SAP BusinessObjects BI4 is (almost) here!

Finally SAP has come up with a date on the BI4 release: February 23, 2011. SAP is announcing a Virtual Launch Event for BI4 and EIM4 on this date, so make sure you register for it.

Below I put another weird video I found somewhere on the web covering the upcoming BI4 release. Also check out the SlideShare presentation for an overview of BI4.
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LOLvid: Fun with SAP BusinessObjects naming conventions

Hahaha check this video on the recent SAP BusinessObjects name changes.

I lol’d.

SAP: “BEx Analyzer sucks”

When I first got into SAP BI a few years ago I followed this course on SAP BW 3.5 which took like 10 days or maybe even more. I do remember the first time I saw and used BEx Analyzer, the MS Excel plugin to view and analyze data from SAP BW. I was just shocked to see such a terrible user interface design and a tool that was not intuitive to use at all! And people were supposed to use this app for their daily work? OMG.

SAP now released a video that basically says that BEx Analyzer sucks. Too complex, too much end-user training needed, to much complaints, too expensive and so on. The solution? SAP BusinessObjects Analysis edition for Microsoft Office.

Have fun watching it.

SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 Platform reference guide

So do you know all the tools/components that are in the SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence 4.0 Platform (wow that’s a pretty long name)? And what about all those new product names? Have a look at this link and bookmark it. It gives you a quick reference guide on all components that are part of the SAP BI landscape. Unfortunately it does not have any external links for more detailed information about each component. Too bad, but luckily we have Google!

SAP BusinessObjects 4 teaser and sneak preview videos

SAP uploaded two new videos on the upcoming SAP BusinessObjects 4 release. First a smooth teaser and second a longer video showing some of the (new) features of this release. This second video shows us a new Query Browser for Xcelsius (SCDD), which seems to enable the creation of direct Universe queries from within Xcelsius. Also a Query Prompt Selector component is demonstrated.