Optimize Google Maps Performance inside of Xcelsius

Posted on October 26, 2009 by

GMaps Plugin provides an excellent method for visualizing geographic points on a map that can be aligned to business performance measures. Many customers often ask how many points I can plot on a map at one time. In the Xcelsius world the answer is usually not strait forward since the dashboard often caries an overhead depending on the number of dependencies with components, data, and logic.

The first question I always ask if they are using Latitude, Longitude values or addresses. This has a major impact on performance because an address needs to be geocoded before the icon is renders (this can tabe about 150ms per data point). If you utilize long,lat coordinates there is 0 latency before all data points are drawn on the map.

I would say that 150-300 data points at a time within a Google Map is adequate for expecting good performance on most computers (assuming you are using long,lat). For organizations who require the geocode service, 20-80 is adequate from a user acceptance standpoint because of the latency of the geocode service. The good news is the Google Premier API provides half the latency of the free API.

We have benchmark tested with 1000, which presents sluggish performance with Long,Lat pairs so my recommendation is to restrict the data points that you plot at one time within a map.

If you do not have your address data stored in a “Long,Lat” format I have found a nice batch geocode website that can do the transformation for you: http://www.batchgeocode.com/.

Let me know what your experience is and how you are using these features. If you have not had a chance to test out GMaps Plugin for Xceslsius, you can download a free trial today.

Original post blogged on b2evolution.

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Posted in Xcelsius, Xcelsius Add-Ons | 2 Comments

2009 BusinessObjects User Conference Review

Posted on October 23, 2009 by

First, I would like to thank everyone whom I had the pleasure of meeting for the kind remarks about my blog. I definitely feel re-energized to make an effort to get all of the articles I have been drafting up on the site.

Like last year, the BusinessObjects user conference was dominated by Xcelsius presentations. This year there was not different with multiple sessions per track which may have been overkill since a lot of information was probably a bit repetitive. I hope that the event team takes the session feedback sheets seriously to properly plan the content next year.

On a personal note, this was the best conference I have ever attended because I got to meet so many readers, customers, and partners whom I never met face to face. With that said, the conference itself seemed smaller in attendance and definitely lacked the buzz that previous BusinessObjects hosted events had. Years ago, the BOBJ conference in October was a production with lots of exciting news about new developments, product announcements, and interesting keynote speakers in addition to standard executive keynotes.

A buzz-worthy product that people seemed energized about was Roambi by meLLmo. This was BusinessObjects customer’s first taste of mobile business intelligence in an iPhone world and it was well received.

I look forward to next year to see how this event evolves, since it is a great forum for user’s to meet and learn about new BusinessObjects and related technologies.

Original post blogged on b2evolution.

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Next Generation Dashboards at the 2009 BusinessObjects User Conference

Posted on October 23, 2009 by

This week at the BusinessObjects user conference, I presented “Next Generation Dashboards with Xcelsius.” This is a subject that is important to me as I evaluate all of the requests that come from my customers and readers. Having the history and understanding of the technology and being a power user myself puts me in a unique position to point out the areas of improvement that are critical to the future success of Xcelsius.

I have uploaded my presentation and an outline of the various solutions demonstrated on state here: Centigon Solutions BOBBJ conference page.

There were several underlying themes that you may not get from the slide deck:
1. The first is how third party vendors are serving as innovation factories now critical to the future success if Xcelsius. While showing off several vendor offerings like Centigon Solutions’ GMaps Plugin, Inovista’s Charts, Antivia’s XWIS, David Moss Solutions Salesforce.com suite, and Roambi by meLLmo customers seemed to understand how relevant these solutions are to building much better dashboards.
2. Today, there is a growing ecosystem of customers, vendors, developers, authors, and enthusiasts who have all adopted and promoted the Xcelsius technology. While this community is thriving outside of SAP BusinessObjects sponsored communities, we need to harness our reach to help push each other and BusinessObjects in the right direction. The four recommendations were:

  • Customers who have invested in Xcelsius need to post and report bugs and enhancement requests.
  • Xcelsius developers should definitely engage third party vendors and expose new functionality to end users not possible out of the box.
  • Everyone should continue to participate in the community, specifically the Xcelsius gurus’ network
  • Customers and vendors both should continue to innovate new ideas and share them with the community

3. Though I did not show any examples, I had permission to share some of the exciting new features that Xcelsius is getting with the new service pack due shortly. It seems that BusinessObjects is finally ramping up on delivering new functionality that we have been long asking for. The question is if they will keep this up as we charge into 2010… I will be exited to write about all of these new features when they are made available.

I look forward to next year when we can share all of the customer success stories who use the new technology showcased at the BOBJ Conference.

Original post blogged on b2evolution.

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Posted in Other, Xcelsius | 1 Comment

Connect Xcelsius to CSV Data

Posted on October 6, 2009 by

Last week, Centigon Solutions release a new data connector for Xcelsius enabling direct connectivity to csv (comma separated values) files. Geared toward customers who require a simple method for updating Xcelsius dashboards, CSV Connector adds value by streamlining dashboard development and connectivity to external data.

Until now, Xcelsius required XML data and web services for live connectivity. CSV Connector is an optimal component for your developer toolbox to connect a dashboard to a flat file located on your desktop or web server.

Since I started using this data connection, CSV Connector has proven to be a perfect low cost solution for building dashboards against legacy reporting systems and databases. In several projects where I have successfully injected csv connectivity, I saved a tremendous amount of development resources previously expended in writing redundant .NET or J2EE services. Even when web services are required to meet customer requirements for live personalized data, I use CSV connector while refining the dashboard design. In several cases I have used a combination of csv connectivity and web services to enable a customer to mashup data from different data sources.

From a property sheet data preview to a simple row filter property, CSV Connector is optimized to make development a breeze while enabling direct connectivity without any additional server-side installation. Try CSV Connector using the free trial and feel free to post any comments or questions.

Original post blogged on b2evolution.

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Posted in Connectivity, Xcelsius, Xcelsius Add-Ons | 17 Comments

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