Cubewise EDU's September Newsletter

Check out what's happening in the world of IBM Planning Analytics, and harness our focus and enthusiasm to your benefit in one or more ways!

We are excited to bring back Horizon, the biggest knowledge sharing event dedicated to IBM PA/TM1 that comes around once every year for the community!

Agenda out now!!! 🎉

Consultants and companies from all over the world will share:
✅ Tips and Tricks discovered
✅ Insights on new features
✅ Customer success stories

New presentations added to the agenda weekly! 

By attending Horizon, within just 24 hours, you will acquire new IBM Planning Analytics/TM1 knowledge and skills to put into practice immediately from the vast knowledge shared across the globe.

We are complementing Horizon with in-person events in Melbourne and Sydney.

– Deep dive into topics from Horizon in an intimate setting
– Workshop topics you want to know more about
– Gain hands-on experience in mini-training sessions to learn about a product
– Network with your peers.

Save the date!

Horizon, Tue 18th October at 9:00am AEDT
Horizon Sydney, Tue 25th October at 9:00am
Horizon Melbourne, Thu 27th October at 9:00am

The early bird price is valid till 30th September, so head over to the Horizon page to check the agenda and secure your ticket today!

Reach out to horizon@cubewise.com if you have any questions. 
Learn how to embed data into a table for email consumption

Join us at Horizon on October 18th, where Yan Lu, Cubewise Consultant from Melbourne, Australia, will walk you through:

✅How to get email notifications to your mobile without logging into the system
✅ Extract and embed IBM PA data in a table on an email

Check out this video for a quick insight into what’s to come. 

Our Horizon presentation of the month is … A Solution for Consolidated Forward Weeks of Cover🎉🎉🎉

This presentation explores a solution used to ascertain a Forward Weeks of Cover calculation at different consolidated levels from source planning data by the Cotton On Group, a retail organisation that operates across many countries and brands.

Check out what Errol Grey, Enterprise Reporting Lead at Cotton On Group, has to share.
Measure your advancement with a well-mapped learning pathway. 

Are you new to IBM Planning Analytics? These are the end-user courses we recommend, in this order.

End User (Excel) – Learn to explore data to be a proficient analyser and get to know all the reporting possibilities in Excel. Choose Perspectives or Planning Analytics for Excel.
Advanced Reporting (Excel) – Learn the intricacies required to create dynamic reports in Excel. Choose Perspectives or Planning Analytics for Excel.
End User (PAW) – Explore how to analyse data, utilise hierarchies and create dashboards for the web, using Planning Analytics Workspace (PAW).
If you have already completed our end-user courses or have experience with IBM Planning Analytics/TM1 , continue your upskilling with these developer courses. Our recommended order is shown below.
Developer Fundamentals – Learn the fundamentals of dimension building, cube design, data loading, writing Rules and TurboIntegrator processes. 
Advanced TurboIntegrator – Learn how experts use TurboIntegrator (TI) to write code beyond the restrictions provided by the wizard. 
Advanced Rules – Learn how to write multi-cube logic and clearly understand how feeders work to ensure an efficient model. 
Advanced MDX – Learn how to write advanced MDX within TM1 and client applications such as PAW and Planning Analytics for Excel to control the data received. 
TM1py Fundamentals – The ideal foundation to get you started with developing your own Python and TM1py scripts. 
Pulse Fundamentals – Learn the functionalities that comes with Pulse such as live monitoring, user analytics, Excel analysis, documentation, migration and proactive alerts. 
Apliqo UX Fundamentals – Learn how to create a modern, curated web experience for your IBM Planning Analytics/TM1 users. 

Reach out to us at edu@cubewise.com if you have any questions.
Classes run bi-monthly in Australia and every quarter in Europe. 
Next online classroom commences on 12th September, in the Australian time zone.

🌏 Australian Time Zone: 9:00am to 5:00pm AEST

Sep 12 – Pulse Fundamentals
Sep 20 – Advanced TurboIntegrator
Sep 21 – Advanced Reporting (PA for Excel)
Sep 21 – Advanced Reporting (Perspectives)
Sep 22 – Advanced MDX

Looking to upskill in more than one course? Join the Power User Membership and gain access to ALL our courses!

Email edu@cubewise.com for more information.
“This training has exceeded my expectation, I knew nothing at all about tm1py and by the end of 4 sessions. I was able to download TM1py, connect to TM1, load data, run a TI process, and add a new element plus the attribute using TM1py script!

So happy that I registered for this course. Marius Wirtz is really the best TM1py trainer, he always makes sure that all the participants have time to ask questions, and if we are stuck or get an error, he will help us to tackle it during the training session.

I would highly recommend anyone who wants to learn TM1py from the beginning to join this course!

10/10

Thanks again to the Cubewise training team for organising this.”

Ivonne Wijaya, Group Management Accountant at GHD

We could not be more pleased with this amazing testimonial. Thank you, Ivonne!

