Cognos 8 BI for Consumers

According to leading analysts, Business Intelligence (BI) has been a top priority for worldwide organizations within the past five years, and it will continue to be a priority in the near future. With a global user base of millions, Cognos is known as a leading provider of Business Intelligence tools. Cognos’ latest release is Cognos 8 BI, a powerful suite of modules that share one common infrastructure for the creation, management and deployment of queries, reports, analyses, scorecards, dashboards and alerts—all designed to support an organization’s Business Intelligence objectives. As a consultant with over 10 years of Cognos BI experience, Juan A. Padilla is an expert in helping organizations develop and implement Business Intelligence solutions. As the first in a series of books on Cognos products, with Cognos 8 BI for Consumers, Padilla provides a step-by-step introductory guide for the key component of the Cognos infrastructure: Cognos Connection. This book walks the reader through the fundamentals of Cognos Connection, the powerful web portal that is the foundation for all users of Cognos 8 BI, from end users to administrators.The guide relies heavily on screen images that demonstrate product workflow and available features; even readers who do not have “live” access to Cognos software can learn about it!
This guide has been designed for: – companies evaluating Cognos as a potential BI solution and need to know the capabilities before purchasing; – those planning to use Cognos products professionally, e.g. job-seekers or consultants; – organizations using previous versions of Cognos who need to evaluate the latest version before upgrading or migrating; and – novice “hands-on” users of Cognos, for whom this guide will be an “anytime, anywhere” tutorial and reference source. In this book, you will discover: – how Cognos Connection functions; – how to work with reports, including scheduling, setting parameters and changing formats; – how to customize the look and feel of the interface to your preferences; – a simulation of Cognos’ security features; and – report samples that show the powerful reporting capabilities of Cognos 8 BI.