February 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
10 FEB 2021	IMPORTANT Actions and Considerations	Account Reconciliation Table Changes Potentially Affect Custom Reports	Updated document. Added a consideration
03 FEB 2021	Account Reconciliation	New Videos	Updated document. Added a feature description.
03 FEB 2021	Enterprise Performance Management Cloud	Give Us Documentation Feedback	Updated document. Revised e-mail address.
03 FEB 2021	EPM Cloud Common	REST API Support for Oracle Infrastructure Gen 2 Environments	Updated document. Revised documentation link.
03 FEB 2021	IMPORTANT Actions and Considerations	New Web Ad Hoc Experience	Updated document. Revised feature description.
03 FEB 2021	IMPORTANT Actions and Considerations	New Approval Process Validation Enhancement for Financial Consolidation and Close Coming Soon	Updated document. Added a consideration.
28 JAN 2021			Created initial document.

Overview

This document outlines the upcoming Enterprise Performance Management Cloud update.

Feature Summary

Enterprise Performance 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, February 5, 2021.

Production Environments: Oracle will apply this monthly update during the first daily maintenance that occurs at or after 22:00 UTC on Friday, February 19, 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, February 5, 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.

Defects Fixed 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.

Follow Us on Social Media

Follow EPM Cloud on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

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

EPM Cloud Common

This section contains announcements related to the common EPM Cloud components such as EPM Automate, Migration, Access Control, Data Integration, Calc Manager, and Smart View for Office.

New Tutorials

Four new tutorials are available for Reports. Note: These videos will be available on February 5th.

Applies to: Financial Consolidation and Close, Planning, Planning Modules, Tax Reporting

Reporting in the new Cloud EPM Platform

This video shows you how to design reports using the new Reporting Solution in the new Cloud EPM Platform. You can design reports with images, textboxes, charts, and grids. Insert formulas to calculate grid values and text functions to dynamically retrieve report and grid metadata. Apply robust reporting features such zooming into levels, conditional formatting, and so on.

Creating Reports in EPM Cloud

This video shows you how to create reports in the new Cloud EPM Platform. You can start by creating a folder in the Library, create a report, define the data source, and select members. You can preview your report while you are designing it, format it, make changes to grid properties, and save the report.

Adding Report Objects

This video shows you how add text boxes and images to reports in EPM Cloud. You start with a report that already has a grid in it. You add a text box and then format the text in that text box. You add images to the report header, and you insert text functions into the report header to display specified information about the report.

Creating Charts in Cloud EPM Reports

In this tutorial you learn how to create charts in Cloud EPM reports. You add charts and then set them up to visualize report data. You can base your chart off of an existing or new hidden grid. Then you can select the data to include in the chart. You can select the type of chart such as a pie chart or stacked bar chart, and select how the legend is displayed

Business Benefit: These videos provide step-by-step instructions to help you perform your related business activities.

New Topics in EPM Cloud Operations Guide

The Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud Operations Guide has been enhanced with topics that help you troubleshoot Smart View (Mac and Browser) for Office 365 add-in. It also contains a new Account Reconciliation topic that explains what to do if reconciliations are reopened after reloading balances. Additionally, many topics in the guide have been optimized so that they can be easily found through Google searches.

Applies to: Account Reconciliation, Financial Consolidation and Close, Planning, Planning Modules, Tax Reporting

Newly added topics include:

• Library Folders Do Not Display in Home Panel (Clear Storage Option)
• Disabling the Popup Blocker on Chrome
• Clearing the Chrome Browser Cache
• Clearing the Office Cache on a Mac
• Chrome: Connection Issue After Clearing Cache
• Task List Display Issue
• Resolving Reopening of Reconciliations After Reloading Balances

Business Benefit: The Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud Operations Guide helps you self-diagnose and fix EPM Cloud issues.

Key Resources

• Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud Operations Guide

New Next-Generation Reporting Capabilities

The EPM Cloud Platform now has new next-generation reporting capabilities. The new Reports, which has previously been available as Management Reporting in the Narrative Reporting business process for the past four years, is now embedded in the EPM Cloud Platform business processes and applications (Planning, Financial Consolidation and Close, Tax Reporting, and Free Form) alongside, and eventually replacing, Financial Reporting. Reports provides a user-friendly, robust report development framework along with an enriched report viewer experience.

Applies to: Financial Consolidation and Close, Planning, Planning Modules, Tax Reporting

Reports also includes books and bursting. Books provide the ability to group together one or more reports, Books, and other documents, to generate a single PDF output. Bursting enables you to run a single report or book for more than one member of a single dimension for one data source, and publish a PDF output for each member. You can schedule a bursting definition as a Scheduled Job.

Reports, books and bursting definitions are stored in the EPM Platform repository, along with Documents used and generated with Books and Bursting. For example, MS Word and PDF documents inserted in Books and CSV files used in a bursting definition, along with PDF files generated by a bursting definition.

You can migrate Financial Reporting reports to Reports either with in-place migration where you can migrate all or individual reports, or by importing Financial Reporting report files that were exported locally from the Explore Repository. Please note when migrating, the system will convert as many elements of the original report into the Reports equivalent as possible. However, there are differences between the two solutions, and not all elements exist in both solutions. You may have to modify certain elements after the report has been migrated in order to produce a report that is equivalent to the original report.

