integrationreporterimaximo6

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IBM Maximo Asset ManagementVersion 6 External Report Integration

Copyright International Business Machines 2011


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External Report Integration (ERI)IBM Maximo Clients have a broad range of reporting needs. These needs may be set by

their industries, or by their corporate standards. Additionally, clients may have in-house

resources familiar with particular reporting tools.

To respond to the diverse needs of Maximo clients, report integration functionality isavailable. This reporting functionality integrates Maximo with external reporting systems.

These external Reporting Systems could be any of the wide variety of reporting tools in the

marketplace today.

The Reporting Integration enables the Maximo User to pass his application query to the

external reporting system without having to leave the Maximo environment. Any number

of report parameters can be passed either using the application query or not - to the

external report system.

This functionality is referred to as the External Report Integration (ERI.) It is very

flexible as it is Report System and Report Version independent.

This document details the Maximo ERI. After an overview of its functionality, the

document includes information on

1. Requirements

2. Enabling the Integration

3. Registering and Running ERI Reports in Maximo

4. Additional Details on ERI

5. Frequently Asked Questions


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OverviewThe External Report Integration (ERI) enables you to integrate your reporting tool of

choice within the Maximo Framework. The diagram below depicts this architecture at a

very top level. In the center of the diagram, the Maximo server is displayed, and directly

underneath it is a separate report server. Both of these servers are connected to the

Maximo database filling and pulling from the vast amounts of its data.

The key component to this integration is that the report server is integrated within

Maximo. The user accesses Maximo and then Maximo directly communicates with the

External Report Server.

This integration is enabled in two key ways.

First, the external reports are registered in Maximos Report Administration

application. This enables them to be visible and accessed within the various Maximo

applications.

Secondly, a direct launch to the report server is enabled from Maximo. This occurs

by passing critical report information from Maximo to the report server url

specified in a maximo property file.

The ERI is best suited for a Maximo user who wants to directly access all of their Maximo

reports from within the Maximo application.


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Requirements of ERI

External Report System Requirements

The External Report Server must provide a web-based interface.

Maximo Version 6 will send required report-related information via an HTML form post tothe URL specified in the Version 6 System Properties. Therefore, there must be a web

application running at that URL that can receive the information, process it accordingly, and

communicate with the Report Server in order to execute a report.

Support/Licensing

IBM does not provide any additional external Reporting System Licenses with Version 6.

Clients are responsible for the purchase and maintenance of their own External Report

System Licenses.

Additionally, IBM will not support issues with External Reporting Systems, related to thesetup or maintenance of the Report Server, report development or debug of the system.


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How to Set Up the ERIEnabling V6 to integrate with your selected Reporting System requires three key

components, which are:

(1) additionalmaximo.properties

2) customreport.jsp

(3) Password Encryption

1. additionalmaximo.properties

A. Access the additionalmaximo.properties file, which is located in

applications\maximo\properties. Near the bottom of this file, locate the

property settings related to the ERI. These are:

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

// Properties for MXES integration with custom reporting tool.

// Customer-defined properties may be added by prefixing the property name with

"mxe.report.custom".

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

// URL of the custom reporting application

//mxe.report.custom.serverURL=http://reportServer:7001/reportApp/customReport.jsp

// Password used for logging on to report server administration tool; will be encrypted

before sending to the reporting application.

//mxe.report.custom.rptServerLogonPass=myPassword

B. Copy and paste these two values from the additionalmaximo.properties to the end of the

maximo.properties file located in:

\applications\maximo\properties

*For clients on Version 6.2.8 and higher see note below.

C. Uncomment the property settings by removing the // from the start of each line, and

input the correct, required values.

Note: If you are on version 6.2.8 or higher, the password for the report server can be

input in the database instead of the property file. The database value is

REPORTCUSTOM.PASSWORD.


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D. Next, depending on your External Reporting System, you may need to pass additional

property values from Maximo. To do this, you can add more property settings to your

maximo.properties file.

For example, assume a root folder name for the External Reporting System must be passed.

This new property value must be added with the prefix mxe.report.custom so it is picked upby Maximo.

Therefore, the new property value would be:

mxe.report.custom.rootFolder

E. When this information is input, your maximo.properties file will look something like the

file shown below. When you have verified that the information is correct, rebuild and

redeploy your maximo.ear file.

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------// Properties for MXES integration with custom reporting tool.

// Customer-defined properties may be added by prefixing the property name with

"mxe.report.custom".

