July 2021 Update

Revision History

This document will continue to evolve as existing sections change and new information is added. All updates appear in the following table:

Date	Product	Feature	Notes
24 JUN 2021			Created initial document.

Overview

This document outlines the upcoming Enterprise Data Management Cloud update.

Feature Summary

Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Monthly Update Schedule

Test Environments: Oracle will apply this monthly update during the first daily maintenance that occurs at or after 22:00 UTC on Friday, July 2, 2021.

Production Environments: Oracle will apply this monthly update during the first daily maintenance that occurs at or after 22:00 UTC on Friday, July 16, 2021.

NOTE: Backing up the daily maintenance snapshot and restoring the environment as needed are self-service operations. Oracle strongly recommends that you download the maintenance snapshot every day to a local server.

The Oracle Help Center provides access to updated documentation. The updates will be available in the Help Center on Friday, July 2, 2021.

NOTE: Some of the links to new feature documentation included in this readiness document will not work until after the Oracle Help Center update is complete.

Fixed Issues and Considerations

Software issues addressed each month and considerations will be posted to My Oracle Support.

This provides visibility into EPM Cloud release contents.

Please Join Oracle Cloud Customer Connect

Please take a moment to join the Cloud Customer Connect forums for EPM Cloud services. Oracle Cloud Customer Connect is a community gathering place for members to interact and collaborate on common goals and objectives. This is where you will find the latest release information, upcoming events, or answers to use-case questions. Joining takes just a few minutes. Join now!

https://cloud.oracle.com/community

NOTE: The Settings and Actions menu now contains a link to Cloud Customer Connect. To access this link, from the Home page, click the down arrow next to the user name (in the upper right-hand corner of the screen), and select Cloud Customer Connect.

Give Us Documentation Feedback

We welcome your comments and suggestions to improve the content of the What's New document and the product documentation.

Please send us your feedback at EPMdoc_ww@oracle.com. In the body or title of the email, state that you are inquiring or providing feedback, and indicate for which EPM Cloud service and the monthly update cycle.

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These are great resources for the latest updates and information about EPM Cloud.

Features

EPM Cloud Common

Updates to the Clone Environment Feature

This update removes the constraint that the cloning source and target environments must be on the same EPM Cloud monthly update.

Applies to: Account Reconciliation, Enterprise Data Management, Financial Consolidation and Close, Narrative Reporting, Planning, Planning Modules, Profitability and Cost Management, Tax Reporting

Account Reconciliation, Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud, and Narrative Reporting do not support the migration of snapshots from a monthly update to a previous monthly update. All other business processes support the migration of snapshots from a monthly update to the previous and next updates.

Business Benefit: This change makes the Clone Environment feature abide by the migration guidelines established for snapshot migration in EPM Cloud.

Key Resources

• Cloning EPM Cloud Environments in Administering Migration for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

Documentation of Differences Between Classic and OCI (Gen 2) EPM Cloud

The Getting Started with Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud for Administrators Guide has been enhanced with a section that lists the major differences between Classic and OCI (Gen 2) EPM Cloud infrastructures.

Applies to: Account Reconciliation, Enterprise Data Management, Financial Consolidation and Close, Narrative Reporting, Planning, Planning Modules, Profitability and Cost Management, Tax Reporting

Business Benefit: This topic helps customers understand the differences in the operation of Classic and OCI (Gen 2) EPM Cloud environments.

Key Resources

• Differences Between Classic and OCI EPM Cloud Environments in Getting Started with Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud for Administrators

REST API to Generate a Role Assignment Audit Report for OCI (Gen 2) Environments

Users with a Service Administrator role can now use a REST API to generate a Role Assignment Audit Report of users with their pre-defined roles on OCI (Gen 2) Environments. This report shows all the changes made to the predefined role assignments within the provided time frame. This report can be generated for the previous 90 days from the current date. You can download the report using the Download REST API.

Applies to: Account Reconciliation, Enterprise Data Management, Financial Consolidation and Close, Narrative Reporting, Planning, Planning Modules, Profitability and Cost Management, Tax Reporting

Business Benefit: This feature allows you to automate reporting on users role assignments.