Financial Reporting will eventually be removed at some future undetermined date, after customers have ample time to migrate their content from Financial Reporting to Reports.

Business Benefit: Provides a highly upgraded, user-friendly, robust report development framework along with an enriched report viewer experience.

Key Resources

• Designing with Reports for Enterprise Performance Management Cloud
• Working with Reports for Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

New Terminology for Management Reporting

With the integration of Management Reporting, rebranded as Reports, in the EPM Platform business processes, for documentation purposes, the term Management Reporting is being replaced with Reports for consistency across all EPM Cloud business processes.

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

Business Benefit: Consistency of naming for Reports across all of EPM Cloud.

New EPM Digital Assistant for Financial Consolidation and Close and Account Reconciliation

In this update, we are introducing the new EPM Digital Assistant to help you perform your daily tasks. This assistant is a chatbot that you access within a business process and use to communicate to access information and perform selected tasks for Financial Consolidation and Close and Account Reconciliation. Within each business process, you can ask questions or give commands to the assistant and it retrieves the information or acts on your requests. The EPM Digital Assistant is based on Oracle Digital Assistant.

Applies to: Account Reconciliation, Financial Consolidation and Close

Business Benefit: The assistant reduces manual tasks and makes it easier to view and update tasks through commands.

Key Resources

• Getting Started with the Digital Assistant for Oracle Cloud Enterprise Performance Management

Dynamic Tabs in Redwood Experience

As part of the Redwood theme experience, we are introducing the Dynamic Tabs feature only within the Redwood theme. Dynamic Tabs allow you to open tabs on the fly, both from a list view or from an existing navigation flow tab to perform related actions. Some use case examples: view drill through from a form in a new temporary tab; view a form in design mode; open Web ad hoc from a form or dashboard; open forms from right-click menus; open dimensions on the fly to view how members are calculated.

Applies to: Financial Consolidation and Close, Planning, Planning Modules, Tax Reporting

Screenshot with dynamic tabs displayed at the bottom of the page

With the Redwood experience, navigation flows within the Redwood theme will move to the bottom of the page instead of the top of the page where they are currently located. With tabs at the bottom of the page, you will benefit from a clear separation of the EPM Cloud horizontal tabs from their browser tabs at the top of the window. Another benefit of this change will be to keep the navigation flow tab names distinct from the names of the artifacts (such as forms and dashboards) rendered within the horizontal tabs. The vertical tabs will stay where they are.

Also within Redwood, action menus in forms are cleaned up to not show items that are already included within the context (right-click) menus in forms.

Business Benefit: Allow users to be able to work on related artifacts within tabs without having to navigate away from a parent artifact.

Key Resources

• Using Dynamic Tabs in Redwood Experience in Working with Planning
• Using Dynamic Tabs in Redwood Experience in Working with Financial Consolidation and Close Cloud
• Using Dynamic Tabs in Redwood Experience in Working with Tax Reporting

New Clone Snapshot Feature

The Clone Snapshot feature is now available for Account Reconciliation and and Profitability and Cost Management. This feature provides a screen-based method to migrate application snapshots from a source environment to a target environment; it is an alternative to writing an EPM Automate script to clone an environment. Note that security (users and their predefined role assignments) cannot be cloned using this feature.

Applies to: Account Reconciliation, Profitability and Cost Management

Cloning of snapshots is useful in migration scenarios, including the following:

• Production to test cloning where only the application needs to be migrated.
• Test to production cloning where only the application needs to be migrated.
• Primary to secondary cloning for disaster recovery.

When you clone a snapshot, Oracle EPM Cloud automatically completes all the actions required to create an exact copy of the current application in the target environment. Because this process recreates the target environment, be sure to backup data and artifacts from the target environment before using this feature.

Business Benefit: Using the Clone Snapshot feature allows you to migrate application snapshots from a source environment to a target environment without writing EPM Automate scripts.

Key Resources

• Cloning Snapshots in Administering Migration for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

REST API Support for Oracle Infrastructure Gen 2 Environments

The Authentication section of the REST API for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud guide is updated to reflect how the user name needs to be passed in Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Gen 2 environments.

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

Business Benefit: Enables REST APIs on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Gen 2 environments.

Key Resources

• Authentication in REST API for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

Role Information

• Service Administrators

New Indentation Option for Standard Mode Ad Hoc Grids in Smart View

A new option in Oracle Smart View for Office 20.200 preserves native Excel formatting used for indentation in ad hoc grids. The new option, Use Excel Indentation (Ad-hoc Standard Mode), appears in the Options dialog, Member Options tab.

Applies to: Financial Consolidation and Close, Planning, Planning Modules, Tax Reporting

In Standard mode, when the Indentation option is set to Subitems in Smart View, the blank spaces used for the indentation could create issues for some users. Now, by enabling the Use Excel Indentation option, this indentation is handled correctly when your application is set to Standard mode.

Business Benefit: When working with Standard mode applications, enabling the Use Excel Indentation option in Smart View lets users see the correct member indentation in ad hoc grids.

