Editor’s Note: This article ultimately became the inspiration for 2009 presentation, Universe Design: Evolution, Intelligent Design, Or Just A Big Mess?
I began my career in Business Objects with very little training. My first assignment was helping a new Business Objects customer replace MS Access reports from their SQL Server sales data mart with Business Objects 5.1. Fortunately, I was working under a very good mentor with many years of Business Objects experience.
Nine months later, I finally got to take Business Objects’ Universe Design class, as my employer was a Business Objects Authorized Education Partner. Attending the class made me appreciate how much more productive I could have been by having the training from the outset.
My initial experiences came flashing back to me at my current project, a migration from Business Objects 6.5 to XI Release 2. As often happens, the staff performing the migration is not the staff that created the universes and reports. The actual migration project can be challenging by itself, but the quality of the work being migrated can introduce additional complexity to the project. The client is a manufacturing firm that adheres to the “Lean Sigma” methodology. I’m still learning about what it means, but apparently part of being lean is not sending staff to training.
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be writing about the top ten mistakes to avoid in universe design. The knowledge to avoid these mistakes is covered in DM310R2 Universe Design, part of Business Objects’ official training curriculum. However, I’ll address these topics from a “what not to do” standpoint rather than the “what to do” standpoint taken by the class.
Stay tuned…
