Cloud Readiness / Sales Planning Cloud
What's New
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  1. May 2019 Update
  1. Revision History
  2. Oracle Sales Planning Cloud, May Update
        1. Monthly Update Schedule
        2. Please Join Oracle Cloud Customer Connect
        3. Give Us Documentation Feedback
    2. Sales Planning
        1. Removal of Support for Transport Layer Security Protocol 1.0 and 1.1
        2. New Version of the EPM Automate Utility
        3. Removal of the Ability to Create New Composite Forms
        4. Filtering Members
        5. New Application Setting: Link Accounts by Default
        6. Updates to the Connections Interface
        7. New Form Validation Rule Options
        8. New 'Success with Warnings' Job Status
        9. New REST API Jobs to Import Security and Export Security, Export Audit Records and the Job Console, and Sort Members
        10. New Version of Oracle Smart View for Office
        11. New Ad Hoc Behavior Configuration Option
        12. Data Management: New Workflow Mode
        13. Oracle NetSuite Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service Sync SuiteApp Role ID
        14. Data Integration Updates
        15. Ability to Execute Jobs from Groovy Rules
        16. Support for All Types of Run Time Prompt Variables in ASO Groovy Rules
    3. Upcoming Changes
        1. Sales Planning Cloud's New Look and Feel
        2. Changes to Default Setting for Exporting Smart List Textual Data
        3. Additional Updates to the Connections Interface
    4. Defects Fixed

May 2019 Update

Revision History

Date Feature Notes
25 APR 2019   Created initial document.

Oracle Sales Planning Cloud, May Update

This document outlines the upcoming Oracle Sales Planning Cloud update.

Monthly Update Schedule

Oracle will apply the latest updates to your test environments starting at 22:00 UTC (15:00 PDT) on Friday, May 3, 2019 and to your production environment on Friday, May 17, 2019, also starting at 22:00 UTC. The updates will be applied to your environments during the first subsequent daily maintenance.

The Oracle Help Center provides access to updated documentation. The updates will be available in the Help Center on May 3, 2019. Some of the links to new feature documentation included in this document will not work until after the Oracle Help Center update is complete.

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

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.

Sales Planning

Removal of Support for Transport Layer Security Protocol 1.0 and 1.1

As announced in previous readiness documents, starting with this update (Release 19.05) to EPM Services, Oracle will support only Transport Layer Security protocol version 1.2 (TLS 1.2) to communicate with EPM Cloud. To ensure the highest level of authentication and data encryption security, TLS 1.0 and TLS 1.1 will no longer be supported after your environments are updated on May 3, 2019.

NOTE: Support for TLS versions 1.0 and 1.1 will be removed for both your Test and Production environments on May 3, 2019.

Because most modern operating systems and browsers support TLS 1.2; users of such systems and browsers will not be affected by the deprecation of TLS 1.0 and 1.1. EPM Automate and Smart View are also not affected by this change.

After TLS 1.1 is deprecated,  you cannot use client operating systems that do not support TLS 1.2 (for example, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and Microsoft Windows 2002) to run operating system-specific commands (for example, code to run cURL tools to transfer data and custom code that integrates with the Rest APIs) against EPM Cloud. Additionally, Smart View installed on such systems will also fail to communicate with EPM Cloud. Similarly, you cannot use browsers that do not support TLS 1.2 protocol to access EPM Cloud environments.

If you are using on-premises FDMEE to integrate with EPM Cloud you must update your on-premises EPM 11.1.2.4 deployment to support TLS 1.2. Refer to the following Oracle Support document to enable TLS 1.2 support:

New Version of the EPM Automate Utility

A new version of the EPM Automate Utility is available with this update. This version includes support for Mac OS and the ability to run multiple sessions of the utility from the same directory. This version also includes new commands (ApplicationAdminMode and SortMember) and updates to the replay command to support Lagtime parameter and to the ProvisionReport command, which now, by default, generates the simplified version of the Provisioning report instead of the classic version. You must install this version of the utility to use these enhancements.

