A quick update from me as I noticed an 11.1.2.3 patch was recently released for Shared Services:
Patch 17307819: PSU 11.1.2.3.050
The patch mainly addresses the long awaited LCM backward compatibility to 11.1.1.4 but requires patch 11.1.1.4.500 to be applied which was also released at the same time.
I was looking through the list of defect fixes and the following caught my attention:
17348625 - Support is needed for the migration of Essbase data for Planning application using Lifecycle Management.
Over time LCM has matured into a well-established tool which does simplify the whole migration piece and is streets ahead of the world we used to live in, yes it does have some drawbacks and bugs but with each release it has improved and now supports the majority of EPM products.
LCM has supported Essbase data migration since 11.1.2.0 but this was for pure Essbase applications and the functionality has been missing for planning applications until now.
The patch requires applying on all servers in an EPM environment and updates not only Shared Services but EPMA and Planning as well.
Once applied new Essbase data artifacts are available for planning application in Shared Services.
The data migration supports both BSO and ASO planning applications.
The BSO export is a full text data export in column format, the ASO export is of course level 0 (not in column format)
The export is the same as using LCM with Essbase applications except with planning the txt file extension is included while with essbase there is no file extension though it is still text format.
If the LCM planning export includes the Essbaase data artifact then the output content will not be zipped and be in exploded format as a folder.
If the planning essbase databases are large in size then be aware the export could take a while to complete and the database will be in read-only mode while the export is active.
It is worth understanding how the export is processed as it could potentially cause problems.
The export looks to be executed from the planning server and at first is exported to the
<EPM_ORACLE_INSTANCE>\tmp directory
The export file is then renamed and moved to the LCM import/export directory.
If the export is large then this could impact the available space on the epm instance drive and add additional network traffic as the file is moved around.
It is possible to change the location of the tmp directory by updating java temporary directory for the planning web application server.
On windows this can be achieved by updating the registry.
For Unix type deployments then setCustomParamsPlanning.sh can be updated.
I did also notice a slight issue if the account running the planning managed server does not have access to the LCM import/export directory (in my case the directory was on a share) then the LCM process will complete successfully but the LCM Essbase Data folder will not exist, the data export will still run to the temporay directory but that is as far as it goes even though it does not fail, this does not happen for any of the other planning artifacts and did throw me for a while but updating the permissions resolved the problem.
When importing the data using LCM the data is not cleared out and it is the equivalent of importing with overwrite values.
There is no option to clear the data which would be nice and I have always thought it would be great if there was an option to completely clear out the target planning application before running an LCM import, maybe one for the future?
If importing to a planning ASO database then any aggregations will need to be run as this is not handled by LCM.
I did test using the EPM clone utility which I blogged about here and can confirm once patched it does automatically export/import the planning data.
Patch 17307819: PSU 11.1.2.3.050
The patch mainly addresses the long awaited LCM backward compatibility to 11.1.1.4 but requires patch 11.1.1.4.500 to be applied which was also released at the same time.
I was looking through the list of defect fixes and the following caught my attention:
17348625 - Support is needed for the migration of Essbase data for Planning application using Lifecycle Management.
Over time LCM has matured into a well-established tool which does simplify the whole migration piece and is streets ahead of the world we used to live in, yes it does have some drawbacks and bugs but with each release it has improved and now supports the majority of EPM products.
LCM has supported Essbase data migration since 11.1.2.0 but this was for pure Essbase applications and the functionality has been missing for planning applications until now.
The patch requires applying on all servers in an EPM environment and updates not only Shared Services but EPMA and Planning as well.
Once applied new Essbase data artifacts are available for planning application in Shared Services.
The data migration supports both BSO and ASO planning applications.
The BSO export is a full text data export in column format, the ASO export is of course level 0 (not in column format)
The export is the same as using LCM with Essbase applications except with planning the txt file extension is included while with essbase there is no file extension though it is still text format.
If the LCM planning export includes the Essbaase data artifact then the output content will not be zipped and be in exploded format as a folder.
If the planning essbase databases are large in size then be aware the export could take a while to complete and the database will be in read-only mode while the export is active.
It is worth understanding how the export is processed as it could potentially cause problems.
The export looks to be executed from the planning server and at first is exported to the
<EPM_ORACLE_INSTANCE>\tmp directory
The export file is then renamed and moved to the LCM import/export directory.
If the export is large then this could impact the available space on the epm instance drive and add additional network traffic as the file is moved around.
It is possible to change the location of the tmp directory by updating java temporary directory for the planning web application server.
On windows this can be achieved by updating the registry.
For Unix type deployments then setCustomParamsPlanning.sh can be updated.
I did also notice a slight issue if the account running the planning managed server does not have access to the LCM import/export directory (in my case the directory was on a share) then the LCM process will complete successfully but the LCM Essbase Data folder will not exist, the data export will still run to the temporay directory but that is as far as it goes even though it does not fail, this does not happen for any of the other planning artifacts and did throw me for a while but updating the permissions resolved the problem.
When importing the data using LCM the data is not cleared out and it is the equivalent of importing with overwrite values.
There is no option to clear the data which would be nice and I have always thought it would be great if there was an option to completely clear out the target planning application before running an LCM import, maybe one for the future?
If importing to a planning ASO database then any aggregations will need to be run as this is not handled by LCM.
I did test using the EPM clone utility which I blogged about here and can confirm once patched it does automatically export/import the planning data.
John,
ReplyDeleteI have seen this patch too and i was interested in applying for the reasons you wrote this blog on.
The doubt i have is how to work on the requirements that this patch has:
"Before applying this patch, install the ADF patch 16709748 patch as described in the readme for that patch."
I have searched for the above ADF patch and from the readme file i don't understand:
1) whether i need it
2) how to install it
I am dealing with a typical installation here: Windows x64 machines/SQL 2008/Oracle Http.
Do you have more info on this ADF patch or what to do there?
thanks!
One of the pre-reqs to installing the shared services patch is apply the ADF patch.
ReplyDeleteIt is applied to the oracle_common home.
Hi John,
ReplyDeleteBasically i hate reading through content on blogs as they tell more about themselves. But first time was very much fascinated towards your blog content.
You - the man with great insight on technology and all i can say is , a man working to help someone with your investigations and experiences .
Thanks for all the blog posts and You are really a strong technical asset for Hyperion world covering in & out's of EPM Products.
I wonder if DRM, FDM and HSF are supported by LCM too ? Because I'm getting "EPMLCM-13000:Service currently not available." when I try to export these artifacts using LCM.
ReplyDeleteThanks
No they are not supported with LCM, for the full list go to http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E40248_01/epm.1112/epm_lcm_user/ch01s04.html
ReplyDeleteI am wondering what is the patch for upgrading from 11.1.2.1 instead? I have been scratching my head on this for sometime
ReplyDelete