biExport Release 2.5
We are happy to announce availability of biExport version 2.5!
This blog post shall give you an overview of the most important new functions and changes. For detailed release notes, please check the IMPORTANT RELEASE INFORMATION document, which is available in the download area of the website.
New Installer Package
The biExport plugin for OPENBI can now be installed and updated easily with three clicks only:
- Start the Installer Executable
- Choose the OPENBI Installation and the plugin to install.
- Start the Installation
The installer can be used to install biExport for SAP Lumira Designer, Lumira Discovery, Design Studio, Lumira Desktop, SAP (BW), biAnalytics and Web. Also, the Load Balancer plugin can be chosen.
Image Export Enhancement: Support of latest CSS styling for Office exports
SAP Lumira Designer 2.x introduced some new CSS styles. Also some custom CSS styles that are used by customers can only be interpreted correctly with the latest web clients. As biExport has to use a background web client for the transformation of HTML to images, users so far may have faced differences between the online dashboard and the export document.
With biExport 2.5 we are using the latest web client versions for the transfer.
New Scheduling Features
biExport has already provided feature-rich, highly customizable and easy to use scheduling, broadcasting and information bursting functions for quite a while. An example can be found here: http://www.designstudio-export.com/blog/broadcasting-information-bursting-scheduling-with-sap-design-studio-lumira-designer-136
With the new scheduleExport() script method it is now easier than ever to schedule a reoccurring export for a specific user. It is an enhancement to the existing doExport() method:
var lschedule = OPENBIEXPORT_1.createSchedulingDefinition("", "", "", "", 5, 2, "minutely");
OPENBIEXPORT_1.scheduleExport("PDF", lschedule, "my_user");
“my_user” must be replaced by the SAP BO user, whose data authorization shall be used for the export.
Refresh biExport document
With biExport, for end users exporting data of a dashboard into PowerPoint, Word and Excel has always been as simple as clicking a button.
If they wanted to refresh the document with the newest data, however, they had to open the dashboard first and click on the button once again.
Now with the new release 2.5, end-users can use our Office add-on biAnalytics to refresh the documents directly in Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel!
During the refresh process, they are asked to login to the system. Then, most actual data are fetched. If defined, the user can even change selection variables. Finally, the data are used to update and re-render charts and tables.
Though this would already be cool enough, the end user even gains two additional features with biAnalytics Office:
- Data provider views can be interactively changed in order to refine filters and drilldowns
- Additional data providers and data views, which have not been provided by the dashboard, can be added easily
It’s no overstatement that the combination of biExport SAP and biAnalytics Office therewith takes integration of different end user tools to a level, which has never been known in the SAP world!
Stay tuned for a separate blog post on the benefits of refreshing biExport documents from Microsoft Office! 
Create native charts
So far, biExport has included charts as images into Word, PowerPoint and Excel documents. The goal was to create an exact 1:1 copy of the chart definition as defined in SAP Design Studio or Lumira Designer.
For certain scenarios however, the better option is to create a native Office Chart, which integrates perfectly into the Office document. Refreshing the biExport document (see above) is one of these scenarios.
Our powerful translation engine ensures that all parameters of the chart (type, colors, layout) are taken into account!
In order to create native charts, you simply have to set the new Export component property “biAnalytics document” to true. Alternatively you can use the placeholder suffix “:NATIVE” to create a native chart.
Stay tuned for a separate blog post on how to use this new feature!
Export for biAnalytics
biExport now also supports creating export documents from our unique BI dashboarding tool biAnalytics Cloud! More information on biAnalytics Cloud can be found on www.bianalytics.cloud.
At bi excellence, we love to create tools that interact perfectly and therewith create the best possible user experience! So, what we create as add-ons for SAP Design Studio, Lumira Desginer, Lumira Discovery and Lumira Desktop, is already built-in seamlessly into our own analytical products!
Stay tuned for a separate blog post on the easiness and deep integration of biExport into biAnalytics!
Support for Custom Export Publishers
We regularly receive special requirements from our customers that we happily build into the biExport solution.
Even though the standard functions already cover a lot of export features and publish modes (also known as “output channels”), it might be necessary to enhance them, e.g.
- to connect your own web service, which the export document shall be published to
- to add a special HTML parser for a custom component (which is needed to export them as native elements)
This can be now easily achieved by writing your own plugin! For this, biExport uses the extremely flexible plugin framework of OPENBI
