I've been asked to investigate for a client the migration from Cognos Decisionstream (7.1), PowerPlay and Impromptu (7.3) to SQL Server 2005. Key driver (so far) is to reduce licensing costs. I can't say I'm a Cognos guru.. so..
Has anyone done this / doing this / thinking about this?
What are the key benefits ?
What does Cognos offer that we don't ?
What are the biggest issues ?
Did you have any problems ?
What other items should I be considering ?
Thanks
www.SQLobSERVER.com
Here is what I found from my research.
1) There are no front-end tools available from Microsoft especially for Cube analysis. Where as in cognos we have PowerPlay Web for this.
2) There is no BI custom portal available from Microsoft. I saw there is some sample BI Portal app provided by Microsoft that is based on Share point services but this cannot be used for production environment.
Looks like Microsoft is totally depending on third party vendors for web based front-end solutions. I found that there is company called Panorama that provides front end web based solutions to SQL Server 2005 BI stuff. If you find any thing from your investigation please let me know.
I too have been asked to do this same evaluation for the company I work at.
We will be having a demo from MS this afternoon and I will post more information at that time.
What I can offer at this time is what my research has yielded.
So far it looks like MS is going to be excellent for the back end work (I.E. building the cubes using the new UDM structures)
What is not clear at this point is how Cognos Cubes will be able to be converted into a MS format?
In addition, I found ProClarity also has some front end modeling tools.
Lets see what MS has to say this afternoon!
|||Fresh out of the MS Demo.
This tool certainly has potential. The integration with the rest of the microsoft suite is exceptional as usual for microsoft products.
They do have end user tools that are in fact web based. This product is still maturing but in my opinion is ready for the market.
I will be going to a Cognos webinar next week and will report back my findings as to how well the two compare and also in relation to the needs of this company. Since this company already has Cognos, there is pressure to remain on that product. However, being a forward thinking company and a publicly traded company it is in the best interest to investigate further the possiblity of this microsoft shop to mirgrate over to the Microsoft tool.
I will post another update next week.
BTW- There was no mention of a converstion tool between Cognos and This MS product.
|||Matrix from a company called DataJungle can support both Cognos and Microsoft cubes in a single, integrated dashboard and analysis product. An excellent front end for those looking to migrate from the Cognos to Microsoft BI platform, without having to rip out there Cognos investment. The company seems to be hot in this market...especially given that Series 8 from Cognos is very expensive...more and more Cognos customers will be moving to Microsoft.
JG
|||Couple of more data points for you:
regarding issue #1: Have you looked at Report Builder in SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services? An end user can use this to design report on top of an Analysis Services cube.
regarding issue #2: We have been working very hard to get a solution to this - we are integrating reporting services with Windows SharePoint Services to enable this scenario. You can download a prerelease build of the Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services Add-in for Microsoft SharePoint Technologies - Community Technology Preview (CTP) here:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=4E50BE6E-3F92-4552-A78C-B3BE1D94D5DA&displaylang=en&mg_id=10049
This is still baking but it will be available with SQL Server 2005 SP2 and will work with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007.
Hope that helps,
-Lukasz
|||1) There are no front-end tools available from Microsoft especially for Cube analysis. Where as in cognos we have PowerPlay Web for this.
Really? How about Excel, Report Builder, or Proclarity?
2) There is no BI custom portal available from Microsoft. I saw there is some sample BI Portal app provided by Microsoft that is based on Share point services but this cannot be used for production environment.
Why?
|||>What are the key benefits (from the first post)?
Ask Cognos to show you how you can integrate custom applications with their backend services and you will have a key benefit 
Also, for a fraction of the Cognos licensing cost, you will get more feature-rich MS offerings in almost all areas. Cognos doesn't have a relational database and data mining offerings. They have a very basic ETL product. UDM wins hands down against PowerPlay. SSRS (both standard and ad-hoc reporting) is more powerful than their Report Studio (or Impromptu for that matter). Instead of a hodge podge of technologies, with MS you will get a well-integrated BI platform.
Teo,
You are still talking about the same "BI" tool in MS that, in their last service pack, REMOVED the 'select all' functionality in reporting services, right? did you just use the work "powerful" in reference to Report Builder? Really?
|||ChicagoClone,
I said "more powerful" (than Cognos), I didn't say "perfect" 
. BTW, the "select all" is back in SP2... and there is much rejoicing throughout the land. From the readme file:
In SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services (SSRS), a Select All check box was automatically added when you created an available values list for a multivalue report parameter. If you upgraded to SQL Server 2005 Service Pack 1 (SP1), the Select All check box was no longer available. In SQL Server 2005 Service Pack 2 (SP2), the Select All check box has been restored.
|||
Any comments about lack of semantic layer for the SSRS report designer (not report builder which can use Report Models). Cognos uses Framework manager for the semantic layer but do you think that people can do without this type of functionality in SSRS.
|||I am not sure it is such a good idea to have that layer. First, you need to wait for Cognos to write a provider for each database version you need to support. Second, such a layer may introduce performance issues because it auto-generates queries for you. Instead, I would encourage you consider UDM in SSAS 2005 as the ultimate semantic layer which can be integrated with many MS and third-party reporting tools as opposed to Cognos tools only in the case of the Framework manager.
|||One another thing I have heard people complain about is, the person who could build the cubes in either of these environments. I have heard users complain that you will need a developer to build cubes in SSAS where as person with limited knowledge can easily create the cubes in Cognos. I do not have experience in Cognos so not sure how much of this is true. I would appreciate if experts could comment in this area.
How easy it is to develop Cubes in Cognos compared to SSAS.?
|||Interesting points. My thinking was that these semantic layer solutions are more for deployments that don't utilize dimensional models but instead get their data straight from the OLTP data sources. Without someone building these dimensional models on the database side to simplify the data, the report designers would at least have the ability to simplify some of the data with these BI semantic layers perhaps at some cost to performance. So in essence, these BI semantic layers may only provide value for initial or prototyping deployments or any other situation where there are no dimensional models, either relational or mutidimensional based.Any thoughts on that.Thanks for your input.
|||In general, SSAS is a database so its primary users are DBAs. One area where you do need developer experience is enhancing the cube with business calculations which requires MDX knowledge. But both Cognos and SSAS real-life cubes will require to be extended. MDX is a standard language and there are books written for MDX. There aren't any books written for Cognos cubes or Cognos in general.
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