Oracle Report Manager

Tips, Tricks and Traps

Prithis Das

1
Agenda

Objectives

Case Study Company Background

Reporting background

Report Manager features

What Report Manager does not do

Setup Considerations

Quick Tutorial

Using Report Manager – Tips

Using Report Manager – Tricks

Traps

Lessons learned

2
Objectives

Provide useful information for R12 implementation teams for
implementation of Oracle General Ledger, Financial
Statement Generator and Report Manager

Indirectly “educate” users about new R12 Report Manager
features

Help avoid potential pitfalls using actual experience from
implementing Report Manager

3
Case Study Company Background

Auto Salvage Company

New implementation of R12

Started April 2007 with very early releases of R12

General Ledger, Payables, Assets, Cash Management,
Advanced Global Intercompany System

120+ Legal Entities

Six regional accounting centers

Complex reporting requirements

400+ legacy reports using best-of-breed reporting tool

4
Reporting Background

Complex reporting requirements

400+ legacy financial reports using dedicated
reporting tool

Typical Trial Balance took over 15 minutes to
generate

Legacy Reports in Excel, and included publishing
features such as fonts, bold and underlining

Lack of security – Users were able to access all
reports across legal entities

5
Report Manager features

Report Manager is an integral part of Oracle EBS

Assumes implementation of Oracle General Ledger
incorporating Financial Statement Generator (FSG)

Provides an online repository to store and access financial
reports

Personalized look and feel on financial reports

Reports can be submitted and accessed through Web
browser. Hence jinitiator need not be installed if user
accesses Report Manager only.

Incorporates security rules to restrict access to published
content

6
What Report Manager does not do

You cannot create FSG components (Row Sets, Column Sets
etc) in Report Manager. These will need to be created
through standard FSG

Excel outputs from Report Manager will not incorporate
Excel formulas

Excel templates do not save all formatting options

Works well with FSG reports. However Standard reports in
Oracle will have formatting issues

7
Setup Considerations

Patchset level – Metalink 820653.1 (9 Jul 2009)
 Check for latest before implementation
 For 11.5.10.2 apply FRM.H over and above FRM.G
 For R12 Report Manager is Auto-installed. Apply FRM.A

Report Manager uses Self Service Workflow
Applications

Report Manager requires the BNE platform used by Web
ADI

Functional Dependancies
 FSGs should have been defined in GL
 For standard reports, they should be assigned to Request Group
assigned to the Report Manager

Custom menu and responsibility for Report Manager

Browser and Excel settings

Seeded template vs Custom templates

8
Custom menu and responsibility

Pre-defined menus for Report Manager are not complete
 “FRM_SECURITY_MENU” menu is pre-defined but not adequate

Need to define/assign additional functions to custom menu:
 Financial Report Template Editor
 Financial Report Submission
 Standard Report Submission
 Repository Management

Alternatively, you may add these functions to the
“GL_SUPERUSER” menu

9
Custom menu and responsibility

Create custom menu for Report Manager
 System Administrator > Application > Menu

10
Custom menu and responsibility

Create custom Responsibility for Report Manager

11
Browser and Excel Settings

Works with Internet Explorer, Firefox, Netscape
 See Metalink 389422.1 (5-Aug-09) for latest browser requirements

Internet Explorer Settings
 Navigate to Tools -> Internet Options and choose the Security tab
 Select Local Intranet and choose the Custom Level button.
 Set the following option to Prompt.
 Initialize and script Active X controls not marked as safe

Excel Settings
 Open Excel, Go to Tools -> Macro -> Security -> Trusted Sources
 Check the "Trust access to Visual Basic Project“

Incorrect settings will lead to error “Microsoft VBScript
runtime error: 429 - ActiveX component can't create object”
or similar error.

12
Quick Tutorial

Create a Template

Submit a single FSG report

Monitor Request and View Output

Submit a Request Set

13
Quick Tutorial

Create a Template
 Select Financial Report Template Editor
 Select a Report, Select Excel Template Editor, Click on Create

14
Quick Tutorial

Create a Template
 Confirm ActiveX control interaction by clicking on Yes, if prompted

Excel template
gets created
with FSG
components

15
Quick Tutorial

Create a Template
 Personalize template with fonts, graphics etc, then upload to Oracle

Use Oracle
menu to upload
modified
template to
Oracle

16
Quick Tutorial

Create a Template
 Name the template, select Drill option, Upload.