Steps to Enable

To improve indentation in ad hoc grids:

1. Ensure that you have installed Smart View 20.200 and are connected to a Standard-mode application in your EPM Cloud source 21.02 or later.
2. In the Smart View ribbon, select Options.
3. In the Options dialog, Member Options tab:
   • Enable the Use Excel Indentation (Ad-hoc Standard Mode) option.
   • In the Indentation drop-down list, select Subitems.
4. Click OK to save your selections.
5. Create a grid layout using ad hoc analysis or open a workbook containing ad hoc grids and click the Refresh button in the Smart View ribbon.
6. Observe that indentation is working as expected.

Key Resources

• Member Options in Working with Oracle Smart View for Office:

Improved Member Selection for Insert Attributes and Mass Allocation in Smart View (Mac and Browser)

In Smart View (Mac and Browser), the Member Selector used with the Insert Attributes and the Mass Allocation features includes new visual and ease-of-use improvements.

Applies to: Financial Consolidation and Close, Planning, Planning Modules, Tax Reporting

Note that the Insert Attributes feature applies to all supported providers. The Mass Allocation feature applies to Planning and Planning Modules only.

The Member Selector for Insert Attributes and Mass Allocation is improved in these areas:

• Tree structure. Members are now displayed in a tree structure in the left pane of the dialog. Use the up and down arrows to the left of member names to expand and collapse hierarchies. Click directly to the left of a member name to select the member, and note the check mark. You may select multiple members from multiple levels in the dimension to add or remove.

• Filter. Type text into the Filter field to filter the members that have already been retrieved within the selected dimension in the Member Selector. Further, using the Hierarchy drop-down, you can filter by Children, Sibling, and other hierarchy options.

• Server Search. Click Server Search to search for all members that contain the entered text, including those that have not already been retrieved within the selected dimension in the Member Selector.

• Check button with the Select Dimension command. Allows you to select the dimension level member.

Business Benefit: Improvements to the Member Selector in Mass Allocation and Insert Attributes make it a more robust and easier-to-use tool for Smart View (Mac and Browser) users.

Steps to Enable

To use the improved in Smart View (Mac and Browser) Member Selector in Mass Allocation and Insert Attributes, Service Administrators must create and deploy a new manifest file with the Mass Allocation and Insert Attributes options enabled:

1. Create a new manifest file and customize it per your requirements, ensuring that you include the Mass Allocation and Insert Attributes options.
2. Deploy the manifest file to Smart View (Mac and Browser) users.

Key Resources

• Deploying and Administering Oracle Smart View for Office (Mac and Browser):
  • Creating and Saving the Manifest File
  • Customizing the Manifest File
  • Deploying the Manifest File to Office 365 Users

• Working with Oracle Smart View for Office (Mac and Browser):
  • Inserting Attribute Dimensions
  • Spreading Values Using Mass Allocation

Simplified Authentication Cache Rebuild Algorithm

EPM Cloud uses cached authentication data to authenticate users. Starting with this update, the cache used for authenticating users is rebuilt using a simplified algorithm to enable the predefined role assignments of users to be effective in EPM Cloud environments after a wait of four minutes. This results in some changes in behavior.

1. Prior to this update, newly added users (through My Services or using EPM Automate) could login to EPM Cloud immediately after their role assignment was completed. After this update, newly added users must wait four minutes or more before they can sign into EPM Cloud.
2. Prior to this update, any changes to predefined role assignments of a user were reflected in Access Control after the user logs in. After this update, changes in predefined role assignments of a user will be reflected when the user logs in again after four minutes.
3. Prior to this update, any predefined role assignments that were not yet reflected in Access Control were reflected after the completion of the next daily maintenance of the environment. After this update, predefined role assignments will be reflected in Access Control after any user logs in to the environment.

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

Business Benefit: The simplified cache rebuild algorithm reduces the wait time to activate new role assignments.

New Source Connections Option in Data Integration

You can now register and manage source systems and connections directly from the Applications page in Data Integration by clicking the Configure Connections button. When the Connections page is launched, customers can add, edit, and delete direct connection information to the following data sources: Oracle ERP Cloud, Oracle HCM Cloud, and NetSuite.

Applies to: Financial Consolidation and Close, Planning, Planning Modules, Tax Reporting

For Oracle ERP Cloud and Oracle HCM Cloud source connections, customers can specify the:

• Name
• Description
• Service URL
• User Name
• Password

Oracle ERP Cloud source connections can be used to register and manage the following data sources:

• Oracle ERP Cloud
• Oracle ERP Cloud (Receivables Transactions)
• Oracle ERP Cloud (Trial Balance Average)
• Oracle ERP Cloud (Custom)
• Oracle ERP Cloud (Payables Transactions)
• Oracle ERP Cloud (Trial Balance)
• Oracle ERP Cloud (Project Management)
• Budgetary Control commitments, obligations, expenditures, and write-back data sources. Budget Review data sources

Oracle HCM Cloud source connections can be used to register and manage Human Resources data from the Oracle Human Capital Management Cloud.

