CA2320721A1 - Interactive business data visualization system - Google Patents

Abstract

An interactive business data visualization system allows the user to combine data from more than one data source and present the data in the form of a graphical, multi-metric data visualization. In a preferred embodiment, the system prompts the user to select data sources and certain features of the presentation layout and generates in response to the user input a number of candidate data visualizations. These candidate visualizations are then numerically evaluated for their visualizing quality by a scoring algorithm and presented to the user for final selection in a ranked order based on the results of this evaluation. The system provides the user with a large variety of two- and three-dimensional visualization tools, including scorecards for visualizing business performance indicators and maps for visualizing geographically distributed data. Any number of such tools can be combined into a fully customized visualization.
The data to be visualized can be filtered and the visualization drilled down for details.
The data can also be presented in a series of consecutive visualizations, to create an animation effect.
For rendering of screen graphics, the system uses a preemptive rendering algorithm to avoid being slowed down when handling screen repaint requests received from the operating system.

Description

T
INTERACTIVE BUSINESS DATA VISUALIZATION SYSTEM
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to an interactive business data visualization system and method. More particularly, the invention relates to a system and method for business data visualization, by generating a ranked list of possible candidate visualizations in response to input solicited from the user and to an algorithm for ranking the generated candidate visualizations. The invention also relates to methods for visualizing business data using a scorecard and physical mapping representations of business data and to a pre-emptive algorithm for rendering screen graphics.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The field of business applications of computer technology has seen many important changes over the last few years. With steadily growing computational power and data storage capacities of computer systems used for business data processing, the interest of the business community has shifted from relatively simple data management systems towards more sophisticated business management systems, such as enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, integrating at the enterprise level all facets and functions of the business, including planning, manufacturing, sales and marketing. An example of a business management software package is SAP R/3 System available from SAP AG
(Germany) or its U.S. branch, SAP America, Inc.
Alternative approaches to business data management and analysis have also been developed over the last few years, with a number of applications implementing the new approaches made available to the business community. These applications provide various data analysis and visualization tools, including reporting tools, database navigation and exploration tools, data modeling tools, and data warehouse construction tools. They combine new ways of data analysis and presentation with methods for discovering hidden patterns and previously unrecognized relationships among the data, an approach known as data exploration and mining. An example of such a business data visualization and analysis tool is Cognos Visualizer from Cognos Inc.
(Canada).
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
In its broad aspect, the invention provides an interactive business data visualization system and method. The visualization in the context of the invention is understood broadly as a graphical, multimetric and interactive presentation of business data, consolidating in a limited space a large amount of complex business information and summarizing it by a number of metrics presented to the user in a highly visual form. The term "metric" (noun) is understood as any quantitative (numerical) measure or qualitative (non-numerical) characteristic calculated or otherwise obtained from business data, which measure or characteristic provides a summary of some aspect of business activities or performances. Metrics are usually numerical and aggregate business data representations and can combine information from more than one data source.
Visualizations according to the invention are organized, in the descending hierarchy, into sheets, scenes, panels and charts. These visualization elements exist in the hierarchy, in that a chart needs to be on a panel, a panel exists in a scene, and scenes are organized into sheets. A visualization may contain more than one sheet and each visualization element may contain more than one visualization element directly descending from it, i.e., a sheet may contain more than one scene, a scene more than one panel, and a panel more than one chart. The system provides the user with two- and three-dimensional panels and a large variety of two- and three-dimensional charts, from which fully customized visualizations can be built. Various filters can be added to a visualization, for example, to include only the data of interest to the user, such as a specific range of values from a selected data item, or to animate a chart by playing data in a sequence.

A visualization can be created in a number of manners, for example by modifying an existing visualization, or by starting with a blank visualization and inserting elements of visualization manually or importing them from another visualizations.
According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, visualizations are created using the Visualization Wizard. The Wizard guides the user through the steps of creating a visualization, by prompting the user to select data sources and certain features of the presentation layout and generating in response to the user input a number of candidate visualizations, which are then presented for the user's selection in a descending order of preference. The Wizard's guidance in creating a visualization can be obtained regardless of the starting visualization element, i.e., whether a sheet, scene, panel, or chart. In the process of creating a visualization with Wizard's help, selections are made by the user through a point-and-click type graphical user interface. A suite of main pages and dialog boxes of the Wizard's interface, together with choices made and a visualization created as a result, are shown in Figures 1 through 10.
The process of making selections in response to Wizard's prompts creates a single visualization request which describes what the user wants to visualize and, at least in part, how he wants it to do, in terms of data items selected from one or more data sources, the grouping of data items, sheets, scenes, panels and charts. Based on the request, the Wizard generates a list of candidate visualizations, each of which uses up all the data items and obeys all the other restrictions of the request. Prior to presenting such a list to the user, the visualizing quality of all the candidate visualizations is numerically evaluated by a scoring algorithm, which associates with each candidate visualization a score number between 0 and 100. The score number attempts to numerically quantify how well a given candidate visualizes the request. The score number is a combination of chart scores (individual scores assigned to each chart within the candidate, describing how well a particular chart visualizes the data items assigned to it) and penalties (heuristics which penalize unused panels, inappropriately assigned data items, etc.). The list of candidate visualizations is then arranged in the descending order of the assigned scores and presented to the user for selection. To reduce the user's attention to only a relative meaningfulness of the numerical score, the latter is preferably presented to the user in the form of a 5-star rating (from zero to five stars, in half star increments).
The visualizations according to the invention may include any number of charts organized into panels, scenes and sheets. The charts available to the user are both two-and three-dimensional and include a large variety of predefined kinds of charts, such as scatter plots, bar, pie, single- and mufti-line, clustered and stacked bar, single- and multi-surface, parallel coordinate, value, swatch and map charts. These charts and combinations thereof are used to visualize various characteristics and relationships of data items selected by the user, e.g., to track data over time, compare trends and cycles, show a time series analysis, compare the relationship between two or several data items, compare groups of related data, show and compare parts of a whole, highlight extreme values, place values as numbers in a visualization, etc. Depending on the characteristic or relationship to be visualized, some kinds of charts may be more suitable than others to provide such a visualization. For example, pie charts will be usually preferred to show the parts of the whole, whereas scatter plots may be preferred to show a correlation between two variables.
Sheets of a visualization according to the present invention may be printed out, for example to be distributed as printed reports or to prepare transparencies for a presentation. A printed page of a visualization is generally divided into a header, a body and a footer. The header and the footer contain normally a textual information, whereas the body contains the graphic part of the visualization (charts, images, etc.), with an additional textual information, such as a description of the sheet, scenes, data sources and filters applied. The user is provided with the option to decide what text and how is displayed as the header, footer or the body on the printed visualization. This is achieved by a graphic user interface in the form of a series of page setup dialogs.
In one preferred embodiment of the invention, business data are visualized using a map chart. This kind of chart is naturally suitable for visualizing geographically distributed data, e.g., by country, state/province, city, etc. According to a preferred embodiment, data visualized by a map chart are color-coded, by coloring each country, state, city, etc. in accordance with values of some quantitative or qualitative characteristic assigned to that country, state, city, etc., using a predetermined color palette for converting the numeric or non-numeric values into corresponding colors. Even though the color palette can provide any arbitrary number of colors for coloring the map, using a large number of colors may not always help the user to see patterns and relationships in geographically presented data. It is therefore preferred to use for color coding of a map chart a discrete color palette with a limited number of colors, for example corresponding to some qualitative descriptors, such as bad, good, excellent, or low, normal, high, etc., which are easily understandable to the user. For a numerical data or characteristic changing continuously in a range of values, the reduction of the number of colors of the palette may be achieved by assigning predetermined colors to a limited number of predefined intervals of the numerical characteristic. Such intervals can be predefined to meet certain qualitative criteria, e.g., below the plan, meeting the plan, and exceeding the plan. It is also preferred to color code relative rather then absolute numerical values, such as percentages. The transformation of absolute to relative values can be achieved automatically by including in a visualization an appropriate filter.
The map charts of the present invention can be drilled similarly as other kind of charts, to provide the user with more specific data on a geographic region of interest, which region was included in the original map chart. Drilling on a map chart not only changes the displayed data (in the similar manner as drilling on other kind of charts), but may also change the map which is displayed. For example, if the original map presented to the user was a world map with revenue as the displayed measure associated to various countries, the user may wish to drill down the map to a selected country, such as the United States, with revenue associated to the states of the country. If such a drilling is requested by the user, a map of the United States showing the revenue associated with each state will be displayed.
In another preferred embodiment, business data are visualized by a scorecard.
This form of data presentation is usually used for visualizing together a number of performance indicators. These may be, for example, key performance indicators of a business, to provide a fast and comprehensive view of the business to the business management, or performance indicators of a product, to see how the product performs across a series of metrics. A scorecard is preferably created using a parallel coordinates chart or a combination of swatch and value charts. Examples of scorecards and their creation are shown in Figures 11 to 20.
In the system according to the invention, the information is manipulated by and presented to the user through a sophisticated graphical user interface (GUI). Navigating the GUI
involves a number of user actions changing partially or entirely the nature and/or relative positions of various objects making up the image appearing on the computer monitor screen (boxes, spheres, wedges, polygons, text, etc.). Examples of such actions are panning (moving the viewing window up, down, or sideways) and zooming (enlarging the view of an object on the screen to show more details). As a result, the screen has to be repainted to update the image shown on the screen accordingly. The navigation itself is carried out using standard input devices, such as a mouse and a keyboard.
In a preferred embodiment, the system according to the invention is implemented as an application running under the MS Windows operating system. In the Windows environment, the application has assigned a message queue storing messages sent to the application by the operating system, which messages, among other things, indicate actions being performed by the user on input devices and provide requests to repaint the screen as a result of such actions. When not performing any other operations, the application checks the queue for messages and if there are any, it removes them one by one from the queue taking appropriate actions, when necessary. However, a single navigational action by the user, such as zooming, may result in a large number of messages being sent by the operating system to the message queue, including numerous requests to repaint the screen. For rendering complex graphics, this can be quite a time-consuming task, resulting in repaint requests stacking up in the queue and a "slide-show"
like rendering of consecutive repaints, particularly in the case of a slower computer.