  • Support for Mac OS

The EPM Automate Utility can now be installed on Mas OS computers.

  • Ability to run multiple instances of the utility from the same directory

The EPM Automate utility now supports the execution of multiple instances of the utility against an environment from the same directory. You can now 

  • Run multiple instances of the utility from the same directory
  • Execute the utility from separate directories

In both these scenarios, each instance of the utility works independently; logging out of one instance does not log you out of other instances.

  • New ApplicationAdminMode command

This command places the application in administration mode so that access to the application is limited to Service Administrators only. This command is useful to prevent users from working on the application when Service Administrators are performing administrative operations.

  • New sortMember command

This command sorts members of Entity, Account, Scenario, and Versions dimensions and of custom dimensions. This command is useful for sorting dimension members after loading members into Planning.

  • New lagTime parameter for replay command

lagTime, an optional parameter, allows you to set the number of seconds that the replay command should wait between the execution of each HAR file included in the replay file. Because user activities are not usually initiated simultaneously, setting this parameter helps to create a more realistic simulation of load on an environment.

  • The provisionReport command now produces a simplified version of the report by default

The provisionreport command now, by default, generates the simplified version of the Provisioning Report identical to the report that is displayed on the Provisioning Report tab of the Access Control screen. You can generate the classic version of the report, which lists the component roles that are subsumed into the pre-defined roles to which users are assigned and the application roles assigned to the user (directly or through groups), by using the format=classic parameter.

Key Resources

Removal of the Ability to Create New Composite Forms

As announced in previous readiness documents, starting with this update (Release 19.05), Oracle has removed the ability to create new composite forms (forms that comprise multiple simple forms). This change will be reflected in test environments starting May 03, 2019 and in production environments starting May 17, 2019. You can still edit and use existing composite forms. You can also migrate composite forms from other applications and supported on-premises versions of Planning applications and use them. However, you cannot create new composite forms in the service.

Oracle recommends all customers to shift their usage to dashboards instead of composite forms.

Filtering Members

You can filter member on the Map Member screen based on a "Contains" or "Equal" operand and a specific source, target or processing order value.

Key Resources

  • Filtering Members in Administering Data Integration for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud

New Application Setting: Link Accounts by Default

A new application setting for block storage (input) cubes named Link Accounts by Default enables you to set the default for whether to XREF linked account members.

Steps to Enable

You don't need to do anything to enable this feature.

Tips And Considerations

Selecting Yes means that XREFs will be created for account members the same way as in previous releases.

Selecting No means that all generated XREFs will be removed from Account members and accounts will no longer be automatically linked in multiple cubes.

HSP_LINK is a new attribute, provided specifically to override the setting No for Link Accounts by Default.  You can add the HSP_LINK UDA to members to create the @XREF function only for those specific members.

***IMPORTANT THIS SECTION USED TO BE STEPS TO ENABLE****

  1. On the Home page, click Applications, and then Settings.
  2. For the option Link Accounts by Default, select Yes or No.

Key Resources

Updates to the Connections Interface

When you create or manage connections in EPM Cloud subscriptions, you will see a number of changes in the Connections interface.

  • On the Manage Connections page, the gear icon is now a Create button.
  • On the Manage Connections page, the Delete option is now a row level action and there is a new Duplicate option.
  • When selecting a service to create a connection, there are new icons for Cloud services and the icons are now selectable.

Key Resources

New Form Validation Rule Options

Two new options Validate with each possible value for user variables from approval unit dimensions and Validate with current approval unit members as values for user variables for user variables are available for data validation rules in forms for promoting and approving approval units.

  • Validate with each possible value for user variables from approval unit dimensions—When enabled, the form will be validated multiple times by replacing the user variable from the approval unit dimension with every possible value. 
  • Validate with current approval unit members as values for user variables—When enabled, the user variable for the approval dimension on the form will be replaced by the approval unit member before the validations are run.