For NetSuite source connections, customers can specify the:

• Name
• Description
• Consumer Key
• Consumer Secret
• Token
• Token Secret
• Account

In this update, the NetSuite policy for accessing integrations has changed and requires token based authorization instead of basic authentication in order to set up the connection to NetSuite from Cloud EPM. Basic authorization credentials will be made read only in a future release..

In addition, the system generates the drill URL automatically. Customers are required to provide only the parameter details on the Map Dimensions page.

Business Benefit: Enables customers to specify the source system and connection information for a direct connection to an Oracle ERP Cloud data source.

Key Resources

• Administering Data Integration for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud:
  • Defining an Oracle ERP Cloud Connection
  • Defining an Oracle HCM Cloud Connection
  • Defining a NetSuite Connection

New Notification Settings for Oracle ERP BI Publisher in Data Integration Application Details

The new Notification Type and Notification Event settings in Application Details in Data Integration have been added so that customers configure how notifications are sent when Oracle ERP BI Publisher reports are executed in the Oracle ERP Cloud.

Applies To: Account Reconciliation, Financial Consolidation and Close, Planning, Planning Modules, Tax Reporting

For the Notification Type, customers can notify by:

• Email Notification
• Bell Notification
• Email and Bell Notification

For the Notification Event, customers can send the notification based on one of the following events:

• Always
• On Success
• On Failure

Here is an example of a Bell Notification in Oracle ERP BI Publisher:

Bell Notification in Oracle ERP BI Publisher

Business Benefit: Enables customers to notify BI Publisher when a job has been processed in Data Integration based on the job status.

Key Resources

• Defining Application Details for Oracle ERP Cloud Data Sources in Administering Data Integration for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

Support for JDBC Drivers Type 3 and Type 4 Compliant in the EPM Integration Agent

When using the EPM Integration Agent, JDBC drivers that are Type 3 and Type 4 compliant can now be used to establish a connection to the data source, execute a query, and then extract the results. The system provides only a framework for using the JDBC driver and does not certify individual drivers. If a driver has special requirements, the customer still needs to write custom scripts.

Applies to: Account Reconciliation, Financial Consolidation and Close, Planning, Planning Modules, Tax Reporting

Business Benefit: Prior to this update the EPM Integration Agent supported only Oracle and MSSQL data sources. For all other data sources, customers had to write custom script to perform the data extraction. This feature enables customers to extract data by simply providing a SQL query without writing a custom script.

Steps to Enable

1. In Application Details for the on premise data source application, populate the JDBC driver and URL fields.  In the following example for a MYSQL database, you might specify:

Application Details Page

2. Copy and paste the JDBC Driver JAR file to the AGENT_HOME/lib folder. For example, copy and paste: mysql-connector-java-8.0.22.jar    
3. Reference the jar file name in the CUSTOM_CLASS_PATH= setting of the agentparams.ini file. For example, enter: CUSTOM_CLASS_PATH=../lib/mysql-connector-  java-8.0.22.jar

Key Resources

• Configuring a Type 3 or Type 4 JDBC Driver for SQL Server in the EPM Integration Agent in the Administering Data Integration for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

Enhanced Custom Attribute Panel in Task Manager

In Task Manager, the Custom Attribute has been re-designed with new tabs, including Properties, Format, and Calculation. The Calculation definition tab will only display if it is a calculated attribute.

Applies to: Financial Consolidation and Close, Tax Reporting

Business Benefit: The Task Manager Custom Attribute panel has been re-arranged to display tabs applicable for the attribute.

Key Resources

• Defining Task Manager Attributes in Administering Financial Consolidation and Close Cloud

Account Reconciliation

New Videos

Two new videos are now available.

Overview: Loading Different Types of Data in Account Reconciliation (Part I)

Loading data is a key prerequisite for performing reconciliations. This is the part 1 of the video series that help you identify the available options for loading different types of data into Account Reconciliation.

Overview: Loading Different Types of Data in Account Reconciliation (Part 2)

Loading data is a key prerequisite for performing reconciliations. This is the part 2 of the video series that help you identify the available options for loading different types of data into Account Reconciliation.

Business Benefit: Videos provide step-by-step instructions to help you perform your related business activities.

Improvements to Date Tolerance in Transaction Matching

Enhancements have been made to how Transaction Matching handles date tolerance range, which is how you specify the number of days to consider for matching of transactions between two data sources in Transaction Matching.

• Anchoring Date Change - In the past, Transaction Matching was designed to anchor the date tolerance on the Subsystem source and it calculated back to the Source.  Now, to make it easier for customers, we are anchoring on the Source (for example, the GL) date which normally is in the system first, and then calculating the date tolerance forward to Subsystem (for example, Bank) which usually comes after. The fields for date tolerance are now labelled Start and End to indicate how many days later the Subsystem transactions are expected to come in.  Note that your existing rules are automatically upgraded in this release. 

• More Precision on Dates by Allowing Same Day Match – There may be times where the administrator would like the match rules to consider transactions on a particular day. For example, you might want to match transactions from the Bank that are posted on the second business day and then transactions posted on 3rd business day in a separate rule. This algorithm generally improves the match rate and accuracy.  Limiting the transactions on the bank side to single would reduce the chances of matching algorithm picking up the wrong transaction.

