WebFOCUS Newsletter December 2003 - An Introduction to Open Portal Services

WebFOCUS Business Intelligence Dashboard is an excellent means of deploying your WebFOCUS applications to end users in a secure, manageable environment. Users can access all the content and WebFOCUS end-user tools to which they have access in personalized views through a Web browser.

Much of this functionality sounds a lot like an enterprise information portal (EIP). So the question arises, What if your organization already has an EIP and requires, or you simply desire, to make all of your employee Web-based activities accessible to it? You already have links to your data-capture systems, corporate news feeds, 401K tracking, HR benefits documentation, Web e-mail access and much more. Why shouldn’t your enterprise business intelligence standard be a part of this framework?

In can be incorporated, and it’s easy to do.

As with everything in the world of WebFOCUS, there are multiple ways of achieving your goal. There are three main methods of integrating WebFOCUS content into your portal:

1. Using standard Web links to WebFOCUS applications and content

2. Creating Web services from WebFOCUS for consumption by your portal

3. Using WebFOCUS Open Portal Services

This article introduces the third option, leveraging WebFOCUS Open Portal Services to deploy Dashboard content into any of the many supported enterprise information portals. Supported portals include: Plumtree, Epicentric, PeopleSoft, SAP, CA/Portal, and more.

Information Builders has developed native integrations based on each of the vendors’ specifications to allow the component technologies within the Dashboard to be exposed to and consumed by these EIPs. Each EIP uses it owns naming conventions for content blocks, such as Webparts, Portlets, Pagelets and iViews. Whatever the portal naming conventions, all portals call the same WebFOCUS Dashboard component technology.

Components and Implementation

WebFOCUS 5 delivers close to a dozen components. Here are some of the available components; all are securely integrated to provide user specific access without requiring users to retype credentials again and again:

Domain and Role Tree: A user- or role-specific categorical grouping of WebFOCUS content. The content in WebFOCUS domains is constantly changing at most sites, and this enables users to always see the latest available content specific to them.

Report Viewer (Launch, List or Folder): A user-defined display of report content that users can access. Content can be displayed as a launch item (displayed immediately in the portal), as a user-selected list of links, or as a folder with a dynamically changing list of content contained within it. Users may have multiple Report Viewer components displayed on their portal page.

Fixed Reports: A content block containing a specific fixed report defined by an administrator. When personalization of a report is not desired, administrators can define content that will always be displayed in a component.

WebFOCUS Search: As more content becomes available, it is increasingly necessary to enable users to quickly find what they need. The search component can be a pop-up tool or displayed right in the portal based on user and site preferences.

Quick Links to Dashboard Views, Library and ReportCaster: When running the live reports from within the EIP isn’t enough, quick links provide access to the full Business Intelligence Dashboard and other important WebFOCUS technology.

Favorites: Save a list of your favorite reports, accessible with the click of a button.

Each portal environment supports its own unique method for registering or consuming external content. Each WebFOCUS component is accessed via a URL with required and optional parameters passed from the portal environment. For WebFOCUS to know how to process and return the component, the WebFOCUS servlet needs a portalType init parameter added. For example, in the case of the PeopleSoft Enterprise Portal, the portalType parameter is set to peoplesoft.

After the necessary init parameter has been defined in the WebFOCUS servlet, many of the components can be called directly from the browser to test functionality. For a default installation environment, entering the following URL into your browser address bar will test the Domain Tree component.

http://hostname/ibi_apps/components/woas/
domain/WOAS_domain.jsp?SID=USER

hostname refers to the Web server where the WebFOCUS Client has been installed. USER refers to a valid dashboard user, such as "admin," without a password.

PeopleSoft Portal Example

The best way to demonstrate the portal integration is through a specific example. In this case, I have developed a few reports within my simplified WebFOCUS Business Intelligence Dashboard environment. Look at Screen 1 for a view of my Human Resources domain, containing a few custom folders, and a launch page with a single report.

Screen 1

From the perspective of the PeopleSoft Portal, the user simply personalizes his or her portal page to include those WebFOCUS components that will make the user more productive. The portal administrator registers the WebFOCUS components and enables user access. Screen 2 is an example of the reports deployed in the PeopleSoft Enterprise Portal.

Screen 2

All your standard WebFOCUS functionality is available from within your third-party portal environment. This includes live drill-downs within your reports, the ability to create My Reports and share them, even full parameterized reporting capabilities. Like designing content for the Business Intelligence Dashboard, reports intended to be displayed immediately need to have certain design considerations taken into account such as look and feel, size and quick performance.

So now you can see how easy it is to leverage your enterprise business intelligence capabilities and deploy them into your already ubiquitous enterprise portal. Lastly, don’t worry about losing the hard work you put into developing your Dashboard applications. Those are still accessible. In fact, you can see a “quick link,” displayed right in your enterprise portal.

Once you have taken the steps described in this article, you will be empowering your users to get access to the information they need when, and where they need it – right at the point of business.