Business Intelligence reporting is one of the core components of any Business Intelligence solution. The reporting software, be it web based or client based, provides users with the functionality to extract and display the data.
Basic reporting functionality is available from many software vendors. Most of the large software houses have a presence in the Business Intelligence reporting market – SAP with Business Objects, IBM with Cognos, Microsoft with Reporting Services (SSRS), Oracle with Hyperion and Oracle Reports, and SAS. Smaller niche players are also in the market including Panorama. These players should not be ruled out as they bring to the market innovative products which are often far ahead of their larger competitors.
Reporting is normally delivered in two ways – either client based or web based. Client based reporting, for example Business Objects Desktop Intelligence, provides users with a rich user interface with a great deal of functionality. The second method is web based. This may be either web based and provided by a dedicated company server – for example Business Objects Web Intelligence or Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services, or it can be internet/cloud based – such as the products being developed from Panorama.
Web based reporting is a fairly recent development, and as such, it doesn’t normally offer the full functionality of it’s full client based equivalents. However, technology and performance is always improving, and some companies, Cognos in particular, offer its reporting application on a web platform only. Business Objects has been slowly moving in that direction with its Web Intelligence product.
Most of the reporting applications, as well as allowing users to develop their own reports, can also schedule and send reports to other users. Additionally, they can save and export the reports in a number of different report formats – Excel, PDF, etc.
Some companies take this a step further and embed functionality into Microsoft Office applications. An example of this is ProClarity and Panorama. These applications allow workbooks to be developed and subsequently embedded ‘live’ into Microsoft Excel or Powerpoint. This provides users with the ability to perform a presentation, and allows them to drill into their data sets as and when required, without leaving the application.
When considering a Business Intelligence reporting application, a number of factors should be taken into account. The first of these is functionality. Does the product deliver everything that is being asked of it? If it is important to be able to create charts and tables and save them using a standard template in PDF format, you want to make sure your application can do that.
Second is usability. This is particularly important if your users are going to be developing their own reports. How user friendly is the user interface? Is it straightforward to create reports? It is important to bear in mind that these applications will be reporting from a data warehouse or middle tier. Those applications reporting over a middle tier normally have an advantage in terms of reporting by providing users with a more user friendly way of selecting data. This is done using a drag and drop interface.
Those not providing a middle tier may require users to select specific tables and columns and specify the joins between them – a definite no-no. While the middle tier is more expensive in terms of development and support time and money, it provides a much richer interface for the users to work from. Business Intelligence reporting is there to enable users to extract their information quickly and easily. They don’t necessarily have the knowledge or want to know the underlying data structures. Reporting applications based on this model should be avoided at all costs.
Third is cost, ongoing support and maintenance. Is the system expensive? Can 80% of the functionality be delivered for 20% of the cost with a competitor system? Support is also important – ideally you want to be working with companies offering excellent customer support.
And finally, training. Is the reporting software intuitive? Can it be picked up by the majority of users with a little training? Rolling out a complicated reporting system, requiring weeks of user training may not be very practical and cost effective.