Would you like to kickstart your knowledge using TM1py?

Classes run every quarter. Register your interest to join the next class commencing on 3rd November in the Australian and European time zone. 

Head here for more information.

Reach out to edu@cubewise.com for more information.
We are excited to release the Pulse Fundamentals Post Training Insight, Making Sense of Past Events.

As your financial system gets larger and more complex, you’re exposed to a wide range of users and will inevitably bump up against performance challenges that come along with the increased scope.

No matter how much effort you put into creating highly efficient and optimized workflows and processes, you’re never going to escape user complaints such as:

– “The application isn’t performing as it should…”
– “The process is much slower than it used to be…”
– “Something is going wrong with the way the application runs…”

Unfortunately, as the developer, you might not always have control over how to fix these problems.  

Pulse offers some powerful functionality when it comes to understanding issues in the past. 

Reach out to edu@cubewise.com if you have any questions.

New to the Power User membership, we have created an exclusive community with like-minded peers.

Exclusive to members, it’s a dedicated space to share insights, access to exclusive presentations, opportunities to network, engage with each other, and share meaningful conversations.

This week, we have organised two meetings to welcome our members, talk about the key features of your membership and this group, provide updates on upcoming events and open the floor for your questions.

Please RSVP for the session that suits your schedule:

Session 1
– Tue 6 Sep @ 8:00am London
– Tue 6 Sep  @ 9:00am CEST
– Tue 6 Sep  @ 3:00pm Hong Kong
– Tue 6 Sep @ 5:00pm Melbourne/Sydney

Session 2
– Wed 7 Sep @ 8:00am Melbourne/Sydney
– Tue 6 Sep  @ 3:00pm, San Francisco
– Tue 6 Sep  @ 5:00pm, Dallas
– Tue 6 Sep  @ 6:00pm, New York

Interested in joining the Power User membership?
Reach out to edu@cubewise.com with your questions.
In an attempt to illustrate our deep passion for IBM Planning Analytics / TM1, our Control CC team asked Cubewisers what was their lightbulb moment.

We carry on our Lightbulb Files series — this time around with Sreenivas Tata, Cubewise’s General Manager for Australia’s Southern Region.

2021 has been a hard year for business. But the plethora of financial and operational challenges companies faced this year also provided plenty of opportunities to reflect, learn, and grow

In the 2022 instalment of Jack’s masterclass series, we’ll take a bird’s eye view at some of the key learnings from our previous masterclasses, as well as the lessons we learned as we navigate the murky waters of FP&A post-COVID-19.

Enroll today on the 6 module Masterclass presented by Jack Alexander

📅 2022 FP&A Masterclass content calendar

– March 17: The Ultimate Value Drivers: Growth and Return on Invested Capital (ROIC)
– April 28: Planning and Analysis for Critical Value Drivers, Part 1: Growth and Profitability
– June 9: Planning and Analysis for Critical Value Drivers, Part 2: Asset Management 
– July 21: Strategic Analysis and Planning
– September 1: The External View: Benchmarking Performance and Competitive analysis
– October 13: Developing Predictive and Analytical Models

A new version of Arc and Slice is now available to download. v3.4 includes many new exciting features. 

– Easily apply standard practices with the code formatter
– Expand Above in subsets and cube views
– Quickly see and clean your applications
– Easier to troubleshoot your MDX
– Export MDX Forms from a cube view

and much more… 

A complete list of all enhancements and fixes can be found in the Arc & Slice v3.4 Release Notes (v3.4.0.md).

Try Arc & Slice now!

Arc & Slice are free to download and includes a three-month “no strings attached” trial license.

It’s safe to say that we’ve never before seen the scale of widespread cash injections that we saw during the COVID-19 pandemic. Governments across the world scrambled to print the money they needed to keep the economy afloat and provide the support that their citizens needed. The natural consequence of this has been rapid inflationary pressures (Blog).

One of the most important knock-on effects of increasing inflation is the natural response that we have seen in interest rates.  In an attempt to control monetary supply, we’ve emerged from a decade-long period of low interest rates – and into one where they seem to keep rising and rising.

As a company, it’s important to assess how these interest rate changes will affect your business and the best way to do this is by utilizing your FP&A tools to their full potential.

Have you ever wondered what happened in your applications in the last few minutes?  Or even over the last few days? Perhaps you want to know who was logged in this morning or how much memory was used last night.  All of these questions can help you get a better understanding of how your IBM Planning Analytics (TM1) system is being utilized.

And all of the answers can be found with Pulse.

Pulse tracks everything that is happening across all your IBM Planning Analytics (TM1) applications (on-premise or on PA SaaS) and it stores this information in a powerful database that is built to handle large amounts of data.

Let’s have a look and see how this can help you.
Planning Analytics Workspace

Find out what’s new or changed in the most recent release of IBM® Planning Analytics Workspace. The new features described here always reflect the full capabilities of Planning Analytics Workspace on cloud.

