boe 101 - florida's center for child welfare |...

1 Revision: 2 (July 28, 2017)

BOE 101

An Introduction to Business Objects Enterprise for the Beginner to the World of FSFN Reporting

Gene Rhyne Lakeview Center Inc. /FamiliesFirst Network [email protected] Tammy Tappan, PMP Devereux CBC [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]


Table of Contents

Summary of changes ............................................................................................................................... 4

Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 5

FSFN Database Servers ............................................................................................................................ 5

Available FSFN Data ................................................................................................................................. 6

Data Extracts: ...................................................................................................................................... 6

BOE (Business Objects Enterprise) ....................................................................................................... 6

Getting Access to FSFN Data .................................................................................................................... 7

Touring the Business Object Environment ............................................................................................... 8

Accessing BOE ..................................................................................................................................... 8

Home Page .......................................................................................................................................... 9

Document List ................................................................................................................................... 10

My Favorites ...................................................................................................................................... 11

Inbox ................................................................................................................................................. 12

Organizing Reports ............................................................................................................................ 13

BOE Reports .......................................................................................................................................... 14

OCWDRU Reports .............................................................................................................................. 14

Opening a Report .............................................................................................................................. 14

Viewing Reports ................................................................................................................................ 16

Finding Reports ................................................................................................................................. 16

Simple Searches ............................................................................................................................. 16

Advanced Searches ........................................................................................................................ 19

Saving Reports ................................................................................................................................... 20

Sending Reports to Others ................................................................................................................. 21

BOE Report Builder ................................................................................................................................ 23

Creating a Simple BOE Report ............................................................................................................ 23

A ‘New’ Document ......................................................................................................................... 23

Select the Universe ........................................................................................................................ 24

Tour of the Edit Query Window ..................................................................................................... 25

Building and running the report ..................................................................................................... 29

Multiple Queries and Universes ..................................................................................................... 32


Viewing and Modifying the Report..................................................................................................... 33

Making Tool bars Visible ................................................................................................................ 33

Navigation and Size Control ........................................................................................................... 33

Adding and Removing Columns ...................................................................................................... 34

Sorting the Report ......................................................................................................................... 34

Changing Font and Color ................................................................................................................ 34

Changing Column Titles.................................................................................................................. 34

Creating a Calculated Column ........................................................................................................ 35

Toggling between the Edit Query and Edit Report Windows........................................................... 37

Modifying the Filter and Adding More Data Dimensions ................................................................ 37

Erase the Report and Start Over..................................................................................................... 37

Saving the report ............................................................................................................................... 37

Save As .......................................................................................................................................... 38

Save to My Computer As ................................................................................................................ 38

Downloading Data via FTP ..................................................................................................................... 38

BOE SFTP feeds .................................................................................................................................. 38

Downloading Extracts via FTP ............................................................................................................ 39

Using Filezilla to transfer files......................................................................................................... 41

FSFN Documentation ............................................................................................................................. 47

Conclusion............................................................................................................................................. 47

Glossary ................................................................................................................................................ 48


Summary of changes

Revision 2 – July 28, 2017

FSFN Database Servers section (page 6)

o Corrected the names of the DCF transaction and reports servers

Available FSFN Data section, Data Extracts subsection (page 6)

o Updated the first sentence to better reflect the history of the data extracts

o Corrected how often the extracts are generated from daily to M-F

o Refined sentence describing the disassociation between the extracts and BOE


Introduction

Welcome to the world of FSFN Data Reporting. This world can be anywhere from very simple to very

complicated, depending on how far you want to go. There are many “How Do I” documents available on

a plethora of topics about FSFN data reporting on the web and on the FSFN website. They all assume

you know how to use the reporting environment that is provided by DCF. If you do not have this

knowledge, this tutorial is that starting point.

This tutorial is for the absolute beginner. It will describe a couple of ways to access FSFN data that are

available and how to create basic reports in the BOE (Business Objects Enterprise) environment. It will

cover many of the definitions for the various parts you will encounter, some database concepts and a

few of the more “advanced” topics that may be useful. Some parts are strictly for background

information, just to help you understand, while others are step-by-step instructions. Most sections will

have an introductory paragraph to explain what the section is having you accomplish. You should be on

the lookout for “Best Practices” within this tutorial.

FSFN Database Servers Before we begin delving into how to create reports we need to cover the world of data storage briefly. A

basic understanding of what is going on behind the scenes will help clarify the reason DCF has to do

some of the things they do. The first thing to understand is that the data world is big and complicated.

The job of this document is to simplify it.

When an FSFN user enters data into the FSFN record about a child, case or investigation, where does it

go and what happens to it? Obviously, it is saved in a database on a server. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? In

concept it is. So why does DCF have so many different database servers and what do they do?

Think about how many different FSFN users across the state are entering data on cases and how many

cases are stored in the database. Don’t forget about all of the cases, active and closed, dating back to

the beginning of electronic record keeping. As you can see, things are getting a little more complicated.

Besides the need to have the storage space available to store all of those records, there also is a need to

be able to retrieve this data in a reasonable amount of time. Computers may be fast but it still takes

time to look up a record. Multiply that little bit of time by every user creating a case note, every

supervisor reviewing a case, or any of the many other reasons someone needs to look at a case or

investigation. The database server also needs time to do things such as replicate data between different

servers and update indexes so records can found.

As you can see, the database servers are very busy without even mentioning the time it takes to run

reports. So how does DCF get us the information as fast as it does? They set up two servers. One server,


called the Transaction Server, handles the critical data path as fast as possible, such as accessing case

records. The second server, called the Report Server, handles the data needs that are not critical, such

as building reports. DCF calls the Transaction Server their OTLP Database and the Report Server their

Data Warehouse.

