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IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Rule Concepts that are often Forgotten

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Did you know that rules are used in TM1 to perform live calculations without the need for any manual intervention or on-demand scripts? This is a very powerful aspect of Planning Analytics and, when used properly, increase the value of the tool for your users.

There are some aspects of rules that I often see people forgetting. Here are some friendly reminders about how to use these components properly:

Division

TM1 offers two different approaches to write a division formula via the “slash”. Not only do I often forget the difference between the two slashes, but I also sometimes forget the names of each slash.

/

The forward slash; goes bottom left to top right

Division by zero using this operator returns an undefined value

\

The back slash; goes top left to bottom right

Division by zero using this operator returns zero

Mathematical Comparisons

TM1 allows for mathematical comparison of numbers using standard nomenclature such as =, >, < and <>. However, TM1 also offers the ability to compare strings via the same functionality. You can compare strings by simply adding an @ symbol to the nomenclature.

Numeric check:  IF ( numValue = numCounter )

String check: IF ( strValue @= strCounter )

And, Or, Not

When writing comparisons, we often use the AND concept and the OR concept.  AND is written by using the ampersand symbol ( & ) and OR is written by using the percent symbol ( % ). But did you know that you can also write NOT by using the tilde ( ~ ).

~( x = 5 ) is the same as writing ( x <> 5 )

Rules are a very powerful component of Planning Analytics. Hopefully these components help you continue creating efficient code.

IBM Planning Analytics, which TM1 is the engine for, is full of new features and functionality. Not sure where to start? Our team here at Revelwood can help. Contact us for more information at info@revelwood.com. And stay tuned for more Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks weekly in our Knowledge Center and in upcoming newsletters!

Learn more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Creating Selectors in Planning Analytics Workspace

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Creating Buttons in Planning Analytics Workspace

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Synchronizing Selectors in Planning Analytics Workspace

Need more guidance? Take a look at our IBM Planning Analytics Training services and our Customer Care Program.

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Learn how to Create Reports in Adaptive Insights

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HTML reports are the “bread and butter” of the finance professional. We’ve created a short demo video of how to easily create reports in Adaptive Insights.

In this video, part of our series The Capabilities of Adaptive Insights, Ken DiSessa shows you how to create a variance report looking at a budget versus actuals. He discusses the color coding and icons in Adaptive Insights, how to drill down into details, and the powerful explore cell feature.

Watch Reporting in Adaptive Insights and you’ll learn how to create a new report using filters and parameters.

Did you miss the first video in our series?

Check out Dashboarding in Adaptive Insights.

Learn more about Revelwood and Adaptive Insights:

Revelwood Named Adaptive Insights Partner Rising Star of the Year

Revelwood’s Insights on Adaptive Live 2019

Adaptive Insights Earned Gartner Peer Insights Customer Choice Award for Best Cloud Financial Planning and Analysis Solutions of 2019

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IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: How to Manipulate Case Used for Text

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Did you know IBM Planning Analytics rules can be used to manipulate the case used for text?  There are rules to change values into both uppercase and lowercase.

UPPER

Converts an entire string to upper case

UPPER(‘Lee Lazarow wrote this’) becomes LEE LAZAROW WROTE THIS

LOWER

Converts entire string to lower case

LOWER(‘Lee Lazarow wrote this’) becomes lee lazarow wrote this

CAPIT

Converts the first letter of each work to upper case

CAPIT(‘Lee Lazarow wrote this’) becomes Lee Lazarow Wrote This

But what if you only want to capitalize the very first character?  You can do this by using these commands in conjunction with the LONG and the SUBST formulas. 

Here is an example of a set of rules that show various ways to manipulate a text string.

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Rules for Capitalization

By combining formulas together in Planning Analytics, text can easily be manipulated in a variety of ways.

IBM Planning Analytics, which TM1 is the engine for, is full of new features and functionality. Not sure where to start? Our team here at Revelwood can help. Contact us for more information at info@revelwood.com. And stay tuned for more Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks weekly in our Knowledge Center and in upcoming newsletters!

Learn more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Ways to Stop a TI Process

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Ways to Skip a Record Using a TI Process

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: How to Maintain a Hierarchy via a TurboIntegrator Process

Need more guidance? Take a look at our IBM Planning Analytics Training services and our Customer Care Program.

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Revelwood Launches “The Capabilities of Adaptive Insights” Video Demo Series

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We’ve exciting news for those who follow our award-winning Adaptive Insights practice. This week we’re launching a new four-part YouTube series, The Capabilities of Adaptive Insights.

In these short videos Revelwood’s Ken DiSessa walks you through how quickly and easily you can do specific activities and tasks in Adaptive Insights cloud-based business planning software. The first video, Dashboarding in Adaptive Insights features Ken demonstrating how easy it is to use Adaptive Insight’s dashboard capability. He’ll show you how to build some of the 13 different types of charts, including KPI charts, bar charts, pie charts and more.

