SAP Enterprise Portal: Integration of BOBJ

with SAP Portal

Posted by Vinod Patil Apr 5, 2013
What are the benefits of Portal Integration?
We can integrate Business Intelligence (BI) content from Business Objects into the SAP NetWeaver Portal.
With this integration, customers are able to mix BI content and other applications easily.
They can also personalize delivery of content based on SAP user roles and groups.
Having enterprise-wide access to relevant business information from a standard enterprise portal allows
customers to make better-informed decisions. Consolidating the infrastructure for application and BI content
delivery leads to reduced cost and time savings.

In our assignment, we integrated Portal 7.3 SP 7 with BOBJ Version: 4.0 SP 4 Patch 3 using below steps.
The steps are more or less similar for other portal versions. Use references section for other versions of portal
& BOBJ.
Steps:
1. Get the com.sap.businessobjects.iviews.par and com.sap.businessobjects.iviews.templates.epa files
from below BOBJ BI server location:
[BI4_INSTALL_PATH]/SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0/warfiles/portlet/iviews
2. Import EPA file to Portal as shown below. Wait till import gets completed successfully (avg. 1 minute) and
then restart portal.

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3. Prepare EAR file from EPA file.

Follow instructions in SAP Note 1672422 - It's not possible to create an iView using the
Business Objects Document List Template iview and the Enterprise Portal 7.3 to correct
com.sap.businessobjects.iviews.par file and then migrate to EAR file.

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4.

Deploy the EAR file to portal using NWDS.

5. Create System Object using new system template: SAP BusinessObjects System Template

Update properties as mentioned below:

System Name:
SAP_BOBJ
System Alias:
SAP_BOBJ
Property Category: SAP Business Objects
Web Application Server URL: http://hostname:port/BOE
Property Category: User Management
Authentication Ticket Type:
Logon Method:

SAP Logon Ticket

SAPLOGONTICKET

Property Category: Connector

Maintain the properties Group, Logical System name, Message Server, SAP Client, SAP System
ID, Server Port, and System Type
Connector system is nothing but SAP system (most cases BW) used for SAP authentication of BOBJ.
Contact your basis team for these details.

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6. Make sure SSO is configured between Portal and SAP System mentioned in connector properties of System
Object in last step.
Connection test shall work fine for SAP_BOBJ system which we created in earlier step.

7. Create iView using SAP_BusinessObjects_Document_List template for BI launch pad.

Update the Business Objects properties of iView as below-

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SAP Enterprise Portal: Integration of BOBJ with SAP Portal

Preview iView and you will directly get logged into BI launch pad. We are done!
Issues?
By default, you won't see Locale and Timezone settings under Preferences in launchpad if launched from
portal. The issue and solution is described in
SAP Note 1885357 - Locales and Timezone settings are not present in Bilaunchpad preferences from SAP
Portal
References:
1. SAP Note 1687295 - How to configure Single Sign On (SSO) on the SAP Netweaver 7.x portal to BI4
2. SAP Note 1531960 - Missing iView Template from SAP EP
3. http://wiki.sdn.sap.com/wiki/display/BOBJ/Appendix+of+the+BOEXI3.1+Integration+into+the+SAP+EP
4. http://wiki.sdn.sap.com/wiki/display/BOBJ/BI4+-+How+to+create+SAP+BusinessObjects+Document+List
+template+into+EP+7.0.x#BI4-HowtocreateSAPBusinessObjectsDocumentListtemplateintoEP7.0.x16489 Views Tags: business, sap, portal, objects, bobj, integration

Troy Cronin
Nov 10, 2014 11:19 PM
Great overview and summary.
Vamsi Krishna Srikanti
Nov 10, 2014 10:09 PM
Hello Vinod,

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SAP Enterprise Portal: Integration of BOBJ with SAP Portal