To avoid these adverse effects, the application according to the present invention uses a preemptive rendering of screen graphics. With preemptive rendering, the application continues the handling of navigational messages until a repaint request is encountered, in which case the application starts the repainting process. However, while handling the repainting process, the application continues checking the message queue for any navigation-relating messages waiting in the queue. If at least one such a message is found, the application stops the process of repainting and flags the screen as only partially rendered. It then proceeds to handle the messages in the queue until a next repaint request is encountered and the new cycle begins with the application starting the handling of the next encountered repaint request, and so on. When the navigation is completed, i.e., no more navigation-related messages is found in the message queue and the screen is flagged as being only partially rendered, the repainting of the screen continues until it is finally fully rendered.
In one embodiment, the visualization system according to the present invention can be run in a Web browser. The present invention provides the user with the ability to launch the visualization system either inside the browser window or in a newly created window.
Similarly, when drilling through the data, the user is given the ability to choose the drill through target to appear either in the current or a new window. This provides the user with the option of keeping the visualization system "alive" while drilling through the data. Both features are achieved by including appropriate toggles into the graphic user interface.

. ~ognos Confidential Title: Cognos Visualizer 1.5 Functional Specification Flexible Print Options Version: 1.00 Issue DateJChange:April 5, 2000 Document Status:Approved Document Type: Functional Specification Security Status:Confidential Feature Prime: Ian Ballantyne Author(s): Ian Ballantyne Product: Cognos Visualizer Components: ~ Windows Authoring Tool ~ Web Server Web Client Web Admin Tool Other (Please Specify):
Target Release: 1.5 D i s c I a i m a r: This document contains information that is deemed proprietary to Cognos. It may not be distributed outside of Cognos without the prior consent of the Vide President of New Products or the Director of Cognos Visualizer.
VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 .Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali~ Functional Specification ' Flexible Print Options Tabie of Contents 1. INTRODUCTION
...............................................................................
................................................................1 1.1 Purpose of this Document.......................................................................
....................................................... 1 1.2 Intended Audience.......................................................................
.................................................................. 1 1.3 Scope ...............................................................................
..............................................................................1 1.4 Origin of Requested Feature........................................................................
..................................................1 1.5 Related Documents......................................................................
.................................................................. I

2. GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF FEATURE
REQUIREMENTS...................................................................

3. GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF FUNCTIONAL CHAiVGES
........................................................................ 3 3.1 Windows Changes ...............................................................................
..........................................................3 3.2 Web Server Changes ...............................................................................
......................................................8 3.3 Web Client Changes ...............................................................................
....................................................... 8

4. IMPACT TO OTHER PARTS OF THE PRODUCT TEAM
......................................................................... 9 4.1 Documentation..................................................................
.............................................................................9 4.2 Training ...............................................................................
.......................................................................... 9 4.3 Installation ...............................................................................
...................................................................... 9 4.4 Customer Support........................................................................
..................................................................9 4.5 Others ............................ ..
..
...............................................................................
............................................. 9

5. PRODUCT
INTERDEPENDENCIES..............................................................
..............................................10 5.1 Other Cognos Products.......................................................................
.........................................................10 5.2 External Products.......................................................................
..................................................................10

6. EVALUATION OF THE SOLUTION
...............................................................................
.....................:.......11 VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page i . .Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali~ Functional Specification Flexible Print Options List of Figures Figure 1 - Sample 1.0 Printed Output.........................................................................
...................................................3 Figure 2 - 1.0 Page Setup Dialog.........................................................................
..........................................................4 Figure 3 - l.~ Page Setup Dialog.........................................................................
..........................................................:1 Figure 4 - 1.5 Insert Field Dialog ...............................................................................
................................................... 7 VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page ii . Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali~ Functional Specification Flexible Print Options List of Tables Table 1 - List of Fields.........................................................................
......................................................................... 8 Table 2 - Interdependencies on Cognos Products........................._.............................................
................................10 Table 3 - Interdependencies on Third Party Products.......................................................................
.......................... 10 VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page iii Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali~ Functional Specification Flexible Print Options 1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 PURPOSE OF THIS DOCUMENT
This Functional Specification (FS) defines the functional requirements for flexible print options. The requirements discussed in this document include changes required in the Windows authoring product, web server and web client. The changes to the Windows authoring product are considered to be a requirement for the product, the changes proposed to the web products however is simply that, a proposal.
This document defines the requirements the software must meet and the requirements that it should be tested against. The requirements included herein are derived from information provided by and discussions with individuals from the Visualizer Product Management and Development teams.
1.2 INTENDED AUDIENCE
The FS is directed toward the following audiences:
~ those who will create the Design Document ~ those who will create the Test Plan and Test Cases ~ those who will prepare the System Documentation ~ members of the product management and marketing teams ~ members of the integration, installation and customer support teams ~ members of the localization team 1.3 SCOPE
This document gives a summary of the proposed UI changes needed to implement this feature.
1.4 ORIGIN OF REQUESTED FEATURE
This feature originated as a product management requirement, the current print layout in Visualizer 1.0 has proven to be too limiting for some customers.
1.5 RELATED DOCUMENTS
The following documents form a part of this document to the extent described herein.
[Viz-1.5-REQJ Visualizer 1.5 Requirements-ver 2.doc, Anna Stone, Cognos Inc., January 2000 VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page 1 l~

,Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali. Functional Specification Flexible Print Options 2. GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF FEATURE REQUIREMENTS
From [Viz-1.5-REQ], many customers have a need for more flexible options for printed reports.
Visualizations are often distributed as regular reports and given to end users as a reporting vehicle.
Additionally, the printed page is used to make a transparency in order to deliver presentations.
To meet these objectives, customers need to have the option to decide what text gets displayed as headers, footers or as body on the printed visualization. For example: some customers want to print only the active filters as a heading on the report, without showing the text which describes which charts the filters are associated to, or any of the other information which is by default printed on the Visualizes pages. One reason they don't want to show the list of charts on which active filters have been applied is because there are times when the filter affects all charts and they don't want to show this information because it is redundant and consumes to much space on the page. We need to treat all the text currently output to the printed pages as optional header and footer information. It is acceptable for Visualizes to include a default setting, which is changeable by the user.
vIL-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page 2 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali~ Functional Specification Flexible Print Options 3. GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF FUNCTIONAL CHANGES
Mvst of the changes are to the Windows authoring product, I will discuss these changes first. Lastly changes to the web product (server / client) are briefly discussed.
3.1 WINDOWS CHANGES
The print layout that existed in 1.0 consisted of a user-defined header and footer, with a fixed body. The following figure gives an example of 1.0 printed output.
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Years M., Figure 1 - Sample 1.0 Printed Output The Sheet 1 label is the header and the Page 1 label is the footer, the rest is the body.
The body of the printed output was broken down into three sections:
"Description", "Active Filters" and "Scenes". Each section had a fixed set of labels and runtime values that would be output. For example, under "Active Filters", for every active filter you always got the labcls "Data Source", "Data Item", "Setting" and "Charts" along with their associated runtime values (from figure 1, these runtime values are "Great Outdoors.mdc", "Products", "Outdoor Products, Go Sports Line" and "Scene llPane111Chartl ").
One or more of these 3 sections would be omitted under certain circumstances.
The "Description" section was omitted if there was no sheet explain text, the "Active Filters" section was omitted if there were not any active filters and the "Scenes" section was omitted if there were no visible scenes.
VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page 3 >Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali~ Functional Specification Flexible Print Options As mentioned previously, the header and footer were user-defined. They could be modified to allow user defined text and a limited number of predefined fields (tokens). These fields consisted of:
1. &P for the current page number.
2. &C for the total number of pages in the printed output.
3. &D for the current date.
4. &T for the current time.
To change the header or footer, the user would invoke the Page Setup dialog.
The following figure shows the 1.0 Page Setup Dialog.
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~~.14..._ "F~F':'-a . .F. . .. , . , ' ~ . . _, Figure 2 - I.0 Page Setup Dialog All of this changes in 1.5, the entire output is user defined. The final printed output will, by default, still closely resemble the 1.0 output, but the user has the option to completely override this. In addition to being able to change the layout, the user has complete control of the fonts used for all text. The following figure illustrates roughly how the new Page Setup dialog will look.
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Figure 3 - 1.5 Page Setup Dialog vIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page 4 ~Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali. Functional Specification Flexible Print Options This new Page Setup dialog is now a tabbed dialog. The first tab, "Page I
Margins", displays most of the information that was in the 1.0 Page Setup dialog. The header and footer edit controls have been removed (new more functional edits have been created on the "Contents" tab to allow for user defined input for the header and footer). Additionally a small diagram that depicts the margins has been added. The picture will shown either a portrait page (shown in the diagram) or a landscape page (not shown). As the user sets focus to one of the edits, the appropriate Line in the picture will be bolded (please ignore the grid shown in the interior of the picture - I grabbed this from Excel). A print preview button has been added. This new button will be displayed only when the page setup dialog is invoked via the menu. If the dialog is invoked while in print preview mode, then the button is hidden. Pressing the button will take the user to print preview mode.
The second tab, "Contents", displays a series of font modifying controls and 3 rich edit contrals. The first rich edit control is for the header, the second rich edit control is for the body and the third rich edit control is for the footer. The user has complete control as to the contents of each of these controls. By default the contents of these controls will produce a printed output that is very similar to the output produced by the 1.0 product. The contents of these controls act as a template that defines how printed output is generated.
The following lists the default contents of each of the 3 rich edit controls:
< ,= G ~. ~ ~....-, "Header:, ~
<Sheet Name>
. ,.~ ~°" , ~ . , ..,: Bony t . _ Description <Sheet Explain>
Active Filters <Filter Name>
Data Source: <Filter Data Source>
Data Item: <Filter Data Item>
Setting: <Filter Setting>
Charts: <Filter Associated Charts>
Scenes <Scene Name>
Description: <Scene Explain>
Charts: <Scene Charts>
<Scene Image>
~~ '~~- ~3:.~ ,. M:Foater Page <Page>
At first glance, this may look a bit confusing. The content of each control acts as a template that dictates what gets displayed in the printed output. All text enclosed in angle brackets < > are fields. For example the contents of the header is <Sheet Name>, this does not mean that the printed output will contain "<Sheet Name>" but that the sheet name (e.g. "Sheetl") will be output in place of the field. Notice in the margin of the Body block that there are lines. These lines are "group" designators.
There are two different types of groups, an active filters group and a visible scenes group. The group designators are used to determine what should be displayed as a unit of information in the printed display. For example suppose that you have 2 active filters, with the active filters grouped as shown above, the following is what would be displayed on the printed output:
VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page 5 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali~ Functional Specification Flexible Print Options Filterl Data Source: Great Outdoors.mdc Data Item: Products The first filter printed as a group Setting: Outdoor Products, Go Sports Line Notice the blank line that separates each Charts: Scenel\Pane111Chartl block of text, this blank line is pan of the group Filter2 Data Source: Great Outdoors.mdc Data Item: Years The second filter printed as a group Setting: 1995 Charts: Scenel\Panell\Chartl If the active filters were not grouped then the following would be displayed on the printed output:
Filter 1 Filter2 Data Source: Great Outdoors.mdc Data Source: Great Outdoors.mdc Data Item: Products All data for both filters is interleaved since Data Item: Years there was no grouping Setting: Outdoor Products, Go Sports Line Setting: 1995 Charts: ScenellPane111Chartl Charts: Scenel\Panell\Chartl Grouping is accomplished by selecting the appropriate lines of text in a control and pressing the group button (as shown above). Grouping is possible when one or more "active" filter fields is selected or when one or more "visible" scene fields is selected. Grouping can not be preformed if a mixed set of fields (one or more "active" filter fields and one or more "visible" scene fields) is selected. The "active" filter fields group can be nested inside the "visible" scene fields group or visa versa.
,c Grouping can be removed by positioning the cursor inside a group and pressing the ungroup button (as shown above). If the cursor is in a nested condition, then the inner group is ungrouped.
After modifications have been made in any of the 3 rich edit controls, the original default contents for a control can be restored by setting focus to the control that you wish to restore and then clicking the "Restore to Default" button. When clicking on this button a confirmation message box will be displayed to verify that the user does in fact want to restore the contents of the edit. The message will be something similar to:
"xxxx will be overwritten with default text and fields." OK/Cancel; where xxxx will either be "Header", "Footer" or "Body".
VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page 6 ~ognos Confidential Cognos Visuali: Functional Specification ' Flexible Print Options Gone are the cryptic fields from 1.0 (&P, &C, &T and &D). These have been replaced with more user-friendly fields (<Page>, <Page Count>, <Time> and <Date>). In addition to these fields, there are several more fields available to the user. All fields can be placed in any of the 3 controls, but some are better suited for one control over another. To insert a field, the user positions the cursor at the desired location in one of the 3 rich edit controls and then clicks the "Insert Field..." button. The user is then presented with the following dialog:
Clicking on the "Special" type radio button will allow the user to pick one of the previously mentioned fields and one new one (Page Break). Clicking on the "Active objects on current sheet" type radio button will allow the user to select fields specific to the current sheet, active filters and visible scenes. Clicking on the "All objects on current sheet" type radio button will allow the user the ability to select fields related to any scene or filter on the current sheet. The complete list of fields is given below:
S ecial N/A Date Time Pa a Pa a Count Pa a Break Active ob'ects on current sheet Current Sheet Sheet Name Sheet Ex lain Visible Scenes Scene Name Scene Ex lain Scene Charts Scene Ima a VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page 7 Figure 4 - 1.5 Insert Field Dialog , ~ognos Confidential Cognos Visuali: Functional Specification ' Flexible Print Options Active Filters Filter Name Filter Data Source Filter Data Item Filter Settin Filter Associated Charts All ob'ects on currentScenes Scene Name ("name") sheet Scene Ex lain ("name") Scene Charts ("name") Scene Ima a ("name") Filters Filter Name "name") Filter Data Source "name"