In general, the Report Server is updated overnight with data from the Transaction Server. There are a

few exceptions where specific data is updated more frequently.

One caveat that must be brought out into the open: in reality there are a series of interconnected

servers that make up each of the two servers mentioned. Data warehousing is a discipline in itself. There

are all kinds of factors involved in data warehouse management such as load balancing, replication,

backups, and security - all well above what we need to know for data reporting.

The important takeaway so far is that there are two servers that provide data; the Transaction Server

and the Report Server. They will appear again in some of the topics to follow.

Available FSFN Data

Data Extracts:

Some of the data from FSFN’s predecessor, HomeSafenet, that was transferred to FSFN is made

available as text files to the CBCs and are often referred to Data Extracts or Extracts. These extracts

were basically dumps of raw data, one file for each database table. The files are spreadsheets of just the

text with no column headers. The data in each column was separated by a pipe (|) character. Separate

documents supplied by DCF were available on their website that identified what was in each column.

Each agency that wanted to use this data had to frequently download approximately 70 of these files

from a secure FTP site. Some of the files were very large, in the 1-4 gigabyte range. Once transferred,

each file had to be imported into a DBMS (Database Management System) so it could be used as a data

source for whatever reporting tool the agency had available. The DBMS could be as low-end as

Microsoft Access or high-end as Microsoft SQL Server. Each agency needed staff that was very computer

savvy to make use of this data in a meaningful way.

These extracts are still being generated from the Report Server Monday-Friday. However, they are no

longer updated with new data elements that have been added to FSFN.

It is necessary to point out that the Extracts are separate from the BOE; however, some of this data is

also available in the BOE reporting Universes, for example person addresses.. Even downloading these

files is handled in a different way. This process will be described in the Download section later in this

document.

BOE (Business Objects Enterprise)

To make accessing FSFN data much simpler to the average user, DCF was able to make the BOE

(Business Objects Enterprise) environment available, replacing the need for the Extracts. BOE, as it is

commonly called, is basically a drag-n-drop report builder. The user, working in a graphical interface,


drags data objects from a data universe to query results and filter areas, runs the query, and places the

returned data elements on to a report. These reports are also called documents. The final results

resemble a spreadsheet. The report can be saved and sent to others within BOE. It can also be

downloaded from within BOE to the user’s computer for off-line use or as part of a “batch” where

several reports are downloaded together. This process will be described in the Download section later in

this document.

BOE is the tool that is used across DCF and the CBCs to access FSFN data. It has some very powerful

features while being simple to use.

As we move forward in this tutorial we will concentrate on BOE but will bring in Extracts when a subject

applies to both. Let’s get started.

Getting Access to FSFN Data

Your agency’s FSFN security officer is the main point of contact for getting the proper credentials to

access FSFN data. Your FSFN security officer can guide you through any DCF or agency policies in

obtaining FSFN access. Assuming you already have access to FSFN, getting access to the BOE reporting

environment is just a matter of requesting the Reporting User Group on your FSFN profile be changed.

There are several reporting user group choices available. The “Agency, Power User” is the one that you

will need to create reports at the CBC level. The most common reporting user group choice for CBCs is

“Agency, Scheduled, On Demand”. This choice will allow viewing of reports that are already created by

both the DCF staff in Tallahassee and the local CBC users.

You may need a different set of credentials to access the FTP server for the data extracts and another

set of credentials to access the FTP server for the BOE “batch” file. Your FSFN security officer can help

you get these additional sets of credentials.


Touring the Business Object Environment

Accessing BOE

Access to BOE is through FSFN. After logging into FSFN, select the ‘Reporting’ option under the ‘Utilities’

menu.

Figure 1 - The Utilities menu


Home Page

The BOE Home page will be the first page you see. It is the generic launch point. Here are some of the

key things to notice in the main area of the page:

1. BOE User ID – In the upper right corner is your BOE User ID. This is different than your FSFN ID.

This ID will be used to identify you as an owner of a report and is needed by others so they can

send reports to you.

2. Document List – This link will open the document list page.

3. My Favorites – This link will open the document list page focused on your ‘My Favorites’ folder.

4. My Inbox – This link will open the document list page focused on your ‘Inbox’ folder.

5. Information OnDemand Services – This is a link to BOE vendor services.

6. Help – This link is to the vendor supplied help documentation for BOE. It does not specifically

address FSFN topics but can be valuable if you want to use the advanced functionality of BOE.

7. Preferences – This page allows you to change a few settings. Two of the most popular settings to

change are the start page and the number of rows of data per page displayed.

Figure 2 - BOE Home Page


Document List

The technical name for the document list page is ‘My InfoView’. This is the main page you will use to

access folders or reports and to launch the report creator.

The ‘My InfoView’ page is divided into two panels and operates similar to Microsoft Window’s File

Explorer. The panel on the left is the ‘tree view’ and the panel on the right is the ‘detail view.’ The tree

view displays the folders and subfolders allowing for quick navigation to reports if you know where the

report is located. You can easily expand or collapse the folders to tailor what is visible. Click on a folder

to select it.

The detail view displays what objects are within the selected folder along with information about the

object. These objects include subfolders and reports. Some of the information displayed about each

object is the title of the object, what type of object it is, and the owner or creator of the object. If the

object is a report it may also display the date the report was last run and how many instances or

versions are stored.

Above the two panels is a tool bar which will be covered in future sections. On the far right are controls

to navigate through the pages of items in the selected folder.

