platforms
- Sizing Considerations based on Expert recommendations
- Configure and Setup Out of the Box OBIEE 11g System with Sample Application Repository and Web Catalog
- Validate the Application after installation
- Configure specific parameters (OPMN.xml) for the data sources (Oracle, SQL Server, Teradata etc)
- Configure specific parameters for BI Publisher (xmlp-server-config.xml)
- Configure 11g specific tags in instanceconfig.xml
- Separate Connection Pools for Queries and Init Blocks in Physical Layer of the OBIEE RPD
- Invalid Objects are deleted
Optimize Existing 10g For Upgrade
- Identify Superfluous, redundant and unused content
- Web Catalog Objects:
- Reports
- Dashboards & Dashboard Prompts
- Shared Folders & User Folders
- Web Groups
- RPD Objects:
- Physical Layer Objects
- BMM Layer Objects
- Presentation Layer Objects
- Initialization Blocks
- Variables
- Users
- Security Groups
- Consistency Check before Upgrade
- Leading/Trailing Spaces on Column Names in OBIEE Repository Not Supported in 11g
Test Plan
for Upgrade
- Perform a test upgrade – On a smaller Catalog with few selected critical Reports/Dashboards
- Identifying unknown issues during Actual Upgrade
- How does the new system look like after upgrade
- Define different phases/stages for upgrade process
- Upgrade Schemas (Scheduler)
- Configure Connections
- Upgrade Repository
- Upgrade Web Catalog
- Upgrade BI Publisher Catalog
- Upgrade BI Publisher Scheduler
- Perform testing and validate results at the start and end of each stage
- Validate iBots/Agents on new Schema – Fix issues manually if any
- Check TNS Entries for Oracle, opmn.xml for Teradata, Correct version of Essbase client
- Fix all Consistency Errors, Configure Connection Pools
- Manually fix reports/dashboards for known issues
- Configure the parameters in xmlp-server-config.xml
- Validate the Scheduler reports
Post
Upgrade Considerations
- Implement New and Enhanced 11g Functionalities
- Support for additional data sources (Ex: Essbase, Oracle TimesTen, Hyperion Financial Management, ADF, SAP BW Native, OBI Metadata Web Service etc)
- Hierarchy Objects in Presentation Layer (Analysis)
- Support Unbalanced Hierarchies (Ragged & Skipped)
- Support Parent-Child Hierarchies
- Delta Code Migration as against full RPD migration after initial go-live
- Multi-Currency Support
- Logical Source determination is no longer Random
- Upgrade MUD Repositories Manually (Use ONLY Command line upgrade utility – “obieerpdmigrateutil”)
- Use ONLY Upgrade Assistant to perform the upgrade of Production Repository and Web Catalog
- Configure Essbase specific database features corresponding to Environment Variables
- Fix Localized Text for Users “My Folder” objects
- Siebel Workflow actions are not upgraded – Perform this task manually
- RPD & Web Catalog deployments now controlled using FMW Control
- Security
- Doesn’t allow Blank Repository Password
- Groups in 10g transform to Application Roles in 11g
- Users/Application Roles are not managed Externally
- Default Cluster Configuration even in Single Server Environment
- Pivot table Calculated Items needs to be fixed manually
- Custom Styles and Skins are not upgraded, Have to be implemented manually again in 11g