Planning Analytics Workspace Classic on Cloud no longer available as of 2.0.79
The ‘new experience’ is a major update to the Planning Analytics Workspace user experience that was originally released as part of the 2.0.56 update in October 2020.

Process editor available only on modeling workbenches
As previously announced, processes must be created and edited on a modeling workbench as of Planning Analytics Workspace 2.0.79.

Track and report on plan progress with the plan Overview report
You can view a plan-level overview report to help you assess the progress of your plan.

Send email reminders to contributors of open tasks
You can now send an email reminder to plan contributors from the Contributions panel of the Overview report.

Set task dependencies for plan automation
You can now automatically open a task upon completion of one or more dependent tasks.

Set a start date for your tasks
You can now set a start date as well as an end date for a task.

Use the new Features and Configuration tile to administer you Planning Analytics Workspace on Cloud environment
The Features tile in Planning Analytics Administration on Cloud is renamed as Features and Configuration. When you click the Features and Configuration tile, you see two tabs: Features and Configuration.

Configure an inactivity timeout for Planning Analytics on Cloud
Planning Analytics Workspace on Cloud enforces an inactivity timeout. Previously, this inactivity period was set to 60 minutes for all users and could not be configured by a Planning Analytics administrator.

Use the new interface to manage chores involved with a specific process
Previously, when you opened the context (right-click) menu for a process in the Databases tree, you could click the Display chores involved option to open the Modify chores window. This window listed all of the chores that included the process. You could then use the Modify chores window to edit selected chores that included the process or delete the process from selected chores.

Select multiple variables in the process editor
You can now select multiple variables in the process editor. When multiple variables are selected, you can apply any option on the selected variables bar to multiple variables simultaneously.

Go to a specific line in the process editor
You can now jump to a specific line in the process editor with Go to line. This capability was previously available only in the rules editor through shortcut keys (Ctrl + L or Cmd + L). Now, you can click the Go to line icon in both the rules and process editors to quickly move up and down the script. This feature is especially useful if you encounter a process error that requires you to go to a specific section and line number.

Apply formatting to visualization axis
When you apply formatting to a visualization axis now, the axis retains the format when you change the member on the axis or when synchronization automatically changes the member. The formats are also retained when you switch from one visualization to another or convert the visualization to an exploration and vice versa.

Wrap text in data cells
You can now format string cells in explorations (or views) to wrap text. You can wrap multi-line text in data cells with or without line breaks. Previously, you could only wrap text in headers.

Deprecation notice – chore editor to be removed from books, available only on workbenches as of Planning Analytics Workspace 2.0.81
Starting with Planning Analytics Workspace 2.0.81, chores must be created and edited on a modeling workbench.

Planning Analytics for Microsoft Excel

Read about what’s new or updated in IBM® Planning Analytics for Microsoft Excel.

Aligning releases for IBM Planning Analytics components
To simplify and align IBM Planning Analytics for Microsoft Excel releases with those across IBM Planning Analytics Workspace, IBM is labeling its next Planning Analytics for Excel release as IBM Planning Analytics for Microsoft Excel 2.0.79.

Alternate web technology support for components in Planning Analytics for Microsoft Excel
IBM Planning Analytics for Microsoft Excel now supports the use of Microsoft Edge WebView2 for all components (cube viewer, drill through, set editor, and content store) through a new feature flag. Enabling this feature flag allows these components in Planning Analytics for Excel to be compatible with newer web standards.
What’s new in TM1 Web
Read about what’s new or updated in IBM® TM1® Web
There are new features in IBM® TM1® Web. For more information, see the TM1 Web documentation in IBM Knowledge Center

Aligning releases for IBM Planning Analytics components
To simplify and align IBM Planning Analytics TM1 Web (Spreadsheet Services) releases with those across IBM Planning Analytics Workspace, IBM is labeling its next TM1 Web release as IBM Planning Analytics TM1 Web 2.0.79.

Location detail for SUBNMs included in the TM1 Web Export dialog
In TM1 Web, when you export a websheet (slice) to Excel, you can now see the location details for any cell that contains SUBNMs in the websheet. The location details appear in the Export dialog and along with the sheet name, includes the row and column number of the SUBNM. This makes it easier to identify SUBNMs and determine which SUBNM is driving the report based on its position. Previously, if there were multiple SUBNMs in a websheet with the same dimension name, it was difficult to identify the SUBNM when exporting.

Authentication enhancement for websheets in IBM Planning Analytics Workspace
You no longer see an authentication error when you open a TM1 websheet with data from multiple databases in Planning Analytics Workspace. Instead, an authentication page now displays for each database that is referenced in the websheet. Simply enter your credentials to open the websheet. This enhancement eliminates the need to manually resolve the authentication error, saving you time and effort.

Known issues
The following are known issues in IBM Planning Analytics TM1 Web. These issues will be resolved in a future release.