Figure 3 - The ‘My InfoView’ page

Tree View panel Detail View panel


My Favorites

The ‘My Favorites’ folder is just a dedicated folder for your use. Save reports or shortcuts to reports that

you access on a routine basis or ones you are creating. Feel free to organize your reports by creating

subfolders (Right-click on the folder and select New and Folder on the pop-up menus. Alternatively, click the New

on the menu bar and select Folder.). No one else has access to your ‘My Favorites’ folder.

Figure 4 - My Favorites folder


Inbox

The ‘Inbox’ folder is another dedicated folder. It is a receptacle for any reports that are sent to you by

another user or process. Just like most email programs, there is an envelope icon next to the document

title that indicates whether or not the report has been opened. This icon can be toggled by right-clicking

on the document to access the pop-up menu.

Figure 5 - BOE Inbox with opened and unopened reports


Organizing Reports

Housekeeping of computer files is something that is always put off until it is a major undertaking to

reorganize them so it is best to start early. Besides storing reports in subfolders there are times you will

need to manipulate the individual reports. Begin by selecting a report. You can then either select

‘Organize’ from the tool bar or navigate to ‘Organize’ on the pop up menu that appears when you right-

click on the report. Depending on the owner of the report, the choices on the menu will vary. As an

owner of a report you will have full control to copy, paste or delete the report.

Figure 6 - Organize options


BOE Reports

OCWDRU Reports

OCWDRU is the Office of Child Welfare Data Reporting Unit. They are responsible for creating many of

the standard reports used by DCF and the CBCs.

Reports created by any of the DCF offices, including OCWDRU, are commonly called ‘canned reports’,

and the data in these reports can be trusted for their accuracy. These reports are a good place to begin

when learning about the BOE reporting environment.

Opening a Report

Opening a report is very simple, just right-click on it and select View or View Latest Instance from the

pop-up menu. The View Latest Instance option is only avaiable if BOE stores more than one instance of

the report.

Before we open the report, let’s take a more indepth look at the detail panel. Looking at the image

below, notice that the first report list has a ‘Last Run’ date and the others do not. Most reports are

refreshed when you view the report. Some reports run at a scheduled time and a copy is saved, hence

the ‘Last Run’ date. There may be more than one saved copy or instance. The ‘Instance’ column shows

you how many instances are saved. Right-click on the first report and a popup menu will appear giving

us a few options. The options available on this popup menu may be different depending the owner of

the report and your access rights. The two we are interested in are ‘View Latest Instance’ and ‘History’.

The former will open the most recent version of the report. Selecting the ‘History’ option will take us to

a list of the instances.

Figure 7 - A report's right-click pop-up menu

The ‘History’ page shows each of the instances with the most recent at the top. In the first titled column

is the time when the instance was run and in the last column is the status of that run. Obviously, clicking


on the instance time will open the report instance. Clicking on the status will provide some very useful

information such as how long it took for the report to execute or the reason why it failed. These details

are key pieces of information when you begin creating reports for yourself.

Figure 8 - A report's History page


Viewing Reports

What you find in a report when you open it will depend on who built the report, what they wanted to

present and any properties they have set. There are far too many reports to discuss. One of the

OCWDRU reports will be a good example for an introduction.

Most of the OCWDRU reports have a standard layout. They begin with a tab that provides important

information about the report such as the purpose of the report and the criteria they used to populate

the report. Reports created by other units or agencies do have this standard layout, most of which are

just a simple tabular format.

The toolbar above the body of the report has many tools you are probably familiar. Here are the ones

you will use most often:

1. Document: The submenu has choices to close the report or save the report. This will be

covered in more detail in a later section.

2. Binoculars: This is the find button. It will search the current page for the text you desire.

3. Magnification: Otherwise known as the zoom function. You can type in almost any

zoom factor or select any of the predefined choices.

4. Page Navigation: On multipage reports you can type in any page number or use the

first, previous, next, or last buttons.

Figure 9 – Commonly Used Tools

Finding Reports

With the vast number of reports available in the BOE reporting environment and with many having

similar titles, finding a specific report can be a daunting task. One feature that will be very beneficial is

the Search feature. You have the option to perform a simple search or an advanced search.

Simple Searches

For a simple search, begin by selecting the folder you wish to search in the tree view panel. The search

will look in this folder and into any subfolders. You cannot perform a simple search on public folders and

personal folders at the same time.

Near the center of the menu bar is the search text field located next to a ‘Search title’ dropdown button.

By default, simple searches search for titles containing the text that is entered in the edit field. By

clicking on the dropdown arrow you will be given the option to search on the title, keyword, or both. If


the edit field will not allow you to enter text, verify that you have a folder selected as covered in the

previous paragraph.

Best Practice: Do not use the asterisk wildcard character when performing searches. BOE

considers the asterisk just another character.

Note: The text entered in the edit field when performing searches is not case sensitive.

Figure 10 - Simple search for any OCWDRU Reports with "Adoption' in the title

Click on the magnifying glass to execute the search. BOE will then return a list of reports in the selected

folder and any subfolders that contain the text that was entered in the search field as part of the title. A

new node will appear in the tree view which stores the results of the search. You can perform another

search on this node, as if it was a folder, to drill down further into the search results.


Figure 11 - The search results node


Advanced Searches

The power behind an advanced search is the ability to select more than one search parameter to find

the desired reports. For an advanced search, begin by clicking on the ‘Search title’ dropdown arrow and

select the ‘Advanced Search’ option. The advanced search window will open.