Filter Data Ite "name") Filter Settin "name") Filter Associated Charts ("name") Table 1 - List of Fields For the "All objects on current sheet" set, each field is displayed with the name of the specific object as part of the field. For example if the <Filter Data Item ("name")> field is inserted for a filter with "Product" as its name, the field would be displayed as <Filter Data Item (Product)>.
The layout will be saved as part of the .viz file. It is proposed that this layout will then be used by the web client far its printout. This is discussed in the next two sections.
3.2 WEB SERVER CHANGES
The format of the .viz file will be changed to include a layout object. This object will need to be loaded by the server and sent down to the web client.
3.3 WEB CLIENT CHANGES
The layout saved by the Windows authoring tool will need to be used when setting up the printed output for the web client. Note that the web client will ignore the <Page Break> field, as the web does not support page breaks. The printed output is a single continuous page, because of this <Page> and <Page Count/
fields will be output with the value "1". Also since the printed output is conceptually a very long single page, the header will be output once at the beginning of the printed output and the footer will be output once at the end of the printed output.
VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page 8 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali. Functional Specification Flexible Print Options 4. IMPACT TO OTHER PARTS OF THE PRODUCT TEAM
4.1 DOCUMENTATION
This feature will need end-user documentation.
4.2 TRAINING
No impact 4.3 INSTALLATION
No impact 4.4 CUSTOMER SUPPORT
No impact 4.5 OTHERS
No impact VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page 9 d .Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali. Functional Specification Flexible Print Options 5. PRODUCT INTERDEPENDENCIES
S.1 OTHER COGNOS PRODUCTS
ro to No im act Powe la No ' act U front No im act Architect No ' act Schedule No ' act Co ac No im act Services No im act PPDS No im act Access Mans No im act er Table 2 - Interdependencies on Cognos Products 5.2 EXTERNAL PRODUCTS

Ma Info No im act Ob'ective ToolkitNo ' act Ob'ective Grid No im act Grid/J) VDI No im act Ro ue Wave No ' act Ob'ect S ace No ' act Table 3 - Interdependencies on Third Party Products VIZ-1.5-FlexibleP~intOptions-FS-01 00 Page 10 a~

Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali. Functional Specification Flexible Print Options 6. EVALUATION OF THE SOLUTION
This feature is closely related to the "Panel text improvements" feature.
There is a certain inherent limitation in the implementation of the "Flexible Print Options" feature that would also be a limit with the "Panel text improvements" feature. If runtime text that is substituted for a field runs over a single line, proper coding to handle text that follows this multi-line wrapped text will need to be added. This limitation doesn't appear to affect the usability of printing given that there is generally no text that follows a field, but it may affect the panel text feature, if this occurs than this limitation would be removed from both features.
It should be noted that the web components proposed in this document if adopted would be implemented as a task after Beta. Only the windows implementation is slated to be completed prior to Beta.
VIZ-1.5-FlexiblePrintOptions-FS-01 00 Page 11 ~a Cognos Confidential Title: Cognos Visualizer 1.5 Functional Specification Map Drill Version: 0.02 Issue DatelChange:February 28, 2000 Document Status:Under Review Document Type: Functional Specifcation Security Status:Confidential Feature Prime: Ian Ballantyne Author(s): Ian Ballantyne Product: Cognos Visualizer Components: a Windows Authoring Tool ~/ Web Server Web Client U Web Admin Tool Other (Please Specify):
Target Release: 1.5 D i s cl a i m a r: This document contains information that is deemed proprietary to Cognos. It tray not be distributed outside of Cognos without the prior consent of the Vice President of New Products or the Director of Cognos Visualizer.
VIZ-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 a.~

Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali: Functional Specification Map Drill List of Figures Figure 1: Drill tab on map chart property page ...............................................................................
..............................3 Figure 2: Map Drill Wizard - Map Locations ...............................................................................
................................=4 Figure 3: Map Drill Wizard - Map Type ...............................................................................
.......................................4 Figure 4: Map Drill Wizard - Settings ...............................................................................
........................................... ~
Figure 5: Map Drill Wizard - Map Selection......................................................................
.......................................... ~
Figure 6: Drill tab on map chart property page after wizard.........................................................................
.................6 Figure 7: Base context map chart context menu...........................................................................
.................................7 Figure 8: Chart tab on map chart property page ...............................................................................
............................. 8 VIZ-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 TOC-ii ~!~( . . ~Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali: Functional Specification Map Drill List of Tables Table 1 - Interdependencies on CoSnos Products.......................................................................
................................ 1 1 Table 2 - Interdependencies on Third Party Products.......................................................................
.......................... 1 I
VIZ-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 TOC-iii ' Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali; Functional Specification Map Drill 1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 PURPOSE OF THIS DOCUMENT
This Functional Specification (FS) defines the functional requirements for drilling on map charts. The requirements discussed in this document include changes required in the Windows authoring product, the Web server and client products.
This document defines the requirements the software must meet and the requirements that it should be tested against. The requirements included herein are derived from information provided by a~:d discussions with individuals from the Visualizes Product Management and Development teams.
1.2 INTENDED AUDIENCE
The FS is directed toward the following audiences:
~ those who will create the Design Document ~ those who will create the Test Plan and Test Cases ~ those who will prepare the System Documentation ~ members of the product management and marketing teams ~ members of the integration, installation and customer support teams ~ members of the localization team 1.3 SCOPE
This document gives a summary of the proposed UI changes needed to implement this feature.
1.4 ORIGIN OF REQUESTED FEATURE
This feature originated as a product management requirement, map charts in Visualizes 1.0 did not provide for drilling, this has proven to be too limiting for some customers.
1.5 RELATED DOCUMENTS
The following documents form a part of this document to the extent described herein.
(Viz-1.5-REQ] Visualizes 1.5 Requirements-ver 2.doc, Anna Stone, Cognos Inc., January 2000 [Viz-1.5-AdvancedDataExploration-FS]
VIZ-1.5-AdvancedDataExploration-FS-00 Ol.doc, Stephan Jou & Lesley Grignon, Cognos Inc., February 2000.
(V iz-1.5-ContextMenus-FS]
VIZ-1.5-ContextMenus-FS-00 02.doc, Stephan Jou, Cognos Inc, February 2000.
VIZ-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 1 .Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuaii: Functional Specification Map Drill 2. GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF FEATURE REQUIREMENTS
It should be mentioned that the concept of drilling in general only applies to OLAP data sources. While Visualizer supports some drilling for non-OLAP data sources, this is limited to data columns that are either date oriented or subject to the encyclopedia algorithm. Please refer to (Viz-1.~-AdvancedDataExploration-FS] for an explanation of these concepts. These non-OLAP data source-drilling concepts do not apply to map drilling (i.e. map drilling can only be done with OLAP data sources).
From [Viz-1.5-REQ], section 6.4.1, "Visualizer must provide the ability for regions on maps to be associated to a different map. For example, assume a US map where the location is associated to the state layer and the measure is associated to revenue. On the US map, customers want the ability to "drill down"
on the state of California, such that they get to see a map of California with revenue possibly associated to counties. Ultimately the goal is to be able to drill down to the selected region of a map. However, if drill down on maps requires a map server which becomes an extensive effort then, as a interim solution for this release, it is acceptable to enable each region to be actionable in a way that it can be associated to a different map or chart on another panel. "
The text above in Italics warrants an explanation. An idea that was floated about initially was that a fabric of maps could be constructed such that there was some form of map hierarchy.
For example, the top map in the hierarchy could be the world countries map, below this could be North America, Europe, Asia, etc., below the North America map could be the US, Canada and Mexico maps. This hierarchy was to be managed by a map server. When the user drilled to a new map, the map server would serve up the new map based on the map hierarchy. Unfortunately the hierarchy is very data dependent. If the users OLAP data source contained US data below the world countries data, then the North America map should not be in the hierarchy. Additionally, concepts such as alternate or special category drilling would not easily fit into a simple map hierarchy. It was thought that the effort to provide a comprehensive map hierarchy that would be data independent and allow for all types of drilling would be too time consuming an effort for the 1.5 release. As such a simpler approach has been taken, the following section provides a description.
VIZ-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 2 a 7 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali: Functional Specification Map Drill 3.. GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF FUNCTIONAL CHANGES
3. 1 CHA:YGES TO THE W(~DOW'S PROD~'CT
Drilling on any charts causes the chart to be refreshed and redisplayed in a new form that retlects the new drilled data. For example, drilling on a bar chart that initially may display -1 bars may result in a bar chart that displays 10 bars. The nature of the new display is entirely driven by the new data that is retrieved as a result of the drill. All charts other than the trap chart behave in a similar manor.
Map charts are different, in addition to the user data, rnap charts display a map. Drilling on a map chart not only changes the data (in the similar manor as drilling on other charts) but it potentially also changes the map that is displayed. The author must configure the new map (drill target) that needs to be displayed as a result of a drill. The next section discusses the changes required to support the setting up of drill targets (the new maps), after which I will discusses how the user performs map drilling.
3. .1 Configuring the drill target Below is a map chart with a modified property page (notice the new Drill tab).
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I Sxa:G~uv l i~ ~ y N SAsel t Fwdy ....... .-: ..... ; . . .:'~.~. .. ~ ~s Figure 1: Drill tab on map chart property page To insert a new map (destination of a drill), the map that you wish to be the source of the drill is selected in the "Maps" tree control. By default the currently displayed map is selected in the tree control. The original rnap inserted as part of either a "Manual Chart Insert" or a "Visualization Wizard" generated chart, is designated as the root map. All other maps will be descendants of this map (children, grandchildren, etc.).
1. Users don't actually drill on a chart, they drill on the dimension axis next to the chart.
VI~::-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 3 C ~gnos Confidential Cognos Visuali: Functional Specification _ Map Driil Pressing insert will invoke the "Map Drill Wizard". The following is the 1'' page of the wizard. The map displayed on this page is the parent map (map selected in ":Maps" tree control prior to pressing "Insert"). On this page you will be able to select one or more "drillable reap Locations".
These are the locations that the user can drill on. The next button will become enabled once l or more locations have been selected. To aid in map location selection, data Labels can be displayed and alternatively be used to select a location. Figure shows this page. ~iotice that Canada has been selected.
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200.9 ;ntt ~~sm, V 1 1 1' Sheaf 1 Feady ~ , Figure 2: Map Drill Wizard - Vlap Locations After selecting the drillable map locations, the user must decide what type of map should be inserted, either a point map or a region map. This is similar to the manual chart insert, before the user can insert a map chart, they must first decide on inserting either a point map or a region rrtap. The following figure shows this 2°d page of the wizard. Note that this page is temporary, it is expected that the choice of which type of reap chart to insert will be moved to a drop list on the "Settings" page for both the Map Drill Wizard and the manual chart insert.
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Figure 3: Map Drill Wizard - Map Type VIZ-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00_02 Page 4 Cl~gnos Confidential Cognos Visuali. Functional Specification Map Drill Following this page, the user must select the location data that is to be associated with the drill. .-ill other data settings are not configurable. Measures that were chosen for the initial root map are reused for all subsequent maps in the drill process. Thus if the root map displays revenue as color, then all drilled maps w111 also display revenue as color. Additionally if the root map is matrixed, then so too are all drilled maps.
This is shown on the following wizard page.
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~TrTn Sr,eat , Figure 4: Map Drill W izard - Settings After choosing the location data, the last page of the wizard is presented to the user. On this page the user simply chooses the map to be displayed as a result of the drill. This is shown below.
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Ccgnos Confidential Cognos Visuali: Functional Specification Map Drill It should be noted that the last two pages of the wizard are the same pages that are displayed when goinv, through the manual chart insert process. Similar to the manual chart insert, pressing tmish on the last page will cause the data to be scored with the chosen map. If the scoring results in no locations found, an error message will be displayed. This is similar to the insert map chart process. If scoring is successful, then the new map is inserted in to the map hierarchy. This is shown in the next figure.
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Figure 6: Drill tab on map chart property page after wizard It is worth noting that if the user selects the same data locations) and target map as done in a previous non through the wizard then the drillable locations selected on the first page of the wizard are simply merged with the list of drillable Locations for the existing map. A second copy of the map is not inserted (this assumes the same parent map for both runs through the wizard). For example if going through the wizard for the first time, a user selects Canada and the United States as drillable locations, then selects North American data locations in their data source and the North American map as the drill target. A second run through the wizard where they select Mexico as a drill location, the same North American data locations in their data source and the North American map as the drill target will not result in a second copy of the North American map in the map hierarchy. A single North American map that can be drilled to via Canada, the United States or Mexico will exist in the hierarchy.
After inserting a new map, the "Map Locations" and "Drill Targets" list boxes are updated. The "Map Locations" list box shows all locations that can be drilled for the selected map in the "Maps" tree control.
The "Drill Targets" list box shows the possible target maps that can be displayed as a result of a drill on the selected location in the "Map Locations" list box. If more than one drill target exists then the user has the option of designating one of these maps as the default map for drilling. The default map is the map that gets displayed when the user double clicks to do a drill.
The user can delete maps from the hierarchy by selecting the map to be deleted in the "Maps" tree control and pressing the delete key. The user can also delete a drillable reap location, by selecting the location to be deleted in the "Map Locations" list box and pressing the delete key. As with all insert and delete operations in Visualizer, these actions are undoable.
VIZ 1 .5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 6 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali~ Functional Specification Map Drill 3..': .2 Performing the drill Once drillable Locations drill targets have been configured, drilling can be performed zither by dou'ole clicking or via a context menu. When moving the mouse over a drillable location on a rnap chart, the cursor will change to reflect the default type of drill action available. This can be either drill up, drill down or no drill at the given location. The context menu for the map chart is similar to all other chart context menus with the one exception. .A "Drill" submenu has been added to the top of the content menu. Please refer to [~'iz-l.~-Contezt~'~Ienus-FSj for a complete discussion of context menus. This new map chart specific context menu is shown below:
D rill Drill TF~rougt-r Lock Cut Copy _Paste D elete Properties Figure 7: Base context map chart context menu In order to discuss the contents of the drill submenu, I will use the following map hierarchy:
World Countries Europe France United States California New York Depending on where the context menu is invoked, there are 3 possible flavors to the drill submenu. These different flavors are discussed in the next 3 sections.
3.1.2.1 ~~lap Chart Context Menu invoked via the Visualization Index The first form of the context menu arises when right clicking on the map chart in the visualization index.
The format of the context menu is as follows:
<ancestor maps>
<current map>
<descendant maps>
If the currently displayed map were the "World Countries" map, then the contents of drill submenu would be as follows:
World Countries >
Europe France United States >
Vh::-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 7 C~~gncs Confidential Cognos Visuali~ Functional Specification Map Drill If the currently displayed rnap were the "L hired States" map, then. the contents of drill submenu would be as follows:
World Countries >
Un=~ted States >
Ca':ifornia New York 3._1.2.2 ~'Vlap Chart Context ~Ylenu invoked via the clap Title Keen readers will have noticed that there was a title below the map in figures 1 and 6. This toe is displayed by default for new map charts created in Visualizer 1.5 and is not displayed by default for converted 1.0 visualization files (we want 1.0 visualization to look unchanged when being displayed in 1.~). The title allows for drill up similar to the main label under a pie chart. The tent displayed can be changed via the "Title" edit box on the "Drill" tab (see tigure 1 or 6). The visibility state as well as the font can be set on the first tab of the map chart property page. This is shown below:
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Figure 8: Chart tab on map chart property page The context menu that is displayed when right clicking on the rnap title is very similar to that which is displayed when clicking on the chart in the visualization index. The only difference is that the default drill up map is displayed in bold.
If the currently displayed reap were the "World Countries" map, then the contents of drill submenu would be as follows:
World Countries >
Europe France United States >
VI~:-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 8 Cognos Confidential Cognes Visuali~ Functional Specification MaD Drill Since there is no drill up from the "'World Countries" reap (it is the root), no menu item is bolded. However if the currently displayed map were the "United States" map, then the contents of drill sub menu would be as follows:
World Countries >
United States >
California New York 3....'.2.3 .ylap Chart Content :Menu invoked via a ~Ylap Location Right clicking over a feature on a map chart (region, point or line) will display the following context menu:
<ancestor maps>
<current map>
<drill target maps>
Similar to the context menu obtained when right clicking on the title, the default drill target will be displayed in bold. If there are no drill targets (user clicks on a non data feature), then the <drill target maps>
section is empty.
If the currently displayed rnap were the "World Countries" map, and the user right clicks over the United States then the contents of drill submenu would be as follows:
World Countries >
United States >
If the currently displayed map were the "World Countries" map, and the user right clicks over Canada then the contents of drill submenu would be as follows:
World Countries >
Canada was not added as a drillable reap location and thus has no drill targets) associated with it.
3.~~ CHANGES TO THE WEB SERVER
The web server will have to be upgraded to support any data changes to the persistence of map charts.
Additionally the communications with the web client will need to be updated to pass on all new information.
3.:3 CHANGES TO THE WEB CLIENT
The web client will need to add support for map drilling. Double click and right mouse context menus will need to be added to support drilling.
VI:'_-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 9 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali~ Functional Specification Map Drill 4. IMPACT TO OTHER PARTS OF THE PRODUCT TEAM
4.1 DOCUWENTATION
This feature will need end-user documentation.
4.2 TR.WNING
This feature is comple:c enough that there should be mention of it in training.
4.3 INSTALLATION
No impact 4.4 CUSTOtVIER SUPPORT
No impact 4.5 OTHERS
No impact VIZ-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 10 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visuali: Functional Specification Mao Drill 5. PRODUCT INTERDEPENDENCIES
OTHER COGNOS PRODUCTS
Im rom to No im act Powe la No im act U front No im act Architect No im act Schedule No im act Co Mac No im act Services No im act PPDS No im act Access Mana No im act er Table 1 - Interdependencies on Cognos Products , Ma Info No im act Ob ective ToolkitNo im act Ob'ective Grid No im act (Grid/J) VDI No im act Ro ue Wave No im act Ob~ect S ace No im act Table 2 - Interdependencies on Third Party Products VIZ-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 11 Cc>gnos Confidential Cognos Visualia Functional Specification Map Drill 6. OUTSTANDING ISSUES
These are several outstanding issues with the current design. Some could be considered enhancements while others could be considered buss. They are listed below in no particular order.
1. It is possible (and may even be desirable) to insert the same map in to multiple locations in the map hierarchy. For example it is possible to have the following map hierarchy:
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- [~ Canada Notice that we have "Canada" in our map hierarchy twice. Each "Canada" map is considered to be unique. Inserting an "Ontario" map under one instance of a "Canada" map will have no affect on the other "Canada" map.
2. The tirst page of the wizard does not show which map locations have already been configured for drilling. Each configured regional location could be displayed using a half tone brush using the selection color and the regions default color. Each configured point location could be displayed using the selection color as an outline, and the interior of the circle displayed in the points default color.
3. The current "Drill" tab on the map chart property page does not allow the user the ability to answer the following question: "What locations can I drill on to display a given map".
For example if the user configures "England", "France" and "Spain" to drill to the "Europe" map, there is no way to get this information easily. The user is forced to click on each location individually and see that they all have "Europe" as a drill target.
4. Visualization files will take a considerably long time to load with large map hierarchies. We should look at the possibility of doing demand loading of maps. This means that on the first drill to a new map, the map would be loaded on the double click dull action.
The 3'd page of the "Map Drill Wizard" does not do any smart selection of location data. If the user selects a single location for drill then perhaps some sort of quick lookup in the location dimensions) could determine the most likely category that the user would use. It could be made the default selection.
If no category can be found, then the location category of the parent map should be expanded but not selected.
6. The "Drill..." menu on the main "Data" popup should show a dialog with the map hierarchy. From this dialog the user can do a drill.
VIL-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 12 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visualia Functional Specification Map Drill Deleting objects from the "Drill" tab is not obvious. The delete key is generally reserved for objects in the visualization finder. The only other instances of being able to delete non-visualization index thin~~
is palettes on the "Palette" tab of the "File,~Properties" dialog and viewpoints on the "Viewpoints" tab of the "'.~lavigation" window. In both of these cases, the user is presented with a "Delete" button. The delete key does not work as a short c:ut (this rnay be wTOng). Given that both of these user interfaces use a delete button, I think something like the following would be more appropriate for the "Drill" tab hl aps C Insert..
Warld CounUies r-~ Canada Delete ( ~ United States _Go to Title World Countries I~tap _Locations Canada Delete United States ya~ra~~t~ , ~
-Eanada ~ Der.;u~t Vh:-1.5-MapDrill-FS-00 02 Page 13 C ~gnos Confidential Title: Cognos Visualizer 1.5 Functional Specification Browser Reuse Functionality Version: 0,02 tss ae Date: April 6, Document Status:Under Review Document Type:Functional Specification Security Status:Confidential Feaaure Prime:Shakir Sadikali Au_hor(s): Shakir Sadikali Prc duct: Cognos Visualizer l.~

