SAP Webi - Overview
Web Intelligence is part of SAP BusinessObjects product suite and is used for analytical and ad hoc reporting to meet an organization’s business requirements. Web Intelligence is a Business Intelligence reporting tool for business users to analyze data in Data Warehouse. It assists business managers in the decision-making process for building future strategies.
Using Web Intelligence, business users can create basic, medium, and complex reports from transactional data in database and by creating Universes using Information Design Tool/UDT. Various SAP and non-SAP data sources can be used to create reports in Web Intelligence. SAP Business Warehouse (BW) system doesn’t require a Universe to connect to Web Intelligence tool.
Web Intelligence tool can work as a client tool of BusinessObjects platform and also as a standalone tool for reporting.
Versions and History
BusinessObjects was first started in 1990 with the tool name Skipper SQL 2.x, and in the year 1994 Business Objects v3.0 was launched.
In 2005, BO XI was released and later on various other versions introduced. Some of the versions are −
- BO XI R1
- BO XI R2
- BO XI R3
- BO XI R3.1
- BO XI R3.2
In 2007, SAP acquired this company for $6.8 billion and the product has been renamed as SAP BusinessObjects.
Later in the year 2011, BO XI 4.0 was introduced. The latest version of the tool is SAP BO 4.2.
Web Intelligence Architecture
SAP Webi has a three-layered architecture −
Database Layer − This layer defines multiple SAP and non-SAP data sources.
Semantic Layer − This layer defines multidimensional data model.
Presentation Layer − This layer defines where data is presented to end-users.
Various data sources can be used to create analytical and ad hoc reports. You can pull data from SAP systems, like SAP ECC, SAP ERP, SAP SRM, and other SAP modules.
Non-SAP data sources include Oracle Database, Microsoft SQL Server, IBM DB2, and Sybase.