17
Quick Tutorial

Create a Template
 Name the template, select Drill option, Upload.

18
Quick Tutorial

Run a Report
 Select Financial Report Submission

19
Quick Tutorial

Run a Report
 Select the new template, add parameters, Submit.

Select your
template

20
Quick Tutorial

Run a Report
 Monitor Requests, View Output

View Output

21
Quick Tutorial

Run a Report
 Publish Report in Excel

22
Using Report Manager – Tips

Create and Test your financial report on standard FSG, and
then publish the report using Report Manager
 Do not waste time over column heading formatting in Apps

Use the Generic FSG template wherever possible. If you use
custom templates, each template is associated with a single
report

Report Set considerations
 Report Sets can only be submitted through standard FSG submission
 Responsibility submitting Report Set must be the same that is
publishing it

Use Repository Maintenance to avoid tablespace issues
 Apply Patch first (Metalink 803014.1)

23
Using Report Manager – Tricks

Use Report Manager templates directly from FSG submission
 Users are familiar with the Request submission functionality

Schedule your month-end reports to publish automatically
 Use standard scheduling functionality

Store Excel settings on custom Excel templates
 Cell background color
 Cell / Text font
 Cell alignment
 Cell Border
 Cell Merge
 Underline
 Page Settings:
 a. Orientation (Portrait / Landscape)
 b. Paper Size
 c. Width of Page

24
Using Report Manager – Tricks (contd.)

Display the Description column in the middle of the report

Description
column in the
middle of a
wide report

25
Using Report Manager – Tricks (contd.)

Display the Description column in the middle of the report
 Create a Custom Template
 Use the Menu (Oracle > FSG Template > Move Line Items Right)

26
Using Report Manager – Tricks (contd.)

Use Report Manager templates directly from FSG submission

Before submission,
select a template, and
set Format = EXCEL.
View Output will open
the output in Excel,
using the template

27
Using Report Manager – Tricks (contd.)

Use Report Manager templates directly from FSG submission
 Use XML Publisher Responsibility
 Copy the “Generic FSG Template”, update the Data Definition to
“FSGXML program”. Attach custom template file if required.

28
Traps

Repository Maintenance could lead to disappearing menus
 Patch 6884665 if on R 11i
 Patch 6884280 if on R 12 (Metalink 803014.1)

Can submit Report Set only from Java form
 Need to update Output Option to XML for each report

Mixup of Request Set submission vs Report Set submission
menu items
 “Report Set” on Java form, but “Request Set” in Report Manager

Printing XML file if Profile Option Number of Copies is set to 1
 Metalink 748037.1 workaround is to attach dummy printer to RGRARG

Significant impact on Database size due to XML outputs

Does not use Definition Access Sets functionality

Report Manager output ignores Display Sets

29
Traps

User to Value Security mandates use of Content Sets
 Alternately, place specific reports on end-user menus

Images (such as logos) can be used on templates from 12.0.6

Profile Option for AutoArchive does not archive. Need to
archive manually.

30
Traps (contd.)

Repository Maintenance could lead to disappearing menus
 Patch 6884665 if on R 11i
 Patch 6884280 if on R 12

31
Traps (contd.)

Can submit Report Set only from Java form
 You cannot submit a Report Set directly from Report Manager
 Also, need to update Output Option to XML for each report
 You can, however, publish a Report Set from Report Manager

32
Traps (contd.)

Mixup of Request Set submission vs Report Set submission
menu items
 The menu labeled “Request Set Publish” publishes Report Sets
 The menu labeled “Report Set Publish” publishes Request Sets

33
Traps (contd.)

Printing XML file if Profile Option Number of Copies is set to 1
 Metalink 748037.1 workaround is to attach dummy printer to RGRARG
 However, workaround will lead to using Reprint for regular reports

34
Lessons learned

Need to be on at least 12.0.4 or later for minimal issues

Web interface can have a learning curve

Use Report Manager selectively for upper management
reports. Operational reports are efficiently done through
standard FSG submission with text output

Use Repository Maintenance frequently – move critical
reports to network drives

Longer than usual turnaround time on SRs

35
Presenter Information

Prithis Das
Rolta TUSC
dasp@tusc.com

36