MF.D Reference:6.7.3 Components:

Y Windows Authoring Tool x Web Server x Web Client x Web Admin Tool Other (Please Specify):

DISCIaIrTler: This document contains information that is deemed proprietary to Cojnos. It may not be distributed outside of Cognos without the prior consent of the Vice President of New Products or the Director of Cognos Visualizer.
VIZ 1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00 02 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visualizer Functional Specification Browser Reuse Functionality Table of Contents 1. LrTRODUCTION
...............................................................................
................................................................ 1 GENERAL, DESCRIPTION OF FEATURE
REQU'IREME~1TS.................................................................
..2 3. BACKGROUND RESE ARCH AND ANALYSIS
...............................................................................
............. a 4. GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF FUNCTIONAL CH~u~IGES
........................................................................5 5. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF FEATURE REQULREWENTS AND FUNCTIONAL
CHANGES........6 6. PRELIML~1ARY THOUGHTS ON DESIGN AND
IMPLEMENTATION..................................""""""". lp

7. IyIPACT TO OTHER PARTS OF THE PRODUCT TEA.vI
.......................................................................11

8. EVALUATION OF THE SOLUTION
...............................................................................
.............................12

9. QUESTIONS STILL TO BE RESOLVED
...............................................................................
......................13 VIZ 1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00 02 ~TOC-i ~(J

Cognos Confidential Cognos Visualizer ~ Functional Specification _. growser Reuse Functionality List of Figures Fi;ure I - Matrix outlining the proposed functionality and options available to the user at each stage ........................;
Fi;~ure 2: Admire tool check box to launch Visualization in a new browser window..................,.....,...,._..._..._...._....,.._6 Fi ;ure 3: (viz] Visualization Properties Dialog with new out of browser launch option....................,_,...,.,.,...,.,..._",... 7 Fi;;ure 4 - TOC and;'or Upfront visual representation of launch posture .......................,..."..",....,....,......_"..,....,.......,., 8 Fi;.;ure ~ - In the browser,~In a new window Visualizer display toggle.........................................................................
..8 Fi";ure 6 - Drill Through overiride option available at Dnll Though time............. .........,_.,.."...",...,..."."........._........,.9 VIZ-' .5-BrowserReuse-FS-00-02 TOC-ii Cognos Confidential Cognos Visualizer Functional Specification _, - Browser Reuse Functionality 1. INTRODUCTION

