OBIEE Blog

Applies to:

Business Intelligence Server Enterprise Edition – Version: 10.1.3.4.1 [1900] to 11.1.1.5.0 [1308] – Release: 10g to 11g
Business Intelligence Server Enterprise Edition – Version: 10.1.3.4.1 [1900] to 11.1.1.5.0 [1308]   [Release: 10g to 11g]
Information in this document applies to any platform.

Goal

How can you determine if there are any Oracle Critical Patch Updates (CPU) and/or Security Alerts for Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition (OBIEE) 10g and 11g?

Solution

Critical Patch Updates and Security Alerts

Critical Patch Updates (CPU) and Security Alerts notifications are posted on the Oracle Technology Network (OTN) website.  This website maintains a listing of all Oracle products including OBIEE and typically gets updated quarterly, or as needed.  It is possible to receive notification of new CPU and security alerts by email.

Critical Patch Updates (CPU) Patches are cumulative for many Oracle products. This means that, for these products, a CPU includes new security fixes as well as all previously released CPU fixes for this particular
platform and version combination. The main benefit of cumulative CPUs is that it allows customers to
quickly and easily “catch up ” to current security release level by only applying the most recent CPU.

For example,you have the patch for Oct 2011, you do not need to first apply the patch for Jul 2011. Applying the most current CPU patch will include all current fixes.
However, each CPU advisory describes only the security fixes added since the previous Critical Patch Update advisory. Thus, prior Critical Patch Update advisories should be reviewed for information regarding earlier published security fixes.

Full details on released CPU patches and how to enable alerts can be found here.

Applies to:

Business Intelligence Server Enterprise Edition – Version: 10.1.3.2 to 10.1.3.4.2 [2405] – Release: 10g to 10g
Business Intelligence Suite Enterprise Edition – Version: 10.1.3.2 to 10.1.3.4.2 [2405]   [Release: 10g to 10g]
Information in this document applies to any platform.

Goal

- How to handle VERSION.TXT files when you have multiple patches?

- When Oracle supplies an OBIEE patch, its README file always says to replace the VERSION.TXT file on the [Oracle Home] directory with the one included.

- When you apply a second, unrelated patch to the environment why would we want to replace the entire VERSION.TXT file?

- Would you append the text in the second patch’s VERSION.TXT file to the first?

- How will this display on the Settings > Administration window when it displays the information in the Product Information box?

- Are OBIEE Patches cumulative?

Solution

This has been confirmed by Development.

1. Version.txt file should be replaced, following instructions in the readme files of each patch.
New version.txt file should not be appended to the end of the current one, but it should replace the current one.

2. Currently, for 10G versions, OBIEE patch installation does not provide for an automatic way of keeping track of the patches applied.

Nevertheless, Development is working to make 11g use opatch installer. Opatch provides a way to keep track of previous patches installed. There is no official date for 11G release.

3. It is recommended that you keep a record of the patches you have applied.
You could implement that in the way you prefer, but separated from OBIEE installation, and in addition to replace the version.txt file used in OBIEE.

For example, you could:
- Append the version.txt file to another file, with name version_history.txt or something like that, everytime you apply a patch.
OR
- When applying first patch, rename original version.txt from GA release to version0.txt and copy version.txt from the patch.
Then, when applying second patch, rename version.txt to version1.txt and copy new version.txt from the second patch, and so on.
OR
- copy new version.txt file to a file named like version_<YYYY_MM_DD>.txt, indicating the date when you applied it.
That way you can have in a single directory all the previous version.txt with its dates of installation.

4. OBIEE One-off patches are not cumulative at this time.

5. Production patches (the ones that do not require a password), normally, contain the fixes of older production patches.

6. When we create a new patch for you (that is when you report a new issue, never seen before, and then we create a fix for that and provide it to you) we ask you the list of one-off patches you have applied. Development uses it to create a merged patch including all those fixes plus the new one.

7. In the case a one-off patch is already available (so, it was not produced for you), you would need to open an SR to ask for a password to download it. In that same SR, please, provide the list of patches applied previously, so Support can determine if it is ok for you to apply the patch, or if a merged patch needs to be created for you.