Thanks for sharing the knowledge. Can you clarify the below please...
I am in process of setting up SSO between EP & BO. Below are the respective version of both the
applications...
Enterprise Portal - 7.31 SP 7
SAP BusinessObjects BI Platform 4.1 Support Pack 2 Patch 1 (Version: 14.1.2.1171)
For setting up SSO between BO & EP, Is it compulsory to maintain the
BO's default authentication as "secSAPR3"?
When I checked our BO system's below files, "authentication.default" parameter is configured as "secWinAD".
"BIlaunchpad.properties"
"OpenDocument.properties"
In our environment, BW system is already configured as default entitlement system in BO with SSO enabled.
But, the only difference is "authentication.default=secWinAD"
BW system also configured as backend system to Enterprise Portal.
Now, after reviewing all this, can you confirm SSO possibility between Enterprise Portal & BO?

Thanks,
Vamsi Krishna.
Vinod Patil in response to Sumana Ghosh on page 6
Nov 10, 2014 8:55 PM
Hello Sumana,
Thanks for comments.
Secret property was added later hence not mentioned in blog. Please refer thread http://scn.sap.com/
thread/3287459 on how to set it up. You will have to put same secret key in system property in portal as put in
BIlaunchpad.properties.

Regards,
Vinod
Sumana Ghosh
Nov 10, 2014 8:30 PM
Hello Friends,

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This is really a very nice blog and helpful also.

I have followed all the procedures mentioned over here.
I have tried to display the BO launchpad in NW portal 7.4.
Single sign on works fine for me.
But I am getting an error when trying to preview the BO Launch iview.
The warning is Warning! The EmbedSecret property is not configured in the system with alias: SAP_BO.
(FWC00009).
I have deleted the .epa file along with all iview & system template.
Again recreate the same but still I am facing the same issue in Portal.
I have checked the Iview and BO system property , Embed Secret property is empty for both iview and
system template under SAP Business Objects.
Can anyone help me to solve the issue.
Thanks in advance.
Regards,
Sumana Ghosh
Vamsi Krishna Srikanti in response to Jose V James on page 8
Sep 11, 2014 7:44 PM
Hello James,
I got these portal iview files under below path of tomcat webserver...
<drive>:\SAP BusinessObjects\SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0\warfiles\portlet\iviews
At this location, below files will be available...
com.sap.businessobjects.iviews.par
com.sap.businessobjects.iviews.templates.epa
With these files the remaining process is almost same as Vinod explained.
In our environment, tomcat webserver was installed on seperate host.
I hope, this helps you.

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Thanks,
Vamsi Krishna.
Jose V James
Sep 11, 2014 4:57 PM
Hello Vinod
I also have the same issue of Vamsi. The "portlet" folder is not found under "\SAP BusinessObjects\SAP
BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0\warfiles "
we are using 4.1 SP3
any idea how to generate that .epa files.
Regards
Jose
Vamsi Krishna Srikanti
Aug 14, 2014 11:06 AM
Hello,
Thank you for sharing the information.
Our present running BO system is with 4.1 SP2 version and Portal is 7.31 SP7
I would just like to know about few things...
Should the below files be needed to download from the market place separately and put it under
"[BI4_INSTALL_PATH]/SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0/warfiles/portlet/iviews" ?
com.sap.businessobjects.iviews.par
com.sap.businessobjects.iviews.templates.epa
Also, I don't find "portlet" directory under "warfiles". Should this be also created manually?
I've searched for the documentation on these versions! but no luck.
I'm not actually looking for a step by step document, but proper help.sap.com documentation /
wiki.sdn.sap.com / sdn.sap.com forum link should be more fine for me.
Please suggest.

Thanks,
Vamsi Krishna.