Key Resources

• Managing Users in REST API for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

Role Information

• Service Administrators

REST API to Generate an Invalid Login Report for OCI (Gen 2) Environments

Users who have both a Service Administrator role and an Identity Domain Administrator role can now use a REST API to generate an Invalid Login Report on OCI (Gen 2) environments. This report shows unsuccessful login attempts for users within the provided time frame. This report can be generated for the previous 90 days from the current date. You can download the report using the Download REST API.

Applies to: Account Reconciliation, Enterprise Data Management, Financial Consolidation and Close, Narrative Reporting, Planning, Planning Modules, Profitability and Cost Management, Tax Reporting

Business Benefit: This feature allows you to automate reporting on unsuccessful login attempts.

Key Resources

• Managing Users in REST API for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

Role Information

• Service Administrators

Enterprise Data Management

Additional Fields for Node Data Type Properties in Expressions

Expressions can access additional information about nodes which are referenced in Node data type properties.

The following fields are now available for Node data type properties in an expression:

• Dimension
• Node Type
• Properties (Node level only)

Relationship properties and Node level properties which are configured to use inheritance or derived default values are not available for selection.

Business Benefit: Business logic can be defined based on the characteristics of a related node via a property association. This information is accessible for derived properties, custom validations, policy filters, subscription filters, and extract filters.

Key Resources

• Data Types for Expression Terms in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Application Templates

Templates provide a way to store application configurations in an offline file for use in other Enterprise Data Management environments. A template contains a single application and related artifacts including dimensions and data chain objects as well common objects such as views, properties, lookup sets, and global connections used by the application. Applications can be exported from a source environment to a template and imported from a template into a target environment. Templates can only be used to create new applications in environments where those applications do not already exist.

Templates can be exported and imported by Service Administrator role users from the Templates page in the user interface. Templates contain metadata only and do not include any data, requests, or transaction history.

Business Benefit: Templates can be used to transfer metadata for individual applications across Enterprise Data Management environments and enable sharing of application definitions to either jump start new implementations or add new applications to existing target environments.

Key Resources

• Working with Templates in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Archive and Reactivate in Dimension Inspector

Dimensions can be archived in the dimension inspector when they are no longer needed by an application. Archiving a dimension places all of its data chain objects (node types, hierarchy sets, node sets, and viewpoints) in an archived state. Once a dimension has been archived, it is hidden in the application inspector and registration wizard.  Archived dimensions cannot be selected for imports or exports. Requests and transaction history are retained for archived dimensions.

Archived dimensions can be reactivated in the dimension inspector in the event they are to be used by an application again.

Business Benefit: Application owners can archive dimensions which were never used or were temporarily needed and have become obsolete.

Key Resources

• Archiving and Unarchiving Dimensions in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Boundancestors and Boundlocations in Expressions

New collections are available for the Node and SourceNode objects in an expression to access related nodes within a bound viewpoint from a partially bound viewpoint.  BoundAncestors returns a list of all ancestor nodes for a node in the bound viewpoint. BoundLocations returns a list of shared node locations for a node in the bound viewpoint.

The following methods and attribute are available for BoundAncestors and BoundLocations:

• Any()
• Count()
• Find()
• Size
• ToFloatList()
• ToIntegerList()
• ToStringList()

Business Benefit: For partially bound viewpoints where a subset of data is being maintained, some business rules need a way to access nodes from a bound viewpoint to ensure data integrity in the context of the entire data set. An example is a custom validation which prevents shared nodes under a common top node in the bound viewpoint but the partially bound viewpoint does not contain all of the nodes under that top node.

Key Resources

• Data Types for Expression Terms in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Convert Timestamps to Dates in Expressions

Timestamp values can be converted to dates in an expression using the ToDate method.  This enables date values to be derived or transformed from timestamp data type properties and allows timestamps to be compared to dates.

Business Benefit: For some business rules, date property values need to be based on or compared to a timestamp property such as Created Date or Last Modified Date.