In the advanced search window select or fill in any of the available fields to create the search criteria for

your search. Click on the ‘Search’ button located in the lower right corner to execute the search. Any

reports that meet all of your requirements will be returned as a new node in the tree view on the

document view page. You can perform another simple search on this node, as if it was a folder, to drill

down further into the search results.

Figure 12 - The Advanced Search window


Saving Reports

Saving a report is a common action in today’s world and is essential when working with any kind of

reporting software. The submenu that appears when the Documents tool button is pressed gives you

access to several actions that can be applied to a report. The choices that appear on this submenu will

vary depending on your access level and the attributes and owner of the report.

The choices that you may already be familiar with and are very common are:

1. Close: Closes the current report.

2. Edit: Puts the report in ‘Edit’ mode allowing you to modify the look of the report or the

dataset from which the report is built. Modifying reports will be covered in more detail

in a later section.

3. Save: Saves the current report with any modifications that have been made.

4. Save As: Allows you to save a copy of the report as a different name or to a different

location within the BOE environment.

Figure 13 - The Document Save menu

The other two choices, Save to my computer as and Save report to my computer as, have common

choices and need some explanation. Each choice saves the output to a file on your computer:

1. Excel: Saves the current report in an Excel proprietary format that was used by Excel

prior to 2007. The saved file resembles the report as viewed in the BOE environment.

2. Excel 2007: Saves the current report in an Excel XML format that has been used by Excel

since 2007. The saved file resembles the report as viewed in the BOE environment.

3. PDF: Saves the current report as a PDF (Portable Document Format). The PDF file

requires a PDF document viewer to open. The saved file resembles the report as viewed

in the BOE environment.

4. CSV, CSV (with options), CSV (all reports): Saves the datasets in a CSV (Comma

Separated Values) format that was used to create the report. This option is one that

users that create reports would better understand and need. It will be discussed in more

detail in the Report Builder section.


Sending Reports to Others

There are times when you may want to send a report to other FSFN users within BOE. It could be to

collaborate on a report or just to send the report for their information. A copy of the report will be

placed in their Inbox. To simplify things you will need the recipient’s BOE User ID.

1. Locate and highlight the report you would like to send.

2. On the menu bar click the down arrow next to “Send To” and choose the “Business Objects

Inbox” option.


3. Once the new page loads, you will see at the bottom, under the displayed text, a checkbox titled

“Use Default Settings”. Uncheck this box to display the controls that allow you to select a

recipient.

Figure 14 - The Send page with "Use Default Settings unchecked

4. In the ‘Search title’ field enter the desired recipient’s BOE Reporting ID and click the magnifying

glass to initiate the search.

5. The user’s name and BOE ID will appear in the “Available” results window. Select the user’s

name and click the right arrow to add the user to the recipient list.

Figure 15 - Adding Recipients

Click the right arrow to add the FSFN

user to the recipient list.

Uncheck “Use Default Settings”


6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 to add additional recipients.

7. Click the ‘Submit’ button located in the lower right corner to send the report to the selected

recipient(s).

BOE Report Builder

As mentioned earlier in this document, BOE has a very powerful report building environment. You can

build some very elaborate reports or just simple grid reports. Building a BOE report sounds like a

daunting task but if you break the process down into small steps it becomes much easier to understand.

Most tutorials will just show you the steps to do something, but in this tutorial we want you to

understand what is happening and why you need to do each step.

Creating a Simple BOE Report

Walking through the creation of a simple report will expose you to most of the main features of the

report building environment. Once this report is created you should be able to understand the basic

process to build your own reports and better understand other information sources that will advance

your skills in report building.

Let’s begin by creating a simple report that returns a list of cases that have been modified since the

beginning of “last” (the previous) month.

A ‘New’ Document

In the ‘Document’ view click on the ‘New’ menu option located on the tool bar above the tree view

panel. On the dropdown menu that appears select ‘Web Intelligence Document’ (sometimes called

“Webi” in conversation.)

Figure 16 – Creating a new report


Select the Universe

You will be presented with a list of data sources called “Universes”. Each universe contains data that has

been determined to be logically grouped for ease of access. There are documents on the DCF website

that may help you determine which universe to use. We will select the ‘Case Detail’ universe for our

report.

Figure 17 – Selecting a Universe


Tour of the Edit Query Window

Once you select the universe you will be taken to the ‘Edit Query’ window. This is where you build the

query that retrieves the data from the underlying report server or DCF DataMart. We need to spend

some time touring this area before we actually start building our report.

On the left side is another tree view panel with two tabs. The first tab, titled ‘Data’, displays the data

elements that are available. At the very top of this panel within the tree view is the name of the

universe. You will see a folder graphic followed by a name. These are called ‘Classes’ in much of the DCF

and BOE documentation. This is a term associated with computer programming. Regardless of whether

you call it a class or a folder, it is still something that contains other objects.

Figure 18 - Classes, Subclasses, Dimensions and Details

Within each class you may find other classes called subclasses. There is really no difference other than

they are within another class. You will also see ‘objects’ which include ‘dimensions’ (blue slanted

diamond), ‘detail’ (green diamond) or ‘measures’ (orange bar). Technically there are differences

between them, but each is still a single piece of information that we can add to a report. Feel free to

scroll up and down in this panel and expand the classes and subclasses.

Class

Subclass

Dimension

Detail


To the right is the ‘Result object’ panel. This is where we drop the pieces of data or objects that are

returned in our query. For those familiar with databases and SQL, this would be the ‘select clause’. The

returned data is called a dataset. The data elements in this dataset are what we will use to display

information in our report. In the image below you can see several objects have already been dropped

into this panel. If you are following along in BOE, drag and drop a few items from the data panel to the

‘Result object’ panel. If you drag and drop a class, all of the elements within that class will follow.