8. When in doubt, ask ORACLE Support if a patch can be applied by you without conflict issues.

Applies to:

Business Intelligence Suite Enterprise Edition – Version: 10.1.3.2 to 11.1.1.5.0 [1308] – Release: 10g to 11g
Business Intelligence Suite Enterprise Edition – Version: 10.1.3.2 to 11.1.1.5.0 [1308]   [Release: 10g to 11g]
Information in this document applies to any platform.

Purpose

This document highlights the security features in Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition (OBIEE) and compares and contrasts features found in OBIEE 10g and 11g.

Questions and Answers

What documentation describes the security model for the Repository (RPD) and Catalog in OBIEE 10g?

OBIEE 10g security and repository access control are described in the Oracle Business Intelligence Server Administration Guide.

Web Catalog security and access control is described in the Oracle Business Intelligence Presentation Services Administration Guide.

What documentation describes the security model for the RPD and catalog  in OBIEE 11g?

OBIEE 11g security is described primarily in two places:

• Oracle Fusion Middleware Upgrade Guide for Oracle Business Intelligence 11g Release 1 (11.1.1)
• Oracle Fusion Middleware Security Guide for Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition 11g Release 1 (11.1.1).
  NOTE: Unlike OBIEE 10g, there are not separate documents for the BI Server and BI Presentation Server.  For OBIEE 11g, both the RPD and catalog security are described in the Security Guide.

How are security settings enabled / controlled in OBIEE 10g and 11g?

In OBIEE 10g, security is controlled at the following points: permissions on the OBIEE Presentation catalog, via the repository (users and passwords) and optionally via an external LDAP, or external tables.

In OBIEE 11g, the security policy is split across the OBIEE presentation catalog, repository and default 11g identity store (embedded WLS LDAP), or external LDAP (i.e. OID or other if used).

What are the primary differences between the OBIEE 10g and 11g security models and what happens during upgrade?

Related

Applies to:

Business Intelligence Server Enterprise Edition – Version: 11.1.1.3.0 [1905] and later   [Release: 11g and later ]
Information in this document applies to any platform.

Symptoms

1) Customer upgraded 10.1.3.4.1 RPD and web catalog to 11.1.1.3.
2) Its noticed that in 11.1.1.3 the same reports take a lot longer to execute:
Eg: 1 min 30 sec in 11G vs. only 30 sec in 10G.
3) RPD doesn’t have any metadata inconsistencies, connection pool settings are good.
4) The memory usage spikes up when reports are run, and BI Server is taking too long compiling these reports.
5) Customer notices that the XML copied from 10g to 11g creates a more complicated logical query in 11g compared to 10g.
6) When customer copies the logical query from 10g and runs in 11g it gives the same performance as 10g.

Cause

Basically this is caused by many column with the empty string formula: ”, causing it to have 2nd UNION leaf to calculate the subtotal in 11.1.1.3.

Solution

These columns with a column formula ” where used as separators in the report.

Replaced all column separators with “duplicate measure” columns with a column length of 0.
This ensures the subtotals are NOT trying to use the separators as dimensions and create extra queries with UNION ALL.

Applies to:

Business Intelligence Interactive Dashboard – Version: 11.1.1.5.0 [1308] and later   [Release: 11g and later ]
Information in this document applies to any platform.

Symptoms

Recently upgraded Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition (OBIEE) from 10g to 11g (OBIEE 11.1.1.5).
All upgrade steps were completed as described in the Upgrade Guide for Oracle Business Intelligence
11g; including upgrading the web catalog and repository (RPD).
The repository was checked and there were no errors.
When logging in to OBIEE Presentation server as a user with OBIEE Administrator role, the 11g dashboard is empty and expected content is not present.

Changes

Upgraded from 10g to 11g.

Cause

Insufficient permissions on ‘shared folders.’
The permissions on catalog folder ‘shared folders’ were available only for ‘Authenticated user’ and ‘Presentation Server Administrators’.

Solution

Login to OBIEE Presentation server as WLS or biadmin user and select Administration link ->
add relevant application role e.g. ‘BI Administrator role’ and grant at least read and traverse permissions to the ‘shared folders.’
Also ensure that you tick the check boxes to apply permissions to all items within the folder and sub folders.