BPM Standard Reports Guide

Refresh Instance Overview

This section describes the fields and descriptions on the Refresh Instance Overview report.

Overview

The Refresh Instance Overview report enables you to monitor which reports have been actively accessed within a selected time period.

The report is specifically designed for Business Objects (BO), built on objects from the SAP universe. It helps track report usage patterns and frequency of refreshes, which are crucial for ensuring that active reports are regularly updated. The Development and Quality Engineering (QE) teams can prioritize reports with higher user engagement for performance optimizations, improvements and testing efforts.

Availability and Prerequisites

This report is available from Maconomy 2.6.7.

To generate results, BusinessObjects auditing must be enabled and connected to an auditing database.

Audience and Access

This report is intended for administrators.

In multi-tenant environments (for example, DFME/Flex on a shared BusinessObjects server), it may be available centrally for administrators only and not visible to tenants or standard users.

In self-managed environments, access depends on your BusinessObjects security and access level configuration.

Report Workspace

Navigation

To open the report workspace, go to Reporting » BI Launch Pad and click Open BI Launch Pad. The report is located on the Audit Analysis folder.

Selection Criteria

Note: Pre-defined filters are set to include only "Web Intelligence" report types, exclude reports containing "do_not_use." and event type include only "Refresh".
Prompt Title Expression Mandatory
Events Started After Only include figures from this event date after the answer to this prompt. No
Events Started Before Only include figures from this event date before the answer to this prompt. No
Note: The report counts refresh events. Only refresh events are counted (for example, when a report is refreshed), not initial openings or modifications.

Generate the Report

To generate the report:

  1. Go to Auditing Analysis » Refresh Instance Overview.
  2. Enter the selection criteria for running the report.
  3. Click Run. The screen refreshes and displays the generated report.

    To keep a copy, click the Download icon. In the dialog box, specify the parameters for the export file (file type, reports and options), then click Export.

Report Description

Universes

The report is based on the following universe(s):

  • SAP universe

Export Fields and Descriptions

The report includes filters to narrow down the time frame for the refresh activity, as well as specific filters for report types and paths to ensure accurate data retrieval.

The report is structured as a cross-tab table, where the Year serves as the primary header and the Month as the subheader, displaying the refresh activity by month within each year. This format allows administrators to easily track report refreshes over time and identify trends in usage, helping to prioritize reports for performance improvements and testing.

The report document is to contain just one report tab named Refresh Instance Overview.

Header Title Sub-header Description
Event Date This displays the date when the current report was generated.
Report Name This column displays the name of reports that have been refreshed within the selected period.

These headers are hardcoded.

Report Path This column displays the path where the report is located.
Date First Run This column displays the date when the report was first refreshed during the selected period.
Last Run This column displays the date when the report was last refreshed during the selected period.
Year Month This column organizes the data by year, with each month listed as a sub-header under the corresponding year.
Total Refresh Instances This column displays the total number of times the report has been refreshed during the selected period.
Note: You can show/hide the Year/Month column by clicking the Toggle icon.

Limitations

None reported.

Admin Setup

Maconomy Setup

Not applicable for this report.

BusinessObjects Setup

Configure Auditing

This procedure is required to generate results for the report.

To configure auditing:

  1. Ensure the auditing database connection is available to BusinessObjects for your database platform (for example, via the appropriate client/driver configuration required in your environment).
    Note: For SQL Server auditing databases, an ODBC connection is commonly used.
  2. Log in to the BusinessObjects Central Management Console (CMC) and select Auditing.
  3. In the configuration section, set the Connection Name to match the auditing database connection name configured for your environment, select the database type, and enter the required credentials.
  4. For Set Events, select Default.
  5. For Set Event Details, enable the required event details for your reporting needs.
    Note: For folder filtering in this report, enable Folder Path Details (see External Setup).

    You can enable event details such as Query, Folder Path Details, Rights Details, and Property Value Details, depending on your reporting needs.

  6. Restart the CentralManagementServer from the Servers tab to apply the auditing changes.

After configuring auditing, it may take time for a newly created auditing database connection to become active.

Note: The "Last polling cycle duration" value is system-controlled and cannot be changed in the Auditing settings.

Import Audit Analysis

This procedure is optional and applies only to self-managed environments. Complete this procedure only if the Audit Analysis folder or the Refresh Instance Overview report is missing.

To import the Audit Analysis content, import the delivered Audit Analysis LCMBIAR file (Oracle or SQL Server variant) using Promotion Management in the Central Management Console (CMC). For step-by-step instructions, see Importing LCMBIAR File with Promotion Management in the BPM Admin Guide.

What Is Included in the Import

The Audit Analysis import includes a connection, the Audit Analysis folder, a universe (from SAP), and the Refresh Instance Overview report.

Update Audit Analysis Connection

This procedure is required after importing Audit Analysis and applies only to self-managed environments.

To update the connection:

  1. Open Information Design Tool (IDT) and connect to your BusinessObjects system.
  2. Locate the Audit Analysis connection and edit it.
  3. Enter the required database parameters and credentials for your auditing database, then save the connection.
  4. Run Refresh Instance Overview to verify the setup.
Note: In Deltek-hosted multi-tenant environments, deployment and connection setup are handled by Deltek administrators.

External Setup

Enable Folder Path Details

To view and filter the folders for the report:

  1. Log into SAP Business Objects.
  2. On the Central Management Console (CMC), select Auditing from the drop-down list.
  3. In the Set Event Details section, enable Folder Path Details.
    Note: You can also enable Property Value Detals to know whether a report is existing or not.

Flush Database

You can reset the values on the database so the refresh count starts from zero.

By default, the counter resets to zero after a year.

Note: The steps below affects all reports.
  1. Log into SAP Business Objects.
  2. On the Central Management Console (CMC), select Applications from the drop-down list.
  3. Select BI Admin » Monitoring Properties.
  4. In the Trending Database Settings section, enable and enter a value in the Delete all history older than [numerical value] of Days checkbox.