Figure 19 - Dragging dimensions to the Result Object panel

Below the ‘Result Objects’ panel is the ‘Query Filters’ pane. This is the area where you will set the

conditions to include or exclude what records are returned in the dataset. For those familiar with

databases and SQL, this would be the ‘where clause’. There is a lot of power in this section. Even though

our example report will not use all of the different possible scenarios, we will cover enough to show you

some of the real power of filters.

Adding filters is done much the same as adding objects to the ‘Results object’: drag and drop objects to

the panel. By default, you will see the name of the object followed by an ‘In List’ option and an edit box.

Think of this as part of a sentence “…where County is In the List of Escambia.”


Figure 20 - Adding a 'County' filter

Note: Objects being used as filters do not have to be included in the result set of the query.

The down arrow next to ‘In List’ will reveal many other conditional options from which to choose. The

edit box allows you to type directly into it or you can select the menu button. The menu button gives

several other choices depending on the condition you have selected. Here is a brief explanation for each

of the choices:

a) Constant: Allows you to type an item directly into the edit box. Separate items by a

semicolon if you want to enter more than one item. This is useful when entering something

like last names where the list to pick from would be unusably long.

b) Value(s) from list: Opens a window that allows you to select items from a list. This option is

useful when selecting items from a finite list such as counties in Florida.

c) Prompt: Allows the person that views the report to enter their own choices. A case

manager may want to view a report of just the cases on which they are the primary worker.

d) Result from another query (any): Allows you to select an object from a different query

within this report. We will cover multiple queries a little later in this tutorial.

e) Object from this query: This allows you to compare objects in the query you are creating or

editing. A common use for this object would be in comparing dates. All of the above

choices require you to enter a literal value. Using this option gives you the ability use a

more dynamic object. Most universes have a class of various dates that may include

‘Today’ or ‘Beginning of This Quarter’. Now you can build a report where you do not have

to go in every calendar quarter to adjust the literal date that you type in as a constant.

When you add more than one object as a filter you will see the word ‘And’ to the left of the objects and

a bracket grouping those objects. Double-clicking the ‘And’ will change it to ‘Or’. The following is clearer

if you have at least three objects. If you drag one object into another object it will group them together

as a subgroup. The subgroup is now grouped with the remaining object(s). More than two objects can


be in the same group and you can have several layers of subgroups. These logical operators give you a

lot of power in filtering your results.

Figure 21 - Filter logic operators


Going back to the panel on the left, select the tab titled ‘Properties’. There are several properties you

can set to limit the retrieved dataset. The one property that you should change almost every time is the

‘Retrieve duplicate rows’ property. Uncheck this box. This limits your data to unique rows.

Figure 22 - Retrieve duplicate rows checkbox

Best Practice: Uncheck the ‘Retrieve duplicate rows’ property to prevent duplicate rows

of data from being returned.

At the bottom of the page you will see a tab titled ‘Query 1’. Right-clicking on this tab will bring up a

submenu with several options such as renaming or deleting the query. Some options may be disabled if

the action is not allowed. For example, if there is only one query in your report it cannot be deleted.

Naming your queries names will help better organize your project.

Best Practice: If you have more than one query in your report, give each a descriptive

name. It will help when navigating between queries.

Building and running the report

The tour of the Edit Query Window was a bit long but it is the central part for selecting and filtering the

data for your report. Now let’s build a simple report to show cases within a couple of counties that have

opened or have had closure information updated since the beginning of “last” month.

1) Start by selecting the dimensions that will be in our results dataset. From the tree panel expand the

Case class and drag and drop the Case ID, Case Status, and Case Opened Date to the Results Objects

panel. To remove a dimension from the Results Object panel, drag the unwanted dimension back to

anywhere on the tree panel.


Figure 23 - Dragging dimensions to the Result Object panel

2) Feel free to add more dimensions (data items) to the dataset beyond what I am using. I limited the

dimensions in this tutorial for data security reasons. Be aware that there is a limit to the amount of

data that can be returned and how long the query is allowed to run. These limits may be generous,

but they are finite and vary depending on what is being done with the data. I will give more specifics

on this later; but for now, if it takes more than five minutes to run, you are asking for too much data.

Figure 24 - Adding a 'County' filter

Now to set conditions that will limit how much data is returned. Drag the County

dimension found in the Primary Worker Location class to the Query Filters panel. You

can drag the dimension from the Results Objects panel or the tree panel. Leave the

‘condition’ as ‘In List’ since we will be selecting two counties. You can type directly in

the edit box, separating values by semicolons, or you can click on the menu button

next to the edit box and select the ‘Value(s) From List’ option. A selection dialog box

will appear, populated with a list of the Florida counties. Highlight ‘Okaloosa’ and


‘Walton’, or other counties serviced by your agency, click the arrow (>) pointing right,

and then click the ‘OK’ button to add these counties to query filter.

Best Practice: It is best selecting from the pre-defined list since the Query Filter is case

sensitive and literal. If you don’t type it exactly how it is stored in FSFN, including caps or

not, you will not have accurate or complete results.

3) Add the ‘Case Open Date’ from the ‘case’ class and the ‘Update Timestamp’ from the ‘Case Closure’

class. Change the condition from ‘In List’ to ‘Greater Than or Equal To’ by clicking on the down arrow

for both dimensions. In cases where you want a static date you can enter a date in the edit field or

select a date from the calendar control. In this example we want to set up a dynamic date that will

change throughout the year. Click on the menu button and select the ‘Object from this query’

option. Another window will appear showing the classes within the current universe. Scroll down

and expand the ‘Report Period Dates’. Select the ‘Last Month Begin Date’.

