Kitchener, Ontario, Canada - April 1, 2008 - BusinessObjects XI 3.0 is now available, adding more functionality than ever to the XI platform. In turn, even more opportunities exist for APOS BI Tools to extend the new XI 3.0 platform and help you maximize on your investments in business intelligence.

"We're pleased to announce that all APOS BI Tools for XI R2 will be available soon for the new BusinessObjects XI 3.0 platform. Our developers are working feverishly - migration is going very well, with some APOS BI Tools already available for XI 3.0."
...Ofir Gil, Vice President, Product

These APOS BI Tools for BusinessObjects XI 3.0 are now available for download:

• Instance Monitor
• Run Time Manager
• View Time Security
• AddressBook Gateway

This list is growing regularly - please check our downloads page or drop us a line for more information. View our recent Press Release for APOS support information for BusinessObjects XI 3.0.

"Bursting Manager will save the accounting staff a considerable amount of time with regards to running and sending out reports."

Tools Used:

Bursting Manager and View Time Security for BusinessObjects XIR2.

Background:

The Oregon Liquor Control Commission (OLCC) holds the exclusive right to sell packaged distilled spirits in the state, which are dispersed statewide from a distribution center in Portland and sold in 243 retail liquor stores operated by contracted agents. The agency is headquartered in Portland with regional offices in Bend, Eugene, Medford and Salem. OLCC's mission is to promote the public interest through the responsible sales and service of alcoholic beverages.

Challenge:

OLCC is continually looking for new ways to better serve the agency and the public with new technology. They were in the midst of migrating to the Business Objects platform from a different environment. With a Business Objects recommendation and some investigation into what the APOS BI Tools had to offer, OLCC contacted APOS Systems for a proactive security solution, to ensure the most effective security measures had been implemented as a breach of security would be very costly.

Solution:

OLCC purchased APOS Bursting Manager and APOS View Time Security. These tools had the functionality that OLCC was looking for. "There was no disruption to install the APOS Tools; that was easy," claimed Frank Fraijo, Database Administrator.

The Bursting Manager tool enables OLCC to burst, distribute and print all at once.

OLCC also purchased View Time Security which utilizes business rules to apply row level security to reports. Report content is filtered for the current user; whether running a report now, scheduling a report, or viewing a saved report instance. Row level security rules can be applied by user group to facilitate powerful data filtering while minimizing entitlement database maintenance requirements. View Time Security allows OLCC to assign business rules by report name to quickly apply the same row level security to a specific report across all occurrences in all folders, minimizing entitlement data maintenance requirements.

Why APOS?

"APOS support was excellent to work with. They were easy to access and they gave me additional ideas on how to better utilize the software tools that we purchased. APOS is the greatest in supporting their software. I look forward to working with them again in the future."

View this case study in full and other APOS case studies here.

Contact apos@apos.com to have your company featured in an APOS Case Study.

APOS has been extending business intelligence with our APOS BI Tools suite for many years - starting with Seagate Info, then Crystal Enterprise, then the powerful XI platform which brings us to today where our focus is on supporting the new XI 3.0 version. In our travels within the user community, we're often asked... "What's with all these tools, why do they all exist?"

Well, there are 4 reasons that come to mind... Some APOS BI Tools are full-client solutions, meaning that our customers can perform their desired actions in a more powerful way on large groups of items, instead of using a web-based approach that tends to deal with activities one at a time or in smaller groups. This is one reason APOS BI Tools appeal to power users and administrators. Examples include Instance Manager, InfoScheduler and Object Manager. Some APOS BI Tools have a narrow focus on extending functionality of specific aspects of XI, to deal more aggressively with specific customer needs. Examples include Bursting Manager, Distribution Server, KPI, Instance Monitor, Report Package Booster. Some APOS BI Tools deliver new functionality not included in the XI platform itself. Examples include AddressBook Gateway, Archive Manager, InfoScheduler, RealTime Monitor, RunTime Manager. Some APOS BI Tools focus on platform integration, bridging the gap from XI to other environments delivering integration solutions not available with the XI platform itself. Examples include our Integration Kits for ESRI GIS, for Microsoft Outlook and for crystalreports.com. It's a long answer to a short question. Please let us know if we can help you maximize your business intelligence investment.

KPI extracts metadata about virtually all aspects of your BusinessObjects XI operational activity, refreshing an external database with a wealth of information for subsequent analysis. KPI now extends BOE Auditor further than ever before.

Here are just a few KPI feature highlights...

• system status snapshots - current load and activity levels of all BusinessObjects XI components
  
• system structure snapshots - current information about servers, users, user groups, folders, reports
  
• report design snapshots - current information about the report design content of all your reports
  
• Universe provided to merge BOE Auditor data with KPI data for the ultimate in activity analysis
  
• track schedule, view on demand and historical instance viewing activity
  
• track instances/schedules for List Of Values objects as well as the LOV objects themselves
  
• track report fields that are not actually on the report (i.e. fields in formulas, summary fields etc.)
  
• track extended report information
  
• track the relationships between Universes and Reports

And now for some new features recently added...

• new Universe tracking options:
  
  • include Table Strategies
    
  • include Join Strategies
    
  • include DB Tables
    
  • include DB Columns
    
  • include Calendars
    
  • exclude Applications
• track any Business Calendar id's that schedules are based on
• track all Business Calendars
• new DeskTop Intelligence report tracking
  
  • Universe fields
    
  • all fields that exist
    
• track the total count of hyperlinks per Crystal report as well as a comma delimited string of the actual hyperlinks
• enhanced control of Universe information, more control over tracking details

Visit here to view a short web demo and learn more about KPI.

Request an evaluation download to see how KPI can help your organization.

Object Manager enables powerful report promotion and bulk maintenance of objects (reports, folders, users, groups, etc.) using a full client tool, instead of just one object at a time with the Central Management Console.

Object Manager is one of the most popular members of the APOS BI Tools suite.

These are just a few highlights of the most popular features of Object Manager:

• User Maintenance - bulk editing
  
• Object Settings - bulk editing
  
• Security and Limits Management - bulk editing
  
• User Preferences Management - bulk editing
  
• Report and Universe Promotion - powerful enhancement

Recently added new features include...

Application Security Management

• maintain security rights on users and groups for application objects inside BOE
  

Category Management

• property management capability of public and personal categories
  
• create new XI categories or remove XI categories
  

Parameter Management

• export a list of initial parameter values for backup

Report Promotion

• update default parameter values on reports during promotion
  
• performance improvements with new folder loading technique
  
• user folders broken down into alphabetical subfolders

Usability Enhancements

• new category maintenance menu structure with sub menus and Public/Personal support

Visit here for a full feature list and a web demo of Object Manager for BusinessObjects XI.

Request an evaluation download to see how Object Manager can help your organization.