• Option to Use a Business Calendar instead of Standard Calendar – In the past, Transaction Matching worked strictly on calendar dates, so you would have to account for weekends and holidays when specifying date tolerance. Now, you can use a business calendar by using a new checkbox called "Enable Business Calendar" for date type attribute rule conditions with tolerance and also a checkbox for business calendar is available for match process default attribute mapping. Once you enable the business calendar, you can specify the date tolerance knowing it will account for weekends and holidays.

Business Benefit: Based on customer input, the improvements made to how date tolerance works in Transaction Matching rules will make it easier to specify the tolerance range, provide more precision on the dates, and allow the choice of working with a business calendar rather than a standard calendar.

Key Resources

• Understanding the Transaction Matching Engine in Administering Account Reconciliation
• Defining the Match Process by Creating Rules in Setting Up and Configuring Account Reconciliation

Ability to Run Data Management Data Load Rules in Parallel

By default, data load rules are run one at a time and the system waits for the data load rule job to complete before starting another. However, by using the Execute data load rules in parallel check box on the Data Load Execution dialog, you can run all data load rule jobs at once and the system waits for all data load rules to complete before setting staging to complete. This is useful to increase performance when processing for large data sets.

Business Benefit: Being able to run data load rules in parallel is useful to increase performance when processing large data sets.

Key Resources

• Define and Save a Data Load Definition in Administering Account Reconciliation

New Variable Explanations (VEX) Argument Added to Import Pre-Mapped Transactions Command in EPM Automate and REST API

In the IMPORTPREMAPPEDTRANSACTIONS command in both EPM Automate and REST API, a new argument (VEX) was added to the list of transaction types to handle loading Variance Explanations.

Business Benefit: New VEX argument for Variable Explanations allows you to use EPM Automate or REST API with these type of transactions.

Key Resources

• Import Pre-Mapped Transactions (Reconciliation Compliance) in REST API for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud
• importPreMapped Transactions in Working with EPM Automate for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

Tabs Added to Custom Attribute Dialog to Improve Usability

The Custom Attribute dialog look and feel has been improved by presenting information in three tabs: Properties, Format, and Calculation.  There is no functional change to Custom Attribute, only an improvement to the user interface.

Business Benefit: The improvement to the user interface for Custom Attributes allows you to avoid unnecessary scrolling and an easier user experience.

Key Resources

• Defining Attributes in Setting Up and Configuring Account Reconciliation

Enterprise Data Management

New Video

The following video is now available.

Overview: Attribute Dimensions in Enterprise Data Management

Introduces you to Enterprise Data Management’s full support for attribute dimensions. Assigned to base dimensions, use attribute dimensions to best describe, classify, maintain, navigate, and visualize your metadata using custom, business-specific hierarchies and taxonomies.

Business Benefit: Videos provide overviews and step-by-step instructions to help you perform your related business activities.

Financial Consolidation and Close

New Video

A new video is now available.

Creating Collections For Supplemental Data in Financial Consolidation and Close

Learn how to create collections for supplemental data in Financial Consolidation and Close. Collections define a set of related attributes required for the data collection process. You learn how to add attributes from dimensions and create custom attributes.

Business Benefit: Videos provide step-by-step instructions to help you perform your related business activities.

Referential Integrity Enhancements

To prevent referential integrity problems in journals, the system now prevents users from changing the Account Type of a member used in a Submitted, Approved, or Posted journal, and also ensures that you do not delete Movement, MultiGaap, Currency, Custom3, and Custom 4 members that are referenced in journals.  The referential integrity check has also been enhanced for changes to the Data Storage property under certain conditions.

Business Benefit: Referential integrity checks prevent potential errors with members in journals.

Key Resources

• Journal Referential Integrity in Administering Financial Consolidation and Close Cloud
• Data Storage Options in Administering Financial Consolidation and Close Cloud

Refresh Database Performance Improvements

The performance of the refresh database operation is improved by optimizing some tasks performed during this operation. The more scenarios, currencies and rate accounts in an application, the more noticeable the improvement will be. This feature is controlled by a substitution variable. Please see the Performance Substitution Variables feature in this section for details.

Business Benefit: Improved performance when refreshing the database.

Performance Substitution Variables

The OptimizeConcurrency, DeltaDBRefresh, and OluRatesLoad substitution variables can be enabled to improve performance.

• OptimizeConcurrency = True

This substitution variable improves concurrency of the consolidation process by executing some of the calculations at the very beginning or at the end. The degree of improvement depends on the entity structure of a given customer. Customers with deeper entity hierarchies will benefit the most.

• DeltaDBRefresh = True

This substitution variable improves database refresh performance by doing only necessary actions based on metadata change. Not applicable for Legacy Non “Extended Dimensionality” applications.

• OluRatesLoad = True

This substitution variable improves refresh database performance. The more scenarios, currencies and rate accounts in an application, the more noticeable the improvement will be.

NOTE: The degree of performance improvement varies widely across different applications as it is purely driven by the application design and data distribution.

Business Benefit: These substitution variables help in improving performance.