//-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

// URL of the custom reporting application

mxe.report.custom.serverURL=http://ERep:7001/reportApp/customReport.jsp

// Password used for logging on to report server administration tool; will be encrypted

// before sending to the reporting application.

mxe.report.custom.rptServerLogonPass=admin

// Root folder name of Report Server

mxe.report.custom.rootFolder=maxreports


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2. customreport.jsp

A. Next, access the customreport.jsp file. This file is located in:

\applications\maximo\maximouiweb\webmodule\webclient\utility

The customreport.jsp file shows the relevant information that is always sent from V6 to thereport server, and provides instructions on how to access that information. Examples of

values in this file that are always passed are:

Report File

Report Folder

Schema

Application Name

It will be up to you and the external reporting system that you are integrating with to

determine if the customreport.jsp file will be used. The intention of this file is to only

highlight the information that is passed from V6 to the external reporting system so the

receiving portion can determine how it will process this information.

These parameters are sent from a hidden form post from V6 to the External Report

Server. Below is a table listing Standard Values passed as request parameters from V6.

Report File Name Security_analysis.rep

Report Description BI Security Analysis Report

Report Folder SECURGROUP

Report Type SECURGROUP

V6 User Name Wilson

V6 Password See encryption section below

Database User Name MaximoDatabase Password See encryption section below

Schema Maximo

V6 Where Clause ((independent = 1))

User Org EAGLENA

User Site BUFFALO

App Main Table MAXGROUP

App Name SECURGROUP

Language Code EN

Locale EN_US

Users Local Timezone EST

Report Server URL http://144.23.45:8090/oraclebi

Report Server Password See encryption section below


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3. Password Encryption

V6 always encrypts the following values before being sending them to the External

Reporting System:

Maximo Password

Database Password Report Server Password

It is up to you to determine what security will be implemented on the External Reporting

System.

If you choose to use any of the passwords sent from V6, the values must be decrypted in

the web application. The customreport.jsp file provides examples of how to do so.

The decryption requires a V6 class file, CypherPlusBase64.class. This file must be made

available to the receiving web application.

This file is located in:

\applications\maximo\businessobjects\classes\psdi\util

An example of where it could be placed is

WEB-INF\classes\psdi\util.


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Registering and Running ERI Reports in Maximo

After enabling the ERI, the Report Administrator needs to register each external report

that will be accessed from Maximo. To do this, the Administrator accesses the V6 Report

Administration application. The following information is required for every report that willbe executed from Maximo:

1. Report File Name: This is the file name of the report, used by the external report

server to identify the report to execute. The external report system determines

the value of this field, and whether or not a file extension must be included.

2. Report Description: This is the description of the report as it appears to the user

within the V6 applications.

3. Report Run Type: For this integration, the report run type must always be

CUSTOM.

4. Application: This is the V6 application where the report will be accessed from.

5. Report Folder: The Report Folder is the folder name where the report is kept in

the external report server. This field defaults to the application folder name.

With the out of the box Version 6 implementation, report folders were created onthe report server to correspond to each of the applications that had reports.

Depending on your report server and setup, you may or may not want to set it up this

way.

6. Detail?: The Detail Field can be enabled to prevent the user from running the report

against more than 200 records in an application. Preventing queries like this can prevent

negative performance impacts.


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An example of an external report registration is shown below.

Notes:

A. There is no validation on any of these fields to the report server.

B. Other values in the Report Details Section are not applicable to Reports from

External Reporting Systems. These include:

No Request Page

Attach Documents

Toolbar Location, Toolbar Image and Toolbar Sequence.

These fields are only applicable to the embedded reporting tool in Version 6.


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Parameters:

In addition to enabling the application query to pass to the external system, the ERI also

enables external reports to include both bound and unbound parameters. Bound parameters

are parameters that have either a relationship to the applications main table or exist via a

maxrelationships. Unbound parameters do not have any relationships to the applications

main table and they do not exist via a maxrelationship.

In the custom work order report above, an example of a Bound Parameter would be status

(WORKORDER.STATUS). An example of an Unbound Parameter would be Inventory

Carrying Cost Percentage. Inventory Carrying Cost Percentage is unbound as there is no

relationship between that variable and the Work Order Tracking Application.

If a parameter is bound, its value will be included in the Maximo Where Clause that is

passed to the report. If a parameter is unbound, its value will not be included in the

Maximo Where Clause.