Key Resources

New 'Success with Warnings' Job Status

The new job status 'Success with Warnings' indicates that a job was successfully completed, but there were warning messages logged while executing the job. Users can review the warnings by viewing the job details.

Key Resources

  • Managing Jobs in Administering Planning for Oracle Planning and Budgeting Cloud

New REST API Jobs to Import Security and Export Security, Export Audit Records and the Job Console, and Sort Members

You can now use REST APIs to execute jobs to import and export security, export audit records and the job console, and sort dimension members.

Steps to Enable

Review Prerequisites and Manage Jobs sections in the REST API for Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud guide (available by going to the Oracle Help Center, navigating to your help center, and then clicking REST API).

Key Resources

New Version of Oracle Smart View for Office

Oracle Smart View for Office 11.1.2.5.900 will be available in May 2019. This version includes new features and fixed defects.

New features include:

  • Enhanced ad hoc features, including cell-based POV, submit without refresh, additional free-form functionality support, and multiple-grid ad hoc.
  • New Extension Alert dialog to notify you of extension updates upon login.
  • Support for Microsoft Office 2019.
  • New Health Check option, Browser Emulation Mode, to ensure that browser-based screens, such as the Oracle Cloud login dialog, render properly.
  • Informational dialog showing the POV of the drill-through report launch point.

This release also fixes a number of defects.

The Smart View 11.1.2.5.900 Readme, available on the Help Center, will contain a complete list of features and defects addressed in this version. You must install this version to ensure access to the new functionalities.

New Ad Hoc Behavior Configuration Option

With the  new application configuration option, Ad Hoc Behavior, Service Administrators can enable the following enhanced ad hoc features and behaviors in Smart View: in grid, cell-based POV, submit without refresh, additional free-form functionality, and multiple grid ad hoc.

To enable the Ad Hoc Behavior option, select the Navigator. In the Application group, select Settings, and then set the Ad Hoc Behavior option to Standard (the default is Native). These ad hoc features are then available to Smart View users:

  • In-grid, cell-based POV—POV members are placed on the grid instead of in the POV toolbar.
  • Submit without refresh—Using the default Submit Data button in the Smart View ribbon, all data cells in a single grid (modified cells and unchanged cells) are marked dirty and submitted. Once the submit operation is complete, the entire grid will be refreshed.
  • Enhanced free-form—Users can insert empty columns and rows anywhere in a grid and change the alias table. Additionally, supports member auto-refresh where deleted members are returned to the grid upon refresh.
  • Multiple-grid ad hoc—Multiple ad hoc grids can be placed on the same Excel worksheet. With multiple-grid ad hoc, users can submit data from any grid on the sheet. Grids based on aggregate storage cubes and block storage cubes are supported on the same sheet. Each grid is independent; for example, if required, you can change the alias table for only one grid on the sheet.

Data Management: New Workflow Mode

The new Workflow mode provides a scalable solution when processing large volumes of data. By default the data load process in Data Management is designed with a well-defined process flow that provides a full audit of the data load process as well as the ability to drill down and view data in Workbench. However, a full data flow may contribute to lengthy processing times due to archiving of data for audit purposes. There are many data load use cases that the audit is not required and performance is a key requirement.

The full data flow is the default mode for loading data. Data is loaded in the standard way between the staging tables, data can be viewed in Workbench, and drill down is supported.

A full (no archive) data flow loads data in the same manner as the full mode, but data is deleted from the staging tables at the end of the data load process. Data can be viewed in the Workbench only after the import step. No drill down is available with the full (no archive) mode. This method is useful when you want to review and validate the data during load process but auditing or drill down is not a requirement. This method does not provide performance improvement but limits space usage since data is not persisted for future reference.