Narrative Reporting

New Chart Property to Exclude Plotting Zero Data Values

In Management Reporting, previously zero data values were always plotted in charts, which resulted in the zero values still visible in the chart.  This is mostly noticeable in line charts. A new Chart General Property, Plot Zero Values, has been added where you can choose if zero data values are plotted or not. The default selection is true.

Business Benefit: Increased flexibility in chart output rendering.

Key Resources

• Chart Properties in Designing with Management Reporting for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

Disclosure Management Taxonomy Designer Support for Base Taxonomy Import for Templates

In the Disclosure Management Taxonomy Designer, you can now add a new template sheet that is populated with line items, dimensionality and more without having to start over with a new Template. This allows you to define a new network node in an existing taxonomy template.

Business Benefit: Improved flexibility and ease of use when working with the Taxonomy Designer.

Updated Narrative Reporting Extension for Smart View

An updated Narrative Reporting Extension for Oracle Smart View for Office is now available to download and install. This update includes general improvements and bug fixes.

Business Benefit: Downloading and installing the latest Narrative Reporting extension for Smart View gives you access to the latest improvements and bug fixes.

Key Resources

• Installing the Narrative Reporting Extension in Working with Oracle Smart View for Office

Planning

New Videos

Two new video tutorials are now available.

Setting Up Planning in Cloud EPM

Learn how to set up Planning in Oracle EPM Standard Cloud, and Oracle EPM Enterprise Cloud. After setting up Planning in Oracle EPM Standard Cloud, you set up custom Planning and free form Planning in Oracle EPM Enterprise Cloud.

Setting Up Multiple Currencies in Planning

See how to set up multiple currencies in Oracle Fusion Cloud EPM Planning. First you create a multiple currency application. Then you set up your input and reporting currencies. After ensuring that exchange rates have been entered or loaded, you modify a form so that the currency conversion is run from that form. You then run the rule from the form. You also set up a bulk currency rule to convert currency and run it.

Several existing videos have been updated:

Managing Cubes in Planning

Learn how to manage cubes in Planning. Planning applications are made up of one or more cubes that store metadata and data.

Designing Navigation Flows in Planning

Learn how to design navigation flows in Planning. Navigation Flows are comprised of clusters, cards, and tabs that allow a user to complete planning tasks. Planning application designers can create navigation flows that control how roles, or groups, interact with the application.

Migrating and Updating Application Artifacts in Planning

Learn how to export and import artifacts in Planning. You can migrate an application, a repository, or individual artifacts across product environments, or use the migrated artifacts to update metadata or as a backup.

Business Benefit: These videos provide step-by-step instructions to help you perform your related business activities.

EPM Planning Financials Support for Budget Revisions and Integration with Budgetary Control

With budget revisions, planners can make revisions to an approved budget in EPM Planning Financials. When you integrate with the Budgetary Control module in Oracle ERP Cloud, you can view current consumption, check that proposed budget changes do not go below what has already been consumed, and update budget changes to impact funds available. After budget changes are reserved and approved, planners can review the budget revision details in Budgetary Control by drilling down on the current approved budget balances.

If you don't have Budgetary Control, you can still use budget revisions to create and populate budget revisions, and share the revisions.

You use Data Integration to drive the integration of budget revisions between EPM Planning Financials and Budgetary Control. Data Integration provides solutions that enable EPM Planning Financials customers to map from the Budgetary Control data model to target dimensions. You can also customize and extend these integrations, for example, by applying other mappings as needed to meet your business requirements.

With this integration, the complete planning and revision cycle is integrated between EPM Planning Financials and Budgetary Control:

• Build your original budget in EPM Planning Financials using the planning and forecasting process, and then push the original budget to Budgetary Control.

• Create budget revisions and check funds in the adopted budget from within EPM Planning Financials to ensure that the budget revisions you are proposing meet the controls set in Budgetary Control.

• Reserve funds in Budgetary Control from within EPM Planning Financials to update budget balance in Budgetary Control.

• Drill through at the cell level from an approved budget in the Current Approved Budget form in EPM Planning Financials to Budgetary Control to review the budget revision transactions that make up the balance.

Business Benefit:

Meet legislative requirements in the US state and local public sector market with integration of management and operational budget tasks across the Budgetary Control module in Oracle ERP Cloud and EPM Planning Financials.

• Accurately manage budget revisions by simultaneously validating against operational budget and consumption balances.
• Maintain control and visibility with approvals and budget revision versions.
• Ensure compliance by validating budget changes against budgetary control policies.
• Improve insight into budget management with access to planning data and tools.

Steps to Enable

Steps are required in EPM Planning Financials and Data Integration to enable this integration. A detailed task list is available in "Setting Up Budget Revisions and Integration with Budgetary Control" in Administering Planning Modules.

Tips And Considerations

• This feature is available to these Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud customers with the Planning Financials module enabled:
  • Legacy Enterprise Planning and Budgeting Cloud Services customers and Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service Plus One (PBCS +1) customers with Financials enabled, when the Essbase version is upgraded to the version that supports Hybrid Essbase and Hybrid Essbase is enabled.
  • EPM Standard Cloud and EPM Enterprise Cloud customers with Module application type when Hybrid Essbase is enabled.