Additionally, a report can execute against both Bound and Unbound Parameters and use theMaximo Where Clause. To enable this functionality, select the flag Use Where Clause in

the Report Details Section of Report Administration.

In the example above, no parameters have been defined for this report, so it will execute

against the Current/Selected/All Record Set defined in the application.

Finally, note it is the responsibility of the client to manage the types of report parameters

used. For more information on the report parameter fields, reference Chapter 6 in the

Report Administration and Development Guide.


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Once the external report and any of its parameters have been registered, the Report

Administrator must generate the request page for the report. This is done by clicking on

the Generate XML on the Report Tab button. When this has been done, a message will

display toolbar saying the Request Page has been generated.

The custom report is now available to users from the Work Order Tracking application.

To illustrate how this will work, go to the Work Order Tracking application. Enter a query.In the example below, a query was executed and 18 records were selected..

To run the report, the end user selects the Run Reports Action from the menu. A list of all

reports that the client has enabled will display. In this example, a variety of reports are

enabled.

The user selects his custom report.


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Its report request page is displayed. Notice that the Schedule and Email tabs do not

display for the custom report type.

The user then clicks Submit. Version 6 then passes the selected record set of 18 work

order records to the External Reporting System. A separate browser session is opened,

and the external report displays using the selected record set.


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4. Additional Details on ERI

Security

1. There are 3 Levels of Report Security:

a. Does the end user have access to Run Reports? (Set in Maximo's Security Groups

application)

b. What specific reports can the end user run? (Defined in the external reporting

system)

c. Once the user runs the report, what data will he see? (Passed from V6 to the

Report System via the report where clause. The report where clause includes the

V6 MBO set for security.)

2. Security levels A and C will be applied to the Version 6 ERI but not Report LevelSecurity (Level B.) V6 will display all reports registered to a specific application it will not

do any filtering for specific user or group access.

This means that if you have six custom ERI reports registered to the Work Order Tracking

application all users who have access to the Work Order Tracking application and who have

run report access will see all six custom ERI reports.


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Report Functionality Not Supported

The table below details the report features that are not enabled or supported in the V6

ERI:

Reporting Functionality Not Enabled/Supported

Version 6 Out ofthe Box Reports

No ERI Reports will be delivered with Version 6.

Report Level

Security

Filtering for specific user or group access will not be enabled. All reports

registered to the specific application will be displayed to all Version 6

users.

Multi Server

Configurations

Configurations of multiple Maximo servers to multiple External Report

Servers are not supported

View Reports Previously executed reports will not be available for display within the

Version 6 applications

Schedule Reports Scheduling of Reports from the Version 6 report request page in the

application will not be enabled.

Email Reports Emailing of Reports from the Version 6 report request page in the

application will not be enabled.

Queries This subtab is not enabled for the external reporting systems.

Quick Toolbar

Access

Direct Access to external reports from the Version 6 applications toolbar

will not be enabled.

Attached

Documents

Direct Print with Attachments to external reports from the Version 6

applications toolbar will not be enabled.

Report Label

Features

The visibility and ability to update the external reporting systems report

titles and labels within the Version 6 Report Administration application

will not be enabled.


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(5) Frequently asked questions

1. What version of Maximo 6 enables this functionality?

The integration is available beginning with Maximo 6.1.

2. Can I use both multiple reporting types?

Yes. You can utilize the Version 6 embedded reports, along with custom reports developedin an external reporting system. This configuration is supported; however it is strongly

recommended that the Maximo Application Server, Database, embedded Report Server and

External Report Server are separated.

3. Are Oracle, Sql Server and DB2 Databases supported in this integration?

Yes.

4. Are there any hardware recommendations?

Yes. For best performance, it is recommended that your configuration contain dedicated

servers for the (1) Application Server (2) Report Server and (3) Database Server

5. What types of Product Platforms are supported in this integration? The specific

product platforms that the External Report System supports will most likely vary from

those of Maximo 6. Therefore, it is the clients responsibility to use platforms that are

supported by both Maximo and their external Report System.

6. Is ERI the only option if a different reporting tool is utilized?

No. Version 6 runs on an open database systems (Oracle/ MS SQL Server), and customers

can bypass the integration, and run their reporting tool of choice directly against the

Version 6 database.


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Revision History

July 2011

(1) Updated with additional notes and diagrams, and also for additional information including

new method of password enablement in Version 6.2.8 (2) Updated document file name to

remove spaces


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