Key Resources

• Data Types for Expression Terms in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Delete Archived Viewpoints

Archived viewpoints which are no longer used can be deleted from views. An archived viewpoint cannot be deleted if it is bound to a dimension, used by any subscriptions or extracts, or has requests which have not yet completed. Viewpoints that have been deleted are removed from their views, but can still be referenced in requests or transactions that may have used them.

Business Benefit: Users with View Owner permissions need to be able to delete viewpoints that have become obsolete and do not need to be retained for future use.

Key Resources

• Archiving, Unarchiving, and Deleting Viewpoints in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Delete Lookup Sets

Lookup sets which are not used by any application can be deleted by Service Administrators. If a deleted lookup set is referenced in an expression, the expression will become invalid and must be corrected.

Business Benefit: Administrators want to delete lookup sets which are no longer used by any application.

Key Resources

• Working with Lookup Sets in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Edit Name and Description in Property Inspector

The Name and Description base parameters for a property can be edited in the property inspector to modify the original values defined at the time of property creation. Changes to these parameters can only be made by a Service Administrator user and will affect all applications that use the property. Properties in the Core and CoreStats namespaces cannot be renamed. If an overriding label or description was not previously specified for a viewpoint using the property, the new name and description values are displayed for the property in the viewpoint.

Business Benefit: Sometimes the name and description of a property are not well defined when a property is created and need to be changed to better accommodate the needs of the applications and users of the property.

Key Resources

• Editing Property Parameters in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Exclude Implicit Shared Nodes for Extracts

The Exclude Implicit Shared Nodes option for extracts can be used to suppress the output of duplicate hierarchy relationships from the results of an extract operation.  When this option is enabled, only a single instance of a parent/child relationship will be included in the output of an extract process. Other instances of the same relationship which may exist in different locations in a hierarchy will be excluded. This option is only available for extracts using hierarchy viewpoints.

Business Benefit: Some external systems and processes expect only a single instance of each parent/child relationship from a hierarchy. Duplicate relationships can lead to errors or issues and should be avoided.

Key Resources

• Specifying Extract Options in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Expand Allowed Values for Properties on Import

The Expand Allowed Values on Import option can be used to update the Allowed Values parameter for properties being imported. When this option is enabled, values coming from the import source which do not exist in the allowed values list for a property will be added to the list for use by the target application. This option is only available for imports using the Replace or Reset mode.

Business Benefit: The allowed values for properties used by an application need to be updated based on valid values coming from a source application during an import process.

Key Resources

• Managing Import Options in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Expanded Job Results for Import, Export, and Extract APIs

Job results for the Import, Export, and Extract REST APIs include additional information for monitoring and audit purposes.

The following details have been added:

• Start Time
• End Time
• Record Count
• Run By User
• Connection Name
• Source File Name (for imports only)

Business Benefit: External programs which run imports, exports, and extracts using the REST API need more information to  properly orchestrate integration tasks and report the results of integration processes.

Import Subset of Trees from Financials Cloud

When importing segment values and hierarchies from Financials Cloud General Ledger into Enterprise Data Management, the import process will only affect trees which are included in the import file if you are using the Merge or Replace import mode. This allows the import file to only contain a subset of the trees which exist in Enterprise Data Management. Trees that are not in the import file will not be affected by the import operation unless you use the Reset import mode.

Business Benefit: A subset of trees which are new or updated can be imported into Enterprise Data Management without negatively affecting other trees which do not exist in the import file.

Key Resources

• Importing Oracle Financials Cloud General Ledger Dimensions in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Include Descendants in Subscriptions Using Top Node Filters

When a parent node that is located under a different top node is inserted or moved under a node that is specified in a subscription top node filter, the descendants of the parent node are also inserted and moved as part of the subscription request. This ensures that the same descendants exist in under the parent node in the original viewpoint and in the target viewpoint of the subscription.

Business Benefit: Descendants of parent nodes which are inserted or moved under a node included in a top node filter for a subscription need to be synchronized from a source viewpoint to a target viewpoint.

Key Resources

• Filtering by Top Node in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Integer and Float Methods for Node Lists in Expressions

New expression methods are available to return a list of Integer or Float data type values from a node list such as children, siblings, ancestors, and locations. Additional methods are available on these integer/float lists to perform aggregate calculations.

