Explore Geographical Relationships in SAP BusinessObjects BI Data with Power Map

The CData ODBC Driver for SAP BusinessObjects BI is easy to set up and use with self-service analytics solutions like Power BI: Microsoft Excel provides built-in support for the ODBC standard. This article shows how to load the current SAP BusinessObjects BI data into Excel and start generating location-based insights on SAP BusinessObjects BI data in Power Map.

Create an ODBC Data Source for SAP BusinessObjects BI

If you have not already, first specify connection properties in an ODBC DSN (data source name). This is the last step of the driver installation. You can use the Microsoft ODBC Data Source Administrator to create and configure ODBC DSNs.

To connect to your SAP Business Objects BI instance, you must set the following connection properties:

• Url: set this to the rest API URL. After logging into the Central Management Console, choose 'Applications' from the combo box. Double-click on 'RESTful Web Service' and you'll see the access URL. By default it is, http://{Server-Name}:6405/biprws.
• User: set this to the username of your instance.
• Password: set this to the password of your instance.

When you configure the DSN, you may also want to set the Max Rows connection property. This will limit the number of rows returned, which is especially helpful for improving performance when designing reports and visualizations.

When you configure the DSN, you may also want to set the Max Rows connection property. This will limit the number of rows returned, which is especially helpful for improving performance when designing reports and visualizations.

Import SAP BusinessObjects BI Data into Excel

You can import data into Power Map either from an Excel spreadsheet or from Power Pivot. For a step-by-step guide to use either method to import SAP BusinessObjects BI data, see the "Using the ODBC Driver" section in the help documentation.

Geocode SAP BusinessObjects BI Data

After importing the SAP BusinessObjects BI data into an Excel spreadsheet or into PowerPivot, you can drag and drop SAP BusinessObjects BI entities in Power Map. To open Power Map, click any cell in the spreadsheet and click Insert -> Map.

In the Choose Geography menu, Power Map detects the columns that have geographic information. In the Geography and Map Level menu in the Layer Pane, you can select the columns you want to work with. Power Map then plots the data. A dot represents a record that has this value. When you have selected the geographic columns you want, click Next.

Select Measures and Categories

You can then simply select columns: Measures and categories are automatically detected. The available chart types are Stacked Column, Clustered Column, Bubble, Heat Map, and Region.