This Functional Specification (FS) defines the functional requirements for the Browser Reuse Feature. The requirements discussed in this document include LI placement of all new toggles and decisions regarding UpFronL Stand alone and Drill Through behaviour.
This document defines the requirements the software must meet and the requirements that it should be tested against. The requirements included herein are derived from information provided by and discussions with individuals from the Visualizer Product Management and Development teams.
1.? INTENDED AUDIENCE
The FS is directed toward the following audiences:
~ those who will create the Design Document ~ those who will create the Test Plan and Test Cases ~ those who will prepare the System Documentation ~ members of the product management and marketing teams ~ members of the integration, installation and customer support teams ~ members of the localization team 1. 3 SCOPE
Changes described in this document impact the Web Client, Server, and Windows Authoring Too( in both functionality and UI. Specifically, new options are discussed regarding screen real estate occupied by the Web Client upon launch and while doing a Drill Through.
l.~l ORIGIN OF REQUESTED FEATURE
VIRD 6.7.3 "We have been asked to make it optional to reuse the existing visualization browser on Drill through to PowerPlay Web and Impromptu Web, Cognos Query. If the author defines what appears as default, there should still be the ability i1i the Visualizer Web client to set this capability as a preference."
I._'7 RELATED DOCU1VIENTS
The following documents form a part of this document to the extent described herein.
Visualizer 1.5 Requirements-ver 2.doc Cognos Visualizer I..S -Product Rquirernents. Cognos Inc. October, 1999.
I.Ey ABBREVIATIONS, ACRONYMS AND DEFINITIONS
The following abbreviations, acronyms and terms are used in this document.
OTB Out-of The-Browser ITB In-The-B rowser TOC Table of Contents VIZ-1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00 02 Page 1 C~~gnos Confidential Cognos Visualizes Functional Specification Browses Reuse Functionality 2~ GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF FEATURE REQUIREMENTS
The feature is a set of two related but different sub-features The first is the ability to have Visualizes launch in one of tu~o postures;
either inside the browses window, or in a newly created Java Frame/Window If Visualizes is being run as a component in the Upfront solution then upon an inside the browses launch it will be governed by Upfront browses controls (ie. Upfront will control how much of the browses Visualizes will take) until the user toggles the out of browses view. In addition, Visualizes will have the ability to "jump" in and out of the browses on the lly using this toggle.
This is done by creating a new Java Frame and ''stuffing" the Visualizes application into it.
The second sub-feature refers to Drill Through functionality. The user will be given the ability to choose whether they wish to have a Drill Through target appear in the current browses window being used, or have it appear m a new browses window. This was done to give consumers the ability to leave Visualizes "alive"
when performing a Drill Through. If one were to use the same browses to display the Drill results, Visualizes would be terminated in order to go to the Drill results. By using a new window to display the Drill Through Visualizes can be kept running while having the results displayed at the same time in a new window. This makes comparison of Visualizes data and the Drill Though data possible and easy.
For a schematic diagram of this functionality please refer to figure 1Ø
Other considerations include the ability to have the administrator set defaults regarding Visualizes launch on a per viz basis and on a global per server basis. Consumers would also like the ability to set a launch posture once and a Drill Through setting once, as opposed to either having to change the posture on the fly after launch or picking a Drill Through posture at Drill Through time.
VIZ 1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00 02 Page 2 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visualizer Functional Specification Browser Reuse Functionality ITB Launch OTB Launch .1. .1.
Drill Through to new browser Drill Through in in the same browser J.. 1 +
Figure 1 - Matrix outlining the proposed Functionality and options available to the user at each stage VIZ-~.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00 02 Page 3 C,~gnos Confidential Ccgnos Visualizer Functional Specification Browser Reuse Functionality 3. BACKGROUND RESEARCH AND ANALYSIS
Preliminary e:cploration has already revealed that it is a trivial task to sunply change the code to launch the lVeb Product in the browser as opposed to launching it in a separate Java frame as is done now. To add toggles to be able to change the launch location should be fairly straight forward however, the question remains as to whether the author, the administrator or the viewer decides where to launch the ~Veb Client.
:after having attempted to discuss possible changes it was determined that it is possible to integrate a toggle into the web client that dynamically changes its posture. This makes the need to upgrade the server, HTVIL
code, admire tool, and possibly the windows product obsolete. As a result this document will no longer discuss changes to be made in these areas since the new solution proposed is cleaner, creates unifo~ry between Upfront and stand alone behaviour, and is appears to have a dramatically reduced cost. This document will describe functional changes and will not describe implementation details.JavaScript forms have also been researched to help implement the requested functionality.
Based on discussions with other senior developers a solution has been e:<plored and is discussed in the rest of this document.
VIZ-1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00_02 Page 4 . Cagnos Confidential Cognos Visualizer Functional Specification - Browser Reuse Functionality 4.. GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF FUNCTIONAL CHANGES
Functional changes are to be made in the tollowing sections:
Server Admin Tool:
1) Adding a check box allowing an administrator to set the default launch posture in the Visualization template which can then be applied to the current template and all visualization created from the template or applied to all visualizations currently on the server.
2) Adding a check box to the Visualization options to have a default launch posture on a per viz basis.
TOC:
The TOC will now display modified icons indicating whether a particular Viz is going to launch ITB or OTB.
Bookmarks and URL (includes server):
Bookmarks and URLs will be modified to encode the launch posture preferences when running in Upfront.
These do not have any bearing on the Drill Through preferences a user might set.
Web Client:
A check box in the Drill Through context menu to allow the user to set Drill Through posture at Drill time to allow the user to persist Drill Through posture preferences.
Changes to the Save As Custom View Dialog in Upfront to give users the ability to specify a launch posture when starting the application.
Server:
Changes will need to be made on the server to support the ITB/OTB launch states, reading of modified bookmarks and URLs for Upfront.
V12-1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00 02 Page 5 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visualizer Functional Specification _ - Browser Reuse Functionality 5. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF FEATURE REQUIREMENTS AND
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Cancel , Appiy Help Figure 2: Admin tool check box to launch Visualization in a new browser window In t.~e Visualization Defaults Dialog an Administrator will be able to control whether all Visualizations created using this template from this point on are set to a particular launch posture. In addition, the Administer will be able to spet:ify whether all existing Visualizations on the server will have their default launch posture changed to the posture cho,en by the Administrator by clicking on the Apply to All Visualizations button.
VIZ- t .5-BrowserReuse-FS-00 02 Page 6 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visualizes Functional Specifiication Browses Reuse Functionality i- .. . .r,., ~ ,~ ". _ a x '~I x ~~l 11 ~ ~~al r l s..
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Figure 3: [viz] Visualization Properties Dialog with new out of brow'ser launch option Ta give the System Administrator the ability to set a default launch posture on a per viz basis a new check box will be added to the [Viz] Visualization Properties Dialog. This dialog is anchored to a single .viz file and affects only thi; one file.
Whenever an Administrator checks to Launch out of the browses check box via the template (figure 1) or on a per viz basis (figure 2), the information is persisted in the config.dat file.
This file will need to be modified to implement thi; functionality. The server will read this information in and will generate the appropriate LrRL when publishing to ~ipfront and will generate the appropriate launch page containing the necessary applet tags otherwise.
VI~.-1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00 02 Page 7 Cognos Confidential Cognos Visualizer Functional Specification Browser Reuse Functionality Table of Contents/Upfront:
File Help Edit View Go Favorites v Back Flefresh Search Favord . Home-:.
Fonnrard Stop Address~~ http:/lwotrballanti2lcognoslcgi-binlvizcgi.exe Sim~leBar 1 ~v!J ~J1 If you require assistance accessing any of these visualizations, please contact your a You are connected to: wotr6allanti2 N :w visual indicators are proposed to give users some indication of the launch posture a particular viz has been given by the Sys. Admire. Whether the user is accessing the Visualization from Upfront or TOC. It is proposed that an icon be beside each name in the TOC or Upfront. Using this implementation the user will have no ability to ov erride the default settings. If the default is set to launch in the web browser and the user wishes to have an out of th~: browser session, they must physically toggle the out of browser mode once the Visualization has loaded.
~ eb Client In/Out toggle:
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D Data Window Control Windo ~ Irr the browser ~ a re In new vvindo Options...
Figure 5 - In the browser/In a new window Visualizer display toggle A new set of radio buttons will be added to the view menu to give the user the ability to switch between full-screen m<rde and in the browser mode. These toggles are mutually exclusive, meaning that the via is either in the browser or in a new window.
VI.?-1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00_02 Page 8 Figure 4 - TOC and,~or Upfront visual representation of launch posture Cognos Confidential Cognos Visualizes Functional Specification Browses Reuse Functionality Web Client Drill Through:
~~n, Figure 6 - Drill Through overiride option available at Drill Though time W en a user performs a Drill Through in Visualizes they will be given two options. They may have the results of the Drill Through displayed in a new browses window or they may display the results inside the browses currently rmning Visualizes. In this case, the Visualizes application will terminate in order to display the Drill Through re~:ults. Another consideration must also be kept in mind. When a user changes the state of the Drill Through posture via this toggle, the state will need to be stored in the registry upon Visualizes shut down. This allows the ust~r to persist the posture preference while giving the ability to change it on the fly. This is much like the way MS
Word, Excel, etc. allow the user to change their preferences regarding the visibility of rulers, page layouts, and the lik °. These changes are then persisted so that they do not need to be reset when the application is re-launched. The client will need to be modified to generate the appropriate Drill Through request.
Bookmarks/URLs:
The UR.Ls and Bookmarks used will be modified to contain launch posture information. The primary reason for this ha:, to do with Upfront. The requirement was that a user should be able to open a Visualization in either OTB or ITB
mode without needing to change it from its default posture. After the oswner has opened a Viz, they may do a Save As Custom View on the Viz and set a launch posture. This information will be stored in the URL string and will be used to tell the server to generate the appropriate launch page. The client application and the admin tool will need to create these bookmarks.
Server:
Th= server will need to be modified to handle this new functionality. It will fast need to read the config.dat file in orc er to set default launch postures for each viz. Afrer having done so, it will need to read in launch posture information from the LRLs/Bookmarks it receives in order to potentially override any default launch settings when a request hits. Thus involves work on the QP and the Dispatcher. The server will also have to generate the TOC
sliE;htly differently to incorporate the launch posture icons. Converting the TOC into a template might also come in handy at this point.
VI::-1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00 02 Page 9 ~G' Cognos Confidential Cognos Visualizer Functional Specification -, Browser Reuse Functionality 6. PRELIMINARY THOUGHTS ON DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION
Launch Changes:
l, Changes to the Admin Tool Viz properties to specify the default launch posture as both a server setting and on a per viz setting.
This option involves adding nvo checkboxs to the Properties Dialogs, one on the server template properties and the other on the visualiation properties. Vlhen either is checked the sen~er will create a launch page to launch the viz in the posture desired.
2. Server TOC extended to generate:
~ A TOC with icons indicating the launch posture of each V'iz contained on it.
3. Server launch extended to:
~ Change HTML depending on the posture in the URL~Bookmark ~ Send a new applet tag Based on the new token value the server will generate a right Applet Parameter Tag that is read in by the Java Client and dictates the posture ~ Reading in launch information from the Config.dat file and applying it to each Viz unless overridden by the URL,Bookmark 4. Java Client to react to the posture setting via the applet tag (includes possible splash screen move) The addition of simple "if then-else" statements based on the applet parameters will change the launch posture upon launch.
Adding new menu items and having the client react to the new radio toggles on the fly.
5. (optional) New Splash Screen code when ITB posture is used Slight changes in HTML code Drill Through Changes 1. Add checkbox to the Java Client to specify ITB or OTB during Drill Through Minor changes on the web client side. It is the Web Client that launches the Drill Through with a new URL and either a window creating call or window redirect.
2. Changes to store the persistence of the Drill Through preference in the registry.
Vla:-1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00 02 Page 10 C«gnos Confidential Cognos Visualizer Functional Specification Browser Reuse Functionality 7. IMPACT TO OTHER PARTS OF THE PRODUCT TEAM
7.3 DOCUMENTATION
Documentation must be aware of the new ITB and OTB behaviour and document its usage.
7.~. TRAINING
Only minor training issues, if any.
INST.aLLATIOIY
No Impact 7.4 CUST01~IER SUPPORT
No Impact is foreseen OTHERS
The Upfront team may wish to be made aware of Visualizer's slightly odd behaviour in an OTB Drill Through/Launch VIZ 1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00-02 Page 11 C;ognos Confidential Cognos Visualizer Functional Specification Browser Reuse Functionalitv $. EVALUATION OF THE SOLUTION
8.1 SYSTEM PERFOR~L-ONCE
8,1.1 CPU Utilization No change 8.1.2 Memory utilization No change 8.1.3 Disk pace utilization No change 8.1.4 Network utilization Slight Increase due to the added requests for the TOC
8.1.~ Other Performance Considerations The Server will be doing more work to support this feature 8.2 SUGGESTIONS FOR IVIPROVEVIENTS (IN THE FUTURE) None at this time VI:'_-1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00-02 Page 12 C:ognos Confidential Cognos Visualizer Functional Specification _, Browser Reuse Functionality 9. QUESTIONS STILL TO BE RESOLVED
There are still optional pieces of tunctionaliry that are currently nor slated for implementation. It must be decided whether these features will add value to the product or if they are not needed.
VI::-1.5-BrowserReuse-FS-00-02 Page 13