The following methods can be used in an expression:

• ToIntegerList
• ToFloatList
• Average
• Size
• Sum

Business Benefit: Derived properties and custom validations need the ability to calculate total values for numeric properties from a node list.  For example, a custom validation which ensures that the total ownership percentage for a list of child nodes equals 100%.

Key Resources

• Data Types for Expression Terms in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Multiple Approvals Per Group for Serial Policies

Approval policies using the Serial approval method can require multiple approvals from the same user group. When the One Approval Per Group option is disabled for a serial policy, you can define the Approvals Per Group for each policy user group. When requests using the policy reach the Approve stage, the request will require the same number of approvals for each user group as specified in the policy.

Business Benefit: Some implementations need multiple approvers from the same user group to approve before a request proceeds to the next approver.

Key Resources

• Creating and Enabling Approval Policies in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Out of Office Handling for Approval Policies

When approval policy invitees are determined for an In Flight request in the Approve stage, users who have set the Out Of Office user preference are invited to approve, but are not included in the remaining approvers count for the policy. If the number of remaining approvers is less than the total approvals required for a policy, the request is escalated to users, with data manager and owner permissions, to get their approval. Out Of Office approvers will remain invited and when they return they can still take action on the request if the escalated users have not acted on their behalf.

Business Benefit: Approval workflow for a request needs to accommodate users who plan to be unavailable to approve requests for a specific period of time.

Key Resources

• Approval Reminders and Escalations in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Out of Order Record Processing During Request File Load

The request file load process now handles out of order rows where child nodes reference parent nodes which are defined later in the file. The load process sorts the file contents to ensure that parent nodes are added to a viewpoint before child nodes and prevents errors from occurring when loading request items from a file. This eliminates the need to manually reorder the rows in the file in order to successfully load it into a request.

Business Benefit: When creating a request file, sometimes the rows which define parent nodes and child nodes may be added to the file out of order (children before parents).

Key Resources

• Request Load File Format in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Record Count Log Report

The Record Count Log report can be used to identify how nodes from different applications and dimensions contribute to the total record count determined by the system. The report displays the node count for every application, dimension, and node type along with the additional unique records from each node included in the total record count. The Record Count Log report is available to Service Administrator users only.

Business Benefit: Administrators want to know how specific applications and dimensions factor into the amount of data being managed in Enterprise Data Management.

Key Resources

• Record Count Log Report in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Redwood Experience as a Default Theme

The Redwood experience is now the default theme upon creation or recreation of an Enterprise Data Management Cloud service (existing as well as new). Existing active environments are not impacted. You can switch to an alternate non-Redwood experience theme from the Appearance page in the Tools cluster. When performing migration tasks, the chosen theme will be exported to and imported from migration snapshot files.

Business Benefit: The Redwood experience is a standard theme for Oracle cloud applications.

Request Activity Improvements

Request activity includes additional columns for each request displayed.

The following columns have been added:

• Request Type
• Owner (Assignee or Submitter)

The Owner column identifies whether a request has been manually submitted or auto-submitted. An Owner filter is also available to limit displayed requests to those assigned to or submitted by a particular user.

Business Benefit: Users want to easily identify whether a request is an Interactive, Subscription, or Import type request. They also want to distinguish manually submitted requests from those that are auto-submitted and be able to find requests which are assigned or submitted by a particular user.

Key Resources

• Working with Request Activity in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Search Below Selected Node in Viewpoint

When searching for nodes, you can filter your search to only nodes below a selected node in a hierarchy viewpoint. This enables you to limit your search to a specific hierarchy or a particular branch of a hierarchy. The Below Selected Node option can be chosen for individual viewpoints where this type of search is performed.

Business Benefit: Users need a way to only search for nodes in a portion of a hierarchy viewpoint to reduce the number of search results returned.

Key Resources

• Searching for Nodes in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Search for Property in Node Type Inspector

Properties can be searched for in the node type inspector to find a property used by a node type. This allows you to quickly find a particular property or multiple properties with a similar name or description.