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Maksim Alyapyshev
Jul 28, 2014 2:57 PM
Thank you for your blog!
tilak mishra in response to Gopal Krishnan on page 9
Nov 12, 2013 4:31 PM
GK.
We have this scenario "business needs different sets of users to see 3.1 and 4.1 system and there is no user
who would wanna see both reports"
So you have mentioned, it can be done using single link thro' content delegation. Could you please help me to
understand.
Thanks,
Tilak
Gopal Krishnan in response to tilak mishra on page 9
Nov 7, 2013 6:40 PM
obviously there are technical restrictions in the built in solution to show both the 3.1 and 4.1 system with
the same link. unless you want to brainstorm with some custom development, there isn't a readily available
solution that I can think of. Probably if the business needs different sets of users to see 3.1 and 4.1 system and
there is no user who would wanna see both reports, you could use single link thro' content delegation. Sorry
about not being of much help.
Rajendrakumar Gaikwad
Oct 23, 2013 8:06 AM
Nice One!
i would like you to list out what were the challenges faced and how they were resolved.
Regards
Rajendra
tilak mishra in response to Gopal Krishnan on page 10
Oct 23, 2013 12:13 AM
Hi GK,
my client wants to use both their existing XI 3.1 infoview and new BI 4.1 Launchpad on the same Enterprise
Portal.
Currently they have 3.1 infoview linked via an iView. However, now i am thinking where to add this 4.1
Launchpad iView.
But from a good design thinking point of view, where should we place the new BI 4.1 objects? The business
think they shouldn't be confused by showing them multiple links like one for 3.1 or 4.1?
What would you advise?
Jan Thomas Nygaard
Oct 10, 2013 11:27 AM

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Hi,
Has anyone tried to integrate a BOBJ report using this approach into portal on device / SAP Mobile Portal?
I'm trying but it just keeps spinning in my safari browser on my iphone - maybe issue with safari support for
BOBJ. We are on BOBJ 4 SP6 and SAP NW Portal 7.3 SP9
Br Jan
Gopal Krishnan in response to Vinod Kumar Yadav on page 10
Aug 8, 2013 7:45 PM
its possible. just create different system objects for each of these systems and configure the appropriate
iViews. You can then have all these reports displayed in one single portal. In fact we're doing it. We have an
older version of BOBJ and also BOBJ4.0, both displaying their reports in the same portal.
Vinod Kumar Yadav
Aug 7, 2013 12:20 PM
Hi Vinod
Can we connect more than one BOBJ systems to single Enterpise Portal i.e can we have multiple system alias
(like SAP_BOBJ, SAP_BW) pointing to different BO, BI systems?
In our scenario, we have two BI, BO landscapes for two sub groups of a company and different dashboards are
being developed in two BO landscapes. We want all dashboards to be displayed at one place like Enterprise
Portal.
Kindly, suggest how this can be accomplished.
Thanks,
Vinod Yadav
Vinod Patil in response to A. Pennington on page 10
May 13, 2013 4:14 PM
Good that your issue is solved
Thanks for the comments.

and blog was helpful.

A. Pennington
May 10, 2013 2:22 PM
Bad form to answer my own questions, I know, but my issue with getting prompted for a user was because
vintela.enabled = true was set in the global.properties file of Apache.
I set it to false and then the SSO worked correctly.
Thanks Vinod, great blog!
A. Pennington
May 10, 2013 12:43 PM

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One question - is it a pre-requisite that there be AD SSO enabled between the browser and the Bobj before this
will work? i.e. is it pre-requisite that if you go from a browser to the http://server:port/BOE/BI directly, that it logs
you in with SSO automatically?
When I have followed your instructions, I get the BI launchpad launched, but it still prompts for the SAP BW
user and password - I think because I do not have AD SSO enabled in Bobj BI.
The Connector tests ok, so the SSO between portal and BW Backend is fine.
However, I don't see how the portal is doing SSO with the BI Launchpad itself?
Any ideas what could be wrong? Or do I need to also enable AD SSO within BObj ? (I can't actually do that
because I am not allowed the necessary trust relationships between user and server domains)
Thanks Andy.
Jan Thomas Nygaard
Apr 29, 2013 9:16 AM
Nicely structured and detailed blog thank you.
Lee Lewis
Apr 8, 2013 5:56 PM
Vinod
Excellent. 5 stars.
Lee
Andy Silvey
Apr 5, 2013 10:40 AM
Hi Vinod,
very nice blog, good job,
Andy.

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