• Budget Revisions is available in the Financials module of EPM Planning.

  If you have detailed data in other EPM Planning modules (Workforce, Projects, or Capital), you must pull this data into EPM Planning Financials before you can integrate the data with Budgetary Control.

• The members must match between EPM Planning Financials and Budgetary Control (although you can address prefixes and suffixes in Data Integration). You can map dimensions between EPM Planning Financials and Budgetary Control in Data Integration.

• You must use your own chart of accounts in EPM Planning Financials rather than using the provided chart of accounts. This allows you to bring in the existing account structure from Budgetary Control so that the dimensions match.

• Only monthly, quarterly, and yearly planning is supported. Both 12 month and 13 period calendars are supported. Weekly planning is not supported.

• The Budgetary Control module in Oracle ERP Cloud must be enabled before you begin.

• The currency in EPM Planning Financials must match the currency in Budgetary Control. Only single currency applications are supported.

• In Budgetary Control, a new control budget with Source Budget Type of EPM Financials module (Not Hyperion Planning) is needed for this integration. The currency, calendar, and budget segments must align with the ledger. In a future release, you can change an existing control budget with a source budget type as Other or Hyperion Planning to EPM Financials module source budget type.

• Create a budget scenario in EPM Planning Financials with the same name as the control budget in Budgetary Control to avoid errors in budget synchronization.

Key Resources

• EPM Planning Resources:
  • "Setting Up Budget Revisions and Integration with Budgetary Control" in Administering Planning Modules
  • "Integrating Budget Revisions with Budgetary Control" in Administering Data Integration
  • "Working with Budget Revisions and Integrating with Budgetary Control" in Working with Planning Modules

• Budgetary Control Resource:
  • Source Budget Integration with Budgetary Control: Enterprise Performance Management Financials Module in Using Financials for Public Sector.

Role Information

• Budget Manager role in Budgetary Control.
• Administrator role in EPM Planning Financials to enable budget revisions and set up data mapping.

EPM Planning Projects and Project Management Integration Whitepaper is Now Available

A whitepaper is now available that details the setup required for integration between EPM Planning Projects and Project Management.

Business Benefit: This white paper guides you through the out-of-the-box integration between Oracle Fusion Cloud Enterprise Performance Management and Oracle Fusion Cloud Project Management. This white paper:

• Shows how you can unify your planning, budgeting, forecasting, and project execution processes into a single business flow, by implementing the integration.
• Identifies the scope of the delivered integration.
• Describes the delivered data migration options.

Key Resources

• Unified Planning Budgeting Execution and Analysis of Projects White Paper (Doc ID 2739200.1) (Requires access to Oracle Support)

Profitability and Cost Management

There are no new features for Profitability and Cost Management other than the Clone Snapshot feature (see that topic under EPM Cloud Common).

Tax Reporting

Updated Standard Reports Available

Updated standard reports for Tax Reporting are now available on the Oracle Cloud Marketplace. The updated reports support the Total Special Deductions Hierarchy released in 20.12.

Business Benefit: The standard reports are now up to date with recent changes made for Special Deductions.

Key Resources

• Oracle Cloud Marketplace

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?

REDWOOD USER EXPERIENCE IN EPM CLOUD

As part of the new Redwood experience, we are introducing the Dynamic Tabs feature only within the Redwood theme in this update (21.02). 

In 21.03, to reflect these new and future Redwood-only experiences, the Redwood theme will be shown as a 'Redwood Experience' toggle switch that application administrators can turn on in the 'Appearance' page. Existing Redwood theme applications will default into the Redwood experience while other theme experiences will stay as is.

NEW WEB AD HOC EXPERIENCE IN EPM CLOUD

In an upcoming update, we will introduce the new Web ad hoc experience for all users across all themes. This replaces the existing Web ad hoc with a new user experience when using ad hoc over the Web. This will provide the benefit of fast snappy grids with several Smart View ad hoc capabilities over the Web, all within a newly defined interface for Web ad hoc. Users can start with a cube slice from scratch or traverse from their Web forms or dashboards into these new ad hoc sheets for a whole new ad hoc experience. Users within the Redwood theme can leverage the benefit of the dynamic tabs to work in tandem with form or dashboards or reports alongside these new ad hoc grids. This solves many multi-tasking use cases within Cloud EPM. Ad hoc on the Web will be available for Planning, Financial Close and Consolidation, and Tax Reporting business processes. Within Smart View ad hoc, we will also support multi-parent zoom in capabilities in ad hoc when used within the 'Standard’ ad hoc mode.

RUNBUSINESSRULE EPM AUTOMATE COMMAND - CHANGE OF BEHAVIOR

Starting with the 21.05 update, the runBusinessRule EPM Automate command will no longer let you run a ruleset against Planning, Planning Modules, Financial Consolidation and Close, and Tax Reporting applications. Instead, you should use the runRuleSet command to launch business rulesets using EPM Automate.

If you currently use scripts that use the runBusinessRule command to launch rulesets, you must modify them to use the runRuleSet command.