You’ll also be able to see how some things that are extremely difficult and hard in Excel are easy in Adaptive – specifically, waterfall charts.

Subscribe to Revelwood’s YouTube channel to watch all the videos in our series on The Capabilities of Adaptive Insights.  

Learn more about Revelwood and Adaptive Insights:

Revelwood Named Adaptive Insights Partner Rising Star of the Year

Revelwood’s Insights on Adaptive Live 2019

Adaptive Insights Earned Gartner Peer Insights Customer Choice Award for Best Cloud Financial Planning and Analysis Solutions of 2019

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IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Ways to Stop a TI Process

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Did you know there are two different ways to stop a TurboIntegrator script?

The ProcessBreak command stops processing source data and proceeds directly to the Epilog.  This approach allows you still run code in the Epilog that can perform tasks such as deleting subsets, writing to a process tracking cube, or running other processes.

Here is an example of skipping the data and metadata section if a parameter called pVersion does not exist:

            IF ( DIMIX ( ‘Version’, pVersion) = 0 );
                 PROCESSBREAK;
            ENDIF;

As you can see, there are no parameters to this command.  You use this by simply telling Planning Analytics to go to the Epilog.

If, however, you want to completely end the process then you can use the ProcessQuit command.  This command completely terminates the process without running anything in the Epilog.  Here is an example of doing the same check with ProcessQuit.

            IF ( DIMIX ( ‘Version’, pVersion) = 0 );
                 PROCESSQUIT;
            ENDIF;

It’s up to you to determine how you want to stop a TI script from processing.

IBM Planning Analytics, which TM1 is the engine for, is full of new features and functionality. Not sure where to start? Our team here at Revelwood can help. Contact us for more information at info@revelwood.com. And stay tuned for more Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks weekly in our Knowledge Center and in upcoming newsletters!

Learn more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Ways to Skip a Record Using a TI Process

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Creating Selectors in Planning Analytics Workspace

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Creating Buttons in Planning Analytics Workspace

Need more guidance? Take a look at our IBM Planning Analytics Training services and our Customer Care Program.

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IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Ways to Skip a Record Using a TI Process

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Did you know there are two different ways to skip specific records when you are running TurboIntegrator scripts?

ItemSkip is used to skip a specific record. This is often nested within an IF statement and used when you want to simply ignore a record. Here is an example of skipping a record if a variable called vValue is negative:

            IF ( vValue < 0 );
                 ITEMSKIP;
            ENDIF;

As you can see, there are no parameters to this command. You use this by simply telling Planning Analytics to skip the record.

If, however, you want to skip the record and create a record in the error log then you can use the ItemReject command. This command allows you to customize the message that appears in the log. Here is an example of rejecting the same record using ItemReject.

            IF ( vValue < 0 );
                 ITEMREJECT (‘The value is less than zero.’);
            ENDIF;

It’s up to you to determine how you want to skip records.

IBM Planning Analytics, which TM1 is the engine for, is full of new features and functionality. Not sure where to start? Our team here at Revelwood can help. Contact us for more information at info@revelwood.com. And stay tuned for more Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks weekly in our Knowledge Center and in upcoming newsletters!

Learn more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks:

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Creating Selectors in Planning Analytics Workspace

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Creating Buttons in Planning Analytics Workspace

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Synchronizing Selectors in Planning Analytics Workspace

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Revelwood Partners Adaptive Insights and IBM Earn High Ratings in BPM Partners’ BPM Pulse Survey

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BPM Partners’ BPM Pulse Survey is in its 16th year, and yet again Revelwood partners Adaptive Insights and IBM have both earned high ratings in the annual survey of business performance management vendors.

According to Craig Schiff of BPM Partners, the survey revealed that users of performance management systems are primarily looking for three main features when they evaluate BPM solutions:

  • Ease of use;
  • Performance and scalability; and
  • A single user interface for budget owners outside of finance.

Additionally, Schiff mentioned that users strongly prefer vendors who have integrations with existing systems.

This year’s survey revealed a very interesting key trend: the “rebirth” of dashboards. Users reported that they’ve added dashboards on to most projects, that dashboards are used to deliver analytics, that they have a desire for interactive, drillable dashboards, and that in some cases they have multiple dashboards throughout a solution for specific use cases.

The BPM Pulse survey also found that users have a focus on granular profitability analysis. That focus, however, is different based on industry. Currently the pre-packaged options are limited. It also creates system challenges around volume and performance.

Adaptive Insights’ Rating in the BPM Pulse Survey

Adaptive was named a top-rated vendor in 2019 for the key category of budgeting/planning functionality. The company had an overall score of 4.31 (out of 5) and was cited for its extended market reach, AI capabilities and anomaly detection. Adaptive Insights was also recognized for its comprehensive solution, integrations, data visualization, operational analytics, collaboration, and clean/intuitive user interface.  The survey found that Adaptive Insights was most often selected for its product flexibility. Its highest functional rating in the BPM Pulse survey was for budgeting/planning.

