Next Generation Outline Extractor 2.0.5.1073 released

In the last week or so, we placed an updated version of the Next Generation Outline Extractor on our website. This version provides support for some updated Essbase versions, including 11.1.2.4.002, 11.1.2.4.003, and 11.1.2.4.005. More importantly, it addresses a bug where alias names were improperly associated with parent members when using the MaxL extraction source.. This bug was reported to us by a number of users and we are glad we were able to address it. Here is a list of the issues that were addressed:

2015.11.23 - Issue 1401 - Resolved an issue where only one alias table is exported when using MaxL as the extract source.

2015.11.23 - Issue 1402 - Resolved an issue where extracts using MaxL input and having members specified with Unicode may print incorrect characters in the output.

2015.11.23 - Issue 1403 - Resolved an issue where aliases and udas may have been improperly placed on parent members.

Please contact our support team if you have any issues.

Next Generation Outline Extractor 2.0.4.887 Released

We recently released an updated version of the Next Generation Outline Extractor. This new version, 2.0.4.887, addresses three issues:

• Fixed an issue where the username and password passed via the command line were improperly logged
• Fixed an issue reading MaxL XML data sources when the alias or UDA contained xml encoded characters such as the ampersand (&) character.
• Updated labels on the Input Source tab of the user interface to clarify their purpose.

Here is a screenshot showing the updated labeling.

Due to the architecture of the Oracle Essbase APIs, it is generally much faster to use the MaxL Outline XML extracts when processing an Essbase Outline extract.  The Next Generation Outline Extractor still uses the Essbase Java API during this extract, but it is able to minimize the number of calls.  The second option shown above, Extract and Process MaxL Outline XML, will automatically extract the Outline XML from the cube during the processing.  The third option shown, Use Previously Extracted MaxL Outline XML, uses (obviously) an Outline XML file that has already been extracted.

Thank you to everyone who reported issues or made suggestions as you help make this utility better!

Next Generation Outline Extractor - New Version Available

Today we released a new version of the Next Generation Outline Extractor, version 2.0.3.769.  Here are the release notes from this new version:

Version 2.0.3.769 supports the following Essbase versions:

9.3.1
9.3.1.1
9.3.1.2
9.3.3
11.1.1
11.1.1.1
11.1.1.2
11.1.1.3
11.1.1.4
11.1.2
11.1.2.1
11.1.2.1.102
11.1.2.1.103
11.1.2.1.104
11.1.2.1.105
11.1.2.1.106
11.1.2.2
11.1.2.2.102
11.1.2.2.103
11.1.2.2.104
11.1.2.3
11.1.2.3.001
11.1.2.3.002
11.1.2.3.003
11.1.2.3.500
11.1.2.3.501
11.1.2.3.502
11.1.2.3.505
11.1.2.4

Issues resolved in version 2.0.3.769:

2015.02.15 - Issue 1355 - All Writers - Add functionality to replace all line feeds, carriage returns, tabs, and extraneous spaces in formulas

2015.02.13 - Issue 1354 - RelationalWriter - Changed the default database name from dodeca to extractor

2015.02.13 - Issue 1353 - RelationalWriter - Added CONSOLIDATION_TYPE_SYMBOL, SHARE_FLAG_SYMBOL, TIME_BALANCE, TIME_BALANCE_SYMBOL, TIME_BALANCE_SKIP, TIME_BALANCE_SKIP_SYMBOL, EXPENSE_FLAG, EXPENSE_FLAG_SYMBOL, TWO_PASS_FLAG, and TWO_PASS_FLAG_SYMBOL columns to the CACHED_OUTLINE_MEMBERS table

2015.02.13 - Issue 1352 - RelationalWriter - Added Server, Application, and Cube columns to the CACHED_OUTLINE_VERSIONS table

2015.02.13 - Issue 1351 - Fixed issue with LoadFileWriter where UDA column headers were incorrectly written in the form UDAS0,DimName instead of UDA0,DimName

In addition, a number of fixes, etc, were put into 2.0.2 and earlier releases and those releases went unannounced.  Those updates included the following items:

1. There is no longer a default .properties file for the Extractor.  This will force a user to specify a .properties file.  (2.0.2.601)
2. Removed the "/" character as a switch for command line arguments as it causes problems in Linux. (2.0.2.605)
3. Fixed issue when combining MaxL input with relational output where a "not supported" error message would appear due to certain properties were not being read correctly from the XML file (2.0.2.601)
4. Command line operations resulted in an error due to an improper attempt to interact with the GUI progress bar. (2.0.2.601)
5. Shared members attributes where not be properly written resulting in a delimiter/column count mismatch. (2.0.2.625)
6. Added encoding options where a user can choose between UTF-8 and ANSI encodings.  The Extractor will attempt to detect encoding from selected outline and, if the detected outline encoding is different from the user selected outline encoding, a warning message appears.

File Encoding in the Next Generation Outline Extractor

We had a couple of issues reported with the output of the Next Generation Outline Extractor where the exported file did not work properly as a load file. After some investigation, we found that the file encoding was incorrect. We were encoding the files using the Unicode/UTF-8 format. We chose this encoding so that we could write all characters in all languages, but we did not consider that UTF-8 is only valid for loading Unicode databases in Essbase.

To resolve this issue, we decided to add a configuration to the Next Generation Outline Extractor to allow users to select the file encoding. Here is a screenshot showing the new configuration setting.



As of yesterday, December 8, 2014, the updated Next Generation Outline Extractor is available on our website. The first version to feature this functionality is version 2.0.2.692. Version 2.0.2.692 is available for all Essbase versions from Essbase 9.3.1 forward. We are also happy to announce that his version of the Next Generation Outline Extractor is the first version to support the recently released Essbase 11.1.2.3.505.

If you encounter any issues with the Next Generation Outline Extractor, please don't hesitate to contact our support team at support@appliedolap.com.