SUPPORT FOR COMPOSITE FORMS IN EPM CLOUD

Starting in May 2021, Oracle epm Cloud PM plans to stop official support for composite forms. Customers are advised to convert existing composite forms to EPM Cloud dashboards and log any issues with Support.

NEW “SUPPRESS MISSING NATIVE” OPTION IN FINANCIAL REPORTING WEB STUDIO GRID EDITOR

The new “Suppress Missing Native” option in the “Suppression” panel in the Financial Reporting Web Studio Grid Editor properties is non-functional for 21.01. The desired output of the selection will not be available when the report is executed even if the option is enabled. This will be addressed in an upcoming release.

STRATEGIC MODELING TERMINOLOGY CHANGE

In a future update, the Consolidation feature in Strategic Modeling will be renamed Scenario Rollup.

NEW VALIDATION FOR MEMBER SOLVE ORDER IN PROFITABILITY AND COST MANAGEMENT COMING SOON

A new validation for the Member Solver Order member property will be implemented in an upcoming update. The valid range for this property will be from 1 to 120. If you currently have any member that has a value for Member Solve Order that is greater than 120, when you edit that member in Dimension Management, you will be required to change it to a valid value in order to save your other changes for that member.

ACCOUNT RECONCILIATION TABLE CHANGES POTENTIALLY AFFECT CUSTOM REPORTS

Starting in this update, the ARM_SUMMARY_AMOUNTS table is replaced by the ARM_BALANCE_TOTALS table. Any Account Reconciliation custom reports referencing ARM_SUMMARY_AMOUNTS will need to be updated. For details, see ARM_BALANCE_TOTALS table in Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud Tables and Views for Account Reconciliation.

NEW APPROVAL PROCESS VALIDATION ENHANCEMENT FOR FINANCIAL CONSOLIDATION AND CLOSE COMING SOON

Starting in the 21.03 update, there will be a tighter validation for Administrator users entering or loading data to any entities participating in the approval review process. In order for any users (including Administrator users) to enter data to the applicable entity, the entity must have already started the review process. No data entry is allowed for any entities with the Locked or Not Started approval status.

If you do not wish to start the review process for the entity before entering data, you need to remove the entity from the Approval Unit Hierarchy (AUH) definition or ensure that the AUH is not assigned to specific Scenario/Year/Period in the AUH assignment.

NEW EXTENDACCOUNTSCOPE SUBSTITUTION VARIABLE IN FINANCIAL CONSOLIDATION AND CLOSE

In the 20.11 update, a new feature was introduced in Financial Consolidation and Close to extend the Account scope of Translation and Consolidation Logic. Previously not all system rules were applied consistently to all accounts outside of the “FCCS_Balance Sheet” hierarchy. This has now been updated to apply the same system rules to all relevant accounts regardless of their position in the Account dimension hierarchy.

The most notable change is the calculation of Opening Balance and Foreign Exchange Variance on Revenue and Expense accounts with the exception of Income Statement accounts and Revenue and Expense accounts within Total Other Comprehensive Income. The opening balance and foreign exchange variance calculations for these accounts has not changed and are still redirected to FCCS_REC_OBFXCTA and FCCS_OR_OBFXCICTA respectively.

Prior to the change, the movement of Revenue and Expense accounts with a time-balance attribute of Flow could be reported from FCCS_Movements, FCCS_ClosingBalance, FCCS_Mvmts_Total or FCCS_Mvmts_Subtotal. With the new behavior, the same movement data for the account can be reported from FCCS_Mvmts_Subtotal, with Opening Balance and Foreign Exchange Variance included in the other subtotals.

Note that this feature may have an impact on your application due to certain customizations/configurations, and you may need to update reports and forms, etc. If you need to revert to the old system behavior that was in place before this feature was implemented, you can create a Substitution Variable named “ExtendAccountScope” and set it to “False”. This will revert to the system behavior from prior to the implementation of the enhancement. If this substitution variable does not exist, or exists but is not set to “False”, then the new behavior will apply.

SMART VIEW ADD-ON INSTALLATION FOR TASK MANAGER AND SUPPLEMENTAL DATA MANAGER

In an upcoming release, the installation of Smart View add-ons for Task Manager and Supplemental Data Manager will change. At that time, users of the Smart View add-ons will need to uninstall and re-install their add-ons to take advantage of the latest features and fixes.

TAX REPORTING TOTAL SPECIAL DEDUCTIONS HIERARCHY FINANCIAL REPORTS CONSIDERATION

If you are planning to use the Special Deductions hierarchy introduced in Release 20.12, or if you have Financial Reports that reference the old Special Deductions parent / child hierarchy, please review the information in this Cloud Customer Connect post.

NARRATIVE REPORTING DOCLET VERSIONING LOGIC

In an upcoming update, the versioning logic of doclets in report packages will be changing to prevent the creation of additional versions when repeated system automated updates are made.

LIMITATION WHEN USING CHROME 88.0.4324.06 TO DOWNLOAD AND SAVE FINANCIAL REPORTING REPORTS IN A PDF FORMAT

When using Chrome 88.0.4324.06 (Official Build) (64-bit), you cannot use the Download button to download and save Financial Reporting reports in a PDF format. The workaround is to use the Print button to print the reports in a PDF format.