Figure 25 - Using a dynamic date object in a filter

Best Practice: When using calculated dimensions such as ‘Last Month Begin Date’, be

sure to verify your results. For advanced users this may go as far as looking at the SQL

behind the code that is generated.

4) So far our filter says to return the data we desire where the county is in the list of ‘Okaloosa’ and

‘Walton’ and the ‘Case Open Date’ is greater than the first day of last month AND the Case Closure

‘Update Timestamp’ is greater that the first day of last month. It is close to what we want, but we

want the condition where the ‘Case Open Date’ is greater than the first day of last month OR the

Case Closure ‘Update Timestamp’ is greater than the first day of last month. To do this we first must

group the two dates together. Click and drag the ‘Update Timestamp’ on top of the ‘Case Open

Date’ dimension. You will see a grouping image when you have it positioned correctly. Drop the

field.


Figure 26 – Grouping Filters

5) Double-click on the ‘And’ next to the date group. It will toggle to ‘Or’.

Figure 27 – Toggling “And” and “Or”

6) On the left panel select the ‘Properties’ tab and uncheck the ‘Retrieve duplicate rows’ checkbox. Not

all reports will return duplicate rows but it is a good practice to follow.

7) We are ready to execute our query and see our report. In the upper right of the document page click

the ‘Run Query’ button.

8) Just a couple of quick notes while your report runs:

a. The progress bar is not a true representation of the time for your report to generate. It

is based on the last time the report was run. It will just continue to cycle.

b. There is a time limit as to how long the query will run before it times out. The execution

time is affected by the amount of data retrieved and the load on the server.

Multiple Queries and Universes

Even though using multiple queries is an advanced topic outside of the scope of this tutorial, it is best to

shine a little light on the subject. There are times it may be necessary to include data from more than

one query to create your report. The additional queries may pull data from the same universe that you

have been working with or from a completely different universe.

Adding a second query is very easy. Click on the ‘Add Query’ button located on the toolbar. A submenu

will appear with a list of available universes. Select the ‘Case Detail’ universe and build the query with

any new data dimensions you need. As long as you include dimensions that are available in both queries


BOE will automatically merge the two queries.

Merge is just a technical term that means to link together with a common element. A quick example

would be if you have a list of people with their phone number and another list of the same people with

their address. You could easily merge the two lists together using the person’s name as the common

link.

Adding a second query that is pulling data from a different universe requires a bit more work than just

including common dimensions. Follow this link, Merge Universes, to a good video that goes through the

complete process of merging universes for a BOE report in the FSFN environment.

Viewing and Modifying the Report

At this point you have a report with the results of your query displayed in a grid format. Going in depth

in this area is beyond the purpose of this tutorial but we will touch on some of the more common

features and controls.

Making Tool bars Visible

In the future you can choose which ones you want visible but for the moment turn on all of the tool

bars. Right-click on any blank toolbar area and a submenu will appear. Ensure each toolbar option is

checked.

Figure 28 – Making Toolbars visible

Navigation and Size Control

Just above the upper right corner of the report are your typical page navigation controls. The arrows

with the vertical line will take you to the first or last page. The arrows without the bar are for the

previous and next pages. In the center is the current page number. Of course, you can also enter the

page number directly into this field.

Figure 29 – Report Navigation Controls


Adding and Removing Columns

When you first build your report, all of the columns are displayed in the order the dimensions were

added to the Query Results panel. Along the left is another tree view panel with each dimension listed.

Click and drag the column header from the report to the tree view panel to remove the column. You can

also drag a dimension from the tree view panel to a column location on the report. There will be an

indicator displayed on the report as you drag the dimension over the report. It will take some

experimentation to learn how each of the possible locations will display the data.

Figure 30 – Adding a Dimension to the Report

Sorting the Report

The data on your report will be sorted by columns from left to right. The data in the first column will be

sorted in descending order by default, followed by the second column, then the third, and so on. To

change the sort order of a column right click on the header and select the desired order under the ‘Sort’

option.

Changing Font and Color

Changing the font attributes of the data, column headers or cell backgrounds is done in much the same

way as in many other applications. Begin by selecting the desired cell. On the ‘Formatting’ toolbar are

controls that allow you to change attributes like font color and size, alignment and even cell borders and

fill colors. Right-clicking on the cell will bring up a menu that gives you access to many more options

including text formatting.

Changing Column Titles

By default a column has a title with the name of the dimension. To change the text that appears, right-

click and select the ‘Formula Toolbar’ option. The Formula Toolbar will appear below the other toolbars

and above the report area. Replace the formula that is displayed in the formula field with whatever

actual value you would like to be displayed as the header.

Figure 31 – Formula Toolbar


Creating a Calculated Column

There may be times you would like to add another column with data that is not available as a dimension

in the universe. To demonstrate, let’s add a column with the number of days the case has been open.

Select any cell next to where you would like to new column to be located. Right-click, select ‘Insert’ then

‘Insert column to the right’ to add a blank column to the right of the one selected.

Figure 32 – Inserting a blank new column

Select the new column’s header cell, enter ‘Days Since Opened’ as a literal value in the formula field and

press enter. The column header will now display the new title. (If the formula toolbar is not visible, right-

click on any cell and select ‘Formula Toolbar.)