Business Benefit: In cases where a node type has many properties, being able to search for a property makes it easy to find the property you are looking for.

Key Resources

• Adding, Removing, and Configuring a Node Type's Properties in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Search Results for Different Parents in Node Selector

When searching for nodes in the node selector, multiple search results will be returned for a node that is under different parents in a hierarchy viewpoint. This allows a specific node instance in a particular location of the hierarchy to be selected from the search results for use by a request action being performed on that node.

Business Benefit: To move a shared node to a different parent in a hierarchy viewpoint, you need the ability to search for and select a specific instance of the node under a particular parent where the node will be moved from.

Key Resources

• Searching for Nodes in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Specify Folder for EPM Cloud Global Connections and Extracts

A default folder can be defined for Oracle EPM Cloud global connections to send extract files to specific directory paths in EPM Cloud environments. Extracts that use the EPM Cloud global connections can use the same default folder or specify their own folder if necessary.

Business Benefit: This enables extracts to send mapping files to a Data Management inbox folder and allows Universal applications which manage dimensions for Profitability and Cost Management applications to send metadata files to the profit inbox.

Key Resources

• Creating Global Connections in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

User Filter for Views Page

Views can be filtered from displaying on the Views page for specific users and groups. This allows view owners to restrict the visibility of particular views to specific users. The Show on Views Page parameter on a view can be set to include all users who have data access, include only specified users, or exclude only specified users.

Business Benefit: View owners want to limit the views that particular users can see to focus their usage on specific views such as maintenance views for data sharing and prevent use of other views such as default views for integration purposes.

Key Resources

• Configuring How a View is Displayed in the Views List in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Withdraw Request Approval During Approve Stage

Approvers can withdraw their approval of an In Flight request while it remains in the Approve stage awaiting approvals by other users, or when the request cannot be committed due to validation issues. This enables an approver to make changes to request items and resolve issues which may occur if the request has been enriched during approval.

Business Benefit: Approvers sometimes need to edit request items which they have already approved to make corrections or address data issues resulting from enrichment by other users.

Key Resources

• Understanding Withdrawing Request Approvals in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

Extract Specialty Columns

Specialty columns can be added to extracts to output dynamic values which are specific to a particular run of the extract. Values for the specialty columns are included on each row of the extract file.  

The following extract specialty columns are available:

• Extract Run ID
• Extract Timestamp
• Inverted Level
• Record Number
• User Name

Business Benefit: In some cases, target systems and processes which consume extracted data from Enterprise Data Management require these types of values.

Key Resources

• Selecting Extract Columns in Administering and Working with Oracle Enterprise Data Management Cloud

IMPORTANT Actions and Considerations

Loaner Program for Cloud Infrastructure Generation 2 Testing

Oracle EPM Cloud is now live on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) Gen 2 environments. If you are interested in testing your application performance on an OCI Gen 2 environment, open a service request following the process at https://docs.oracle.com/en/cloud/saas/enterprise-performance-management-common/tsepm/op_procs_loaner_envs.html and request for a loaner environment in an OCI Gen 2 data center for a duration of 30 days with the business justification as “Want to test application performance in an OCI Gen 2 data center”.

After you have performed the testing, submit Provide Feedback from the loaner environment. Create a service request using the normal support process, if you have any issues or feedback for the OCI Gen 2 environment.

For more information, see What is a Gen 2 Cloud?

Null Values in Expressions – Change in Behavior

Starting in Release 21.07, null values are handled differently for certain expression methods. The following changes were made:

• Methods on literal null strings are evaluated using a null value instead of a blank string.
• StartsWith(null) and EndsWith(null) will return False instead of True.
• Substring on a null string will return a null value instead of a blank string.
• When comparing strings using LessThan or GreaterThan, nulls are considered the minimum possible value.
• When null values are used in predicates for NodeList and StringList methods such as Any, Count, and Find, those methods will return False instead of True.

These changes may affect the results of existing expressions for derived properties, property transformations, custom validations, subscription filters, policy filters, and extract filters. Verify whether this change in behavior has any impact in your environment.