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Process documentationTutorial: Creating and Registering Dashboard Apps Locate this document in the navigation structure

 

A dashboard is a configurable set of several apps. In a dashboard, you can configure the number, settings and sequence of the apps. You create apps with the application Dashboard and Presentation Design (Xcelsius), an SAP BusinessObjects product. The data displayed is typically provided by a BW query.

SAP delivers an infrastructure and a wide selection of apps and dashboards, in the Dashboard Framework. The infrastructure supports customer enhancements and developments. You can change delivered apps or create new ones and display them in existing dashboards. You can create apps as follows:

  • Use Xcelsius to create the user interface of the app. You need not yet have set up data capture at this time. You can concentrate on the design of the user interface, and use example data in the Excel spreadsheet in Xcelsius.

    This applies both for the app itself, and for a possible config app (which forms a unit together with the app) or a detail app (which which you have a navigation option using a drill down). In the app and a possible detail app, the desired data is visualized. In the associated config app (which you can call from the dashboard), you make settings about which data is to be displayed.

  • You create a BW query as data source. You can use any data in the Business Warehouse system assigned to the SAP Solution Manager system.

  • Finally, you need to register the apps with the Dashboard Framework, so that you can add the app to all appropriate dashboards.

In this tutorial, you will create, in four separate steps, apps, detail apps, and config apps, including the data provision in increasing complexity.

Displayed Data

The displayed values are taken from a set of generated test date, that is available to you even without complete configuration of SAP Solution Manager (you only need to have set up the connection to the assigned Business Warehouse).

This test data contain values about the use and costs of telecommunication for a fictitious company with eight subsidiaries; in detail, costs and the number and duration of the conversations are displayed for each pair of subsidiaries.

If you want to use this test data for your own apps, take the following into account when creating the associated BW queries:

  • The InfoProvider for the test data is 0CCM_GD (Generated Data). This is a virtual InfoCube; that is, the data is not stored in the BW itself, but is generated when called by the query.

  • The InfoCube contains the characteristic Profile (CCM_PRFL). You can use this to define whether the values generated should always be identical or should be randomly generated. For use in apps, the profile SAND100 is particularly of interest. With this profile, the current date is used as the initial value for the random number generation, which means that – if you call the query on a particular day – the same value is always displayed for a particular metric (such as the costs for telephone calls from one branch to another at a particular time), that is, that the displayed values are consistent across multiple calls.

Process

This tutorial consists of the following parts:

  • Tutorial part 1: Create and Register a Simple App

    In this part of the tutorial, you create and register a simple app and its associated query, in which the telephone costs per month of the different branches of a company are to be displayed for the previous month. Since the displayed period (previous month) is set using a BW variable in the associated query, no further configuration is necessary (and therefore, no config app is required).

    Work through this section to obtain a first overview of creating your own apps and the tools used to do so.

  • Tutorial part 2: Create App with Navigation

    In this part of the tutorial, you extend the app from the first part of the tutorial with the possibility of a drill down, that is, you can display the telephone costs on a daily basis for any branch by double-clicking the associated monthly costs. To do this, you need to extend the app from the first part, create a corresponding detail app with the costs on a daily basis, and create a suitable query for this detail app. Finally, you register both of the newly-created apps.

    Work though this section, if you want to nest apps, that is, if you want to be able to call other apps context-dependently from your app.

  • Tutorial part 3: Create App with Configuration App

    In this part of the tutorial, you extend the app from the first part with the possibility of selecting the month for which the telephone costs are to be displayed for the branches. You do this using a config app, in which you can set the desired month. Finally, you register both of the newly-created apps.

    Work though this section if you want to learn about the concept of the config app.

  • Tutorial part 4: Create Complex App with Configuration App

    In this part of the tutorial, you extend the app and the config app from the third part with the possibility of displaying not only the telephone costs but also the other two metrics that are provided by the test data (call duration and the number of calls). To do this, you need to create a new BW query and to register the two newly-created apps.

    Work through this section, if you want to go further into creating your own apps.

  • Tutorial part 5: Create App with Data Provision by BAdI

    In this part of the tutorial, you provide values to an app via your own BAdI implementation, not from the SAP Business Warehouse. Use this data capture option if it is not possible to supply the data using BW queries, for example if you read your current data directly from the SAP Solution Manager. SAP provides an enhancement spot, under which you can create your BAdI implementation.

    Work through this section if you need to capture data independently of BW.

  • Tutorial part 6: Create App with Translatable Texts

    In this part of the tutorial, you enhance a simple app with translatable texts, i.e. you use the dashboard infrastructure to flag texts as translatable, and to translate them.

    Perform this section if you want to display your apps in several languages.

  • Tutorial part 7: Create a Dashboard

    In this part of the tutorial, you create a simple dashboard for your apps. It shows you how to create a dashboard as an app container, as well as creating apps.

Note Note

Although the different parts of the tutorial build on each other, you can also work through individual parts. To allow you to do this, SAP delivers the results of all parts of the tutorials (apps and queries) under the category Tutorial Samples. The individual parts of the tutorial describe exactly which apps and queries are concerned.

End of the note.