To add the actual data, select any data cell in our new column. On the formula toolbar click on the fx

button which is the function button. This will bring up the Formula Editor window. The top panel is the

‘Formula’ panel. All formulas will begin with an equal (=) sign. The ‘Data’ panel has the data elements

available in the report. The ‘Functions’ panel displays the functions and the ‘Operators’ panel displays

the mathematical operators that are available. The ‘Description’ panel at the bottom will display

information about whatever object is selected. If it is a function, it will display the syntax for that

function. There is a lot of power available to you with all of these operators and functions.

To create the function for our new column, scroll down in the Functions window and double-click on the

‘Days Between’ function. Click inside the parentheses at the end of the function you just added to the

Formula window so that the cursor will be located where the data element is going to be placed. In the

Data window double-click on the ‘Case Open Date’ data element. Back up to the formula window, enter

a semicolon (;) after the close bracket (]) of the data element. In the functions window find and double

click on the ‘CurrentDate’ function.


Figure 33 – Formula Editor showing the DaysBetween calculation

Click ‘OK’ to close the editor. If the syntax is correct, the calculated values will appear in each row.

(While you are editing your formula, you can click on the green check in the upper right of the formula

panel to have BOE do a syntax check at any time.)

Figure 34 – The new column populated


Toggling between the Edit Query and Edit Report Windows

There are times when you will need to toggle between the ‘Edit Query’ and ‘Edit Report’ windows. On

the top tool bar are two buttons, one for each window. You can toggle between the windows at any

time but there is one caveat: if anything on the ‘Edit Query’ window is modified, you will need to click

the ‘Run Query’ button. Otherwise, a popup menu will appear with options to purge the result set

already in memory.

Figure 35 – The Edit Query window

Modifying the Filter and Adding More Data Dimensions

It is inevitable that at some point you will need to modify the filter or another data element that was left

off of the first attempt in creating a report. Either of these actions can easily be done by going back to

the ‘Edit Query’ window and modifying the filter in the ‘Query Filters’ panel, or by adding or removing

the desired dimensions on the ‘Results Objects’ panel. Once satisfied with any changes, click ‘Run Query’

to execute the modified query. The report will again appear with the data limited by any changes to the

filter. The new resultset will be missing any dimensions that were removed and will contain any

dimensions that were added. The new dimensions will be in the result set but will not be on the report.

You will have to add them by dragging and dropping them onto the report.

Erase the Report and Start Over

Sometimes it may be necessary to just start over with the report without destroying the query. This

usually happens when there were a lot of new data elements added and it is more trouble to figure out

what is there than it is to start over. To delete the report right-click on any blank area of the report and

select ‘Delete Report’. Go back to the ‘Edit Query’ window and click ‘Run Query’. The report will be

regenerated with all of the data elements as columns.

Saving the report There is more to saving a report than just saving the report! Where do you want to save it, in what

format, and are there limitations are some of the questions that have to be answered. It all begins with

the ‘Save’ tool button located on the top toolbar. The tool button is enabled only when you are on the

‘Edit Report’ window. If the report has already been saved, the button just saves the current version of

the report to the same location. To do anything else you need to select the down arrow next to the

button.


Save As

The ‘Save As’ option allows you to save the report by a different name or to a different location on the

BOE File Server. If you save it to the ‘My Favorites’ folder only you will have access to the report. Saving

the report to any of the folders or sub-folders under ‘Public Folders’ will allow anyone with access to

that folder to view and, possibly, modify your report. They cannot overwrite your file because you are

the owner. They will have to open and save it with a different name or to a different location.

It is wise to practice good organizational skills when saving files. Feel free to create new subfolders in

your ‘My Favorites’ to group your reports. You may want to group them by subject, or if the report is in

production, or if it is still in development. Even having an archive of reports that are outdated or no

longer needed may be worthwhile. Use the same kind of logic that is used to organize your ‘My

Documents’ folder on your computer.

Save to My Computer As

Saving reports to your local computer is sometimes necessary. You may have other reporting tools

available to you or may want to drill down into the data in ways not available in the BOE reporting

environment. There are several file formats to select from, with Excel and PDF being the most common.

Another useful format is the CSV (Comma Separated Values) format. This format is basically just raw

data in a plain text format.

It was mentioned earlier there are time and data limits when building your report. There are even

stricter limits when saving reports to your computer. Roughly it is 1mb for CSV files and 2mb for Excel

files. There is an allowance for some necessary overhead in Excel files.

A key difference in the chosen format when downloading reports to your computer is very important to

point out. When saving the data as an Excel file you will get the data in the same format as your report,

including any calculated columns and modified column headers. With a CSV file you will only get data

that you have listed in the ‘Results Objects’ panel in the ‘Edit Query’ windows. This does not include any

columns or headers that you have modified or calculated. If you have more than one query, you will get

the data from the first query followed by the second query. This also holds true if you have reports

scheduled for download, which is discussed in a future section.

Downloading Data via FTP Data extracts and BOE reports can be downloaded from the DCF servers to your local machines using an

FTP application. There are differences of how you get the data files and what you get when you

download those files. The use of an FTP application is done outside of the BOE environment.

BOE SFTP feeds

DCF has provided the ability to schedule and generate reports to an encrypted zip file so that they can

be downloaded as a batch. This process of scheduling and getting the encrypted zip file is commonly

called “SFTP feeds”. This ability can be useful if you have a number of reports that you need to run and


save locally on a daily or even weekly basis. It would be inefficient to log into FSFN every day and

manually download each report.

