Envisn's IBM Cognos Blog

April 30, 2012 by Rick Ryan - Envisn, Inc.
Of all the Cognos subject related searches that are done on the web the one that usually tops the list is security. That subject is also number one in terms of the most viewed subjects in our blog archive. Our ebook on Cognos security gets a large number of downloads on a daily basis. And our customers tell us security is the most difficult part of Cognos to manage over time. Why is it so hard to get it right?

The only constant is change

March 30, 2012 by Elwood Philbrick - Envisn, Inc.
Envisn has been providing administrative solutions for Cognos customers for nearly all of our thirteen years. During that period the Cognos products have gone broader and deeper in the BI market, particularly over the past two to three years. Think TM1, Express, Mobile, etc. This Cognos product evolution has been a major trend to give the Cognos users themselves more options to get what they need and get it the way they need it.

February 29, 2012 by Rick Ryan - Envisn, Inc.
This blog could easily focus on the typical BI admin tasks that Cognos administrators have to deal with. The usual stuff like change management, security, license tracking, etc. This is what good administrators do. Users may care about some of these things, but not very much. They just expect them to be managed well as part of the Cognos BI infrastructure. Being good isn’t enough.

January 19, 2012 by Rick Ryan - Envisn, Inc.
In an interview two weeks ago, IBM’s new president, Virginia Rometty, cited Analytics as the single most important focus for the technology company going forward. Analytics is what makes it possible to put the flood of Big Data to productive and profitable use. Other areas of IBM’s focus are enabled by Analytics. Smarter Planet is essentially about being able to mine all of the sensor data now available from multiple real time sources. And Cloud Computing makes it possible to access massive data sources from anywhere.

November 18, 2011 by Rick Ryan - Envisn, Inc.
It would be easy to talk about what’s new in Cognos 10 from the recent IBM Information on Demand (IOD) 2011 event in Las Vegas only in terms of new user capabilities but that would miss a big part of what’s going on here. There are new user capabilities that matter but it’s important to focus on the major trends here as well. This article will attempt to do both.

An Innovative Approach to Modeling Complex BI Projects

October 12, 2011 by Rick Ryan - Envisn, Inc.
With the IBM Information On Demand (IBM IOD 2011) event in Las Vegas less than two weeks away many of you may have already made plans to attend and started to schedule your sessions. For those of you still undecided about which sessions to attend, our blog this week may help make up your mind.

September 21, 2011 by Rick Ryan - Envisn, Inc.
Purpose of this blog article is to share with you the following:

August 2, 2011 by Elwood Philbrick - Envisn, Inc.
The purpose of this article is to identify key metrics that administrators should monitor or pay attention to in terms of their production Cognos Content Store. Many of these can directly impact overall performance as well as user satisfaction.

by Elwood Philbrick - Envisn, Inc.
The purpose of this article is to help Cognos administrators address the need for Cognos license tracking and how best to do it. Administrators are usually the ones tasked with Cognos license auditing and insuring compliance with their license agreement.

by Rick Ryan - Envisn, Inc.
Managers or administrators are often faced with the task of consolidating or merging Cognos BI environments. This may result because of mergers, cost savings or simply a desire to have fewer environments to manage. Invariably the consolidation involves users and content that will be merged into a new or existing environment and this requires careful planning and flawless execution in order to be done successfully. The purpose of this article is to help you identify what you need to know and how to plan and execute a successful merger of Cognos environments.