The simple workflow mode limits data movement between the staging tables. No drill down is available and the data cannot be viewed in the Workbench. This method provides performance improvement and is useful when you do not require auditing or drill down.

Key Resources

Oracle NetSuite Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service Sync SuiteApp Role ID

You can now specify a role ID when connecting to the Oracle NetSuite Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service Sync SuiteApp. The role is required only when you have multiple roles and you want to use a specific role for the connection to the to Oracle NetSuite Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service Sync SuiteApp.

The role ID option is only available for user-based authentications and can be left blank if you don’t have multiple roles. Role IDs are defined in the Oracle NetSuite Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service Sync SuiteApp and not in Data Management.

Key Resources

Data Integration Updates

Data Integration simplified user interface has been enhanced to allow drill-through to source from specified data cells in the Workbench. The updated interface also allows you to create filters to view specific values in the Workbench.

DRILL-THROUGH

Users can drill-through to source from specified data cells in the Workbench.

MULTI-DIMENSIONAL MEMBER TYPE

When adding member mappings, you can now use multi-dimensional as a member type. For example, the mapping for Account dimension can be based on source values of Entity, Product, and Project.

FILTER WORKBENCH DATA

In the Workbench, you can apply filters to view specific values. You can create filter criteria on one or more dimensions using a "Contains" or an "Equal" operand and a specific value.

Key Resources

Ability to Execute Jobs from Groovy Rules

You can now execute jobs of type rules, rulesets, and templates synchronously from a Groovy rule.

Key Resources

Support for All Types of Run Time Prompt Variables in ASO Groovy Rules

Groovy business rules for Planning ASO cubes now support all types of variables with run-time prompts.

Key Resources

Upcoming Changes

Sales Planning Cloud's New Look and Feel

In a future update, there will be a revised interface with enhanced navigation and a new theme called Sky Blue.

The revised interface retains existing functionality and enhances your Home page experience with a more responsive design. The Welcome panel and the global header readjust after resizing, which means less scrolling. Clearer announcements and notification areas are added to the Welcome panel, as are arrows to help you navigate easily between the Home page and your infolets. A bigger Navigator menu has improved usability, more themes for customization are included, and a bigger work area has more space to maneuver and provide better visibility. The interface is more consistent with other Oracle products, such as Fusion Applications.

After the interface is released, all new customers will use the new lighter-colored Sky Blue theme, and existing customers will keep their current theme. You can switch themes using Tools, and then Appearance.

Changes to Default Setting for Exporting Smart List Textual Data

Starting with the June update to the service (release 19.06), the default value of Export Planning Smart List textual data during daily maintenance for incremental data import application setting will be changed to No.

The current default value of this setting (Yes) impacts the performance of the daily maintenance process by also exporting text data associated with Smart Lists. The exporting of text data during daily maintenance is required only if you plan to use the daily maintenance snapshot to perform incremental or selective data imports. Because this is not a common customer scenario, Oracle will not, by default, include Smart List text data in the maintenance snapshot. This change ensures improved performance of the daily maintenance process.

NOTE: The snapshot that is created with the Export Planning Smart List textual data during daily maintenance for incremental data import option set to No is a fully contained snapshot that includes all metadata and data required to recreate your application.

If you have a requirement to include Smart List data in the maintenance snapshot for incremental data imports, you must change value of Export Planning Smart List textual data during daily maintenance for incremental data import application setting to Yes.

Key Resources

Additional Updates to the Connections Interface

Starting with the June update, you will see a number of additional changes to the Connections interface.

  • On the Select Provider to Create Connection page, all Enterprise Performance Management service providers will be grouped into a single service provider called Oracle Enterprise Performance Management Cloud.

  • On the Connection Details page, based on the URL provided, Application Type will be automatically identified and displayed.

  • On the Manage Connections page, the name and description will be grouped together under one column called Name, and the application type and provider will be grouped together under one column called Application.

Defects Fixed

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