BPM Partners BPM Pulse Survey Adaptive Insights Ratings

IBM’s Rating in the BPM Pulse Survey

IBM was named a top-rated vendor for Planning Analytics’ budgeting/planning functionality as well. The company had an overall score of 4.28. The webinar for the BPM Pulse Survey cited the company’s business performance management offerings’ latest enhancements as including “cloud-based administration and modeling, seamless switching between web and Excel views, and more. Users selected Planning Analytics for its product flexibility and its highest functional rating in the BPM Pulse survey was for reporting.

BPM Partners BPM Pulse Survey IBM and IBM Planning Analytics Ratings

 Watch BPM Partners’ webinar – in conjunction with Industry Week – here.

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IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Best Practices for Hierarchies

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Did you know IBM Planning Analytics hierarchies are used to see alternative data rollups in the same view? By default, all dimensions include a single hierarchy based on the original definition.

Creating multiple hierarchies in a dimension is initially disabled in Planning Analytics Workspace. The EnableNewHierarchyCreation parameter must be set to true in the server’s tm1s.cfg file to enable hierarchy creation. This is a static parameter, which means you will need to restart the server once you change the parameter value.

Hierarchies should be maintained via TurboIntegrator (TI) processes whenever possible. For example, when changes are made to the attribute that was originally used to create an attribute-based hierarchy, the associated hierarchy is not automatically updated. The user must delete and recreate the hierarchy to see the changes reflected in the model.

Hierarchies that have been created manually or via TI process can have any structure, while attribute-based hierarchies always have three levels: a total, the attribute values, and the leaves. A hierarchy must be maintained manually or via TI process if it is asymmetric, its elements belong to more than one parent, or it requires more than three levels.

IBM Planning Analytics, which TM1 is the engine for, is full of new features and functionality. Not sure where to start? Our team here at Revelwood can help. Contact us for more information at info@revelwood.com. And stay tuned for more Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks weekly in our Knowledge Center and in upcoming newsletters!

Read more IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks Blogs:

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: The Benefits of Using Hierarchies

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Creating a Simple Dashboard in Planning Analytics Workspace

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: The Ranked Report

Need more guidance? Take a look at our IBM Planning Analytics Training services and our Customer Care Program.

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IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: How to Maintain a Hierarchy via a TurboIntegrator Process

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Did you know it is best practice to maintain a hierarchy in Planning Analytics via TurboIntegrator (TI) process whenever possible? There are five key functions that can be used to do so.

HierarchyExists(DimName, HierName)

HierarchyExists is used to determine whether a specific hierarchy already exists on the server. The first parameter is the name of the dimension that contains the hierarchy to check, and the second parameter is the name of the hierarchy to check.

HierarchyCreate(DimName, HierName)

HierarchyCreate is used to create a new hierarchy in an existing dimension. The first parameter is the name of the dimension in which to create the hierarchy, and the second parameter is the name of the hierarchy to create.

HierarchyDeleteAllElements(DimName, HierName)

HierarchyDeleteAllElements deletes all elements from a hierarchy. The first parameter is the name of the dimension in which the hierarchy exists, and the second parameter is the name of the hierarchy from which to delete all elements.

HierarchyElementInsert(DimName, HierName, InsertionPoint, ElName, ElType)

HierarchyElementInsert adds an element to a hierarchy. The first and second parameters are once again used to specify the names of the applicable dimension and hierarchy (respectively). The third parameter can be used to specify the element before which the new element will be inserted. If it’s left blank, the new element will be inserted at the end of the dimension. The fourth parameter is the name of the new element, and the fifth parameter is the element type. The letter N signifies a numeric element, the letter S signifies a string element, and the letter C signifies a consolidated element.

HierarchyElementComponentAdd(DimName, HierName, ConsolidatedElName, ElName, ElWeight)

HierarchyElementComponentAdd adds a child to a consolidated element. The first and second parameters are once again used to specify the names of the applicable dimension and hierarchy (respectively). The third parameter is the name of the parent or consolidated element, the fourth parameter is the name of the child element, and the fifth parameter is the weight of the child element in the consolidation.

The following code example is used to create the Delivery Format hierarchy in the Publication dimension of this server. The metadata section of the code could then use attribute values or information from the data source to determine where in the hierarchy to place each base level publication.

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: How to maintain a hierarchy via a TurboIntegrator Process

The full list of hierarchy manipulation TI functions can be found here.

IBM Planning Analytics, which TM1 is the engine for, is full of new features and functionality. Not sure where to start? Our team here at Revelwood can help. Contact us for more information at info@revelwood.com. And stay tuned for more Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks weekly in our Knowledge Center and in upcoming newsletters!

Read more blog posts in the IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks Series:

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: The Benefits of Using Hierarchies

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Workarounds for Unsupported Excel Functions in TM1 Web

IBM Planning Analytics Tips & Tricks: Recaclulating Excel Worksheets

Need more help? Learn about our Customer Care options for IBM Planning Analytics & TM1 users. 

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