Claims (27)

WHAT IS CLAIMED IS:

1. An interactive business data visualization system, said system comprising means for presenting data from at least one data source in the form of a graphical, multi-metric data visualization, in response to a visualization request from a user.

2. A system according to claim 1, wherein the data visualization combines data from more than one data source.

3. A system according to claim 2, wherein the data visualization comprises hierarchically organized visualization elements.

4. A system according to claim 3, wherein the visualization elements are selected from the group consisting of sheets, scenes, panels, charts and filters.

5. A system according to claim 4, wherein the system prompts the user to select the data sources and layout features and generates a number of candidate data visualizations based on the user selections.

6. A system according to claim 5, wherein a visualizing quality of the candidate data visualizations is numerically evaluated by a scoring algorithm.

7. A system according to claim 6, wherein the scoring algorithm includes heuristic rules.

8. A system according to claim 7, wherein the candidate visualizations are presented to the user for selection in a ranked order based on the numerical values scored.

9. A system according to claim 8, wherein the values scored are presented to the user in the form of a five star rating.

10. A system according to claim 4, wherein the data visualization comprises at least one visualization element.

11. A system according to claim 10, wherein the visualization element is a two-or three-dimensional chart.

12. A system according to claim 11, wherein the chart is a map.

13. A system according to claim 12, wherein the data are linked to the map.

14. A system according to claim 13, wherein the data are color coded.

15. A system according to claim 14, wherein the data are coded using a continuous color palette.

16. A system according to claim 14, wherein the data are coded using a discrete color palette.

17. A system according to claim 16, wherein the color palette is defined by the user.

18. A system according to claim 11, wherein the chart is a parallel coordinates chart or a swatch chart.

19. A system according to claim 18, wherein the visualization is a scorecard.

20. A system according to claim 1, wherein the data is filtered prior to being visualized.

21. A system according to claim 1, wherein the data are animated by being presented to the user in a series of consecutive data visualizations.

22. A system according to claim 1, wherein system further comprises means for accelerating screen graphics rendering.

23. A system according to claim 22, wherein the means for accelerating screen graphics rendering includes a preemptive graphics rendering algorithm.

24. A system according to claim 12, wherein the map chart can be drilled down.

25. A system according to claim 1, wherein the visualization can be printed out in a form specified by the user.

26. A system according to claim 1, wherein the system may be run in a Web browser window.

27. A system according to claim 26, wherein the user may choose between opening the system in a currently active browser window or in a new browser window.