DCF has a very good step-by-step guide which will walk you through the complete process of scheduling

and downloading reports you have created. This guide identifies the scheduling, naming conventions,

requirements and restraints of the compete process. The BOE SFTP How Do I Guide can be found by

navigating to the “FSFN Website” found on your main FSFN page. On the “FSFN Website” page, under

“Reports”, is a link titled “Datawarehouse”. On that page you will find the guide under the “Resources”

heading. You can also cut and paste “http://fsfn.dcf.state.fl.us/datawarehouse.shtml” into your

browser’s address bar as long as you have an internet connection to the DCF network.

As a general guide, here are the steps from the “How To” guide necessary to get a report as part of the

SFTP Feed:

1. Log into FSFN and navigate to BOE

2. Create a BOE report

3. Save the report to your agency’s subfolder found under the FTP Reports folder

4. Schedule the report by sending a request to the DCF Help Desk

5. Log into DCF’s FTP server to download the encrypted file

6. Decrypt the file

You may want to go a bit further (which is beyond the scope of this document) and set up a fully

automated process to log into the SFTP server, download and decrypt this file. You can even go as far as

loading the data into your local reporting or database system.

One point that needs to be mentioned is that “canned” reports (those created by DCF or OCWDRU)

cannot be included in this process.

Downloading Extracts via FTP

Downloading the Data Extracts is still an available option. The process is quite a bit different than the

BOE SFTP process. Each file can be selected and downloaded individually in a CSV format. These files are

raw ASCII text, have no column headers, and are not encrypted.

An important point is that you cannot open or view the file on DCF’s FTP server. It has to be transferred

or downloaded to your computer system before it can be viewed. There are many text viewer

applications (such as Notepad) that can be used to view these files in their raw state. Microsoft Excel will

open these files in a readable layout. Be aware that some of these files are very large and take a while to

load. Be aware also that many applications, including Microsoft Excel, have limits as to the size of the

file or number of rows within the file that the application will handle.

DCF does have a naming convention for the data extract files. There are several files that begin with

COMM. These are common files and are usually cross-reference files. They have data for every agency.

Almost every file, excluding the cross-reference files, end in the letter T. This notation just signifies it is a

simple ASCII text file verses a binary file. To differentiate data from agencies, the rest of the files begin

http://fsfn.dcf.state.fl.us/docs/datawarehouse/BOE%20SFTP%20How%20Do%20I%20Guide.pdf


with the district code and agency abbreviation. For example, any file that begins with D01FFN is data for

FamiliesFirst Network in District 1.

To access and transfer any of the Data Extract files you will need an FTP application. There are many FTP

applications available. WinSCP is the FTP application referenced in the DCF documentation. Another

common open source (free) FTP application is Filezilla.

Generally, these are the steps necessary to transfer files using an FTP application:

1. Connect to the FTP server

2. Log in using your User ID and password obtained from DCF via your IT security officer

3. Navigate to the source and target folders

4. Transfer the desired files

Note: Different FTP applications handle connecting, logging in and transferring files differently. Be

sure to check the application’s documentation.

You may want to go a bit further, which is beyond the scope of this document, and set up a fully

automated process to log into the SFTP server and transfer one or more of the data extracts. You can

even go as far as loading the data into your local reporting or database system.


Using Filezilla to transfer files

Transferring files in Filezilla is as simple as drag-and-drop, once you are connected. Filezilla’s main view

consists of six panels. The panels can be resized by dragging the bars between the panels much like most

Microsoft applications. The top panel displays the communication messages with the FTP server. The

four panels in the center of the screen display the folder structure and files within the selected folder for

both the “local site” and the “remote site”. The bottom panel displays the transfer status of the files

being transferred.

Here are the steps to transfer a couple of the data extracts using Filezilla:

1. Launch Filezilla.

2. Set the Local site. This is the location where files will be transferred to, usually your computer or

a file server on your network. Changing the location is done much the same way as you would in

Windows Explorer, by clicking on the graphical folders or typing directly in the address window.

Figure 36 – Filezilla: Setting the local site


3. Choose ‘Site Manager’ from the ‘File’ dropdown menu. Site manager allows you to save your

connection settings.

Figure 37 – Filezilla: File Menu and Site Manager Option


4. Select the desired Site and click the ‘Connect’ button. To set up and save a Site, click on the

‘New Site’ button and complete each field under the ‘General’ tab. There is no ‘Save’ button,

everything is saved as it is entered.

a. Host: 160.131.91.4

b. Protocol: FTP – File Transfer Protocol

c. Encryption: Only use plain FTP (insecure)

d. Logon Type: Normal

e. User: The User ID you received from your Security Officer

f. Password: The current password for your User ID

Figure 38 – Filezilla: Connecting to the SFTP Site


5. In the communication panel you will see messages where your machine communicated with the

FTP server. The important thing to see is that it connected and that the directory listing for the

User ID was successful.

Figure 39 – Filezilla: Communicating


6. In the ‘Remote Site’ window, enter your CBC’s remote file location address that was provided by

DCF when the access credentials were granted, including the apostrophes, and hit Enter. A list of

files will appear in the remote site file window.

Figure 40 – Filezilla: Setting the remote site


7. To transfer files, select one or more files in the Remote site file window and drag them to the

Local site file window. You can add more files while others are transferring. The file transfer

status panel will show each file in the transfer queue in the order they will be transferred and

their status. Filezilla will transfer several files concurrently.

Figure 41 – Filezilla: Transferring Files

8. Once all file transfers are completed, just close Filezilla.


FSFN Documentation If any of the links do not open, copy the link into your web browser; you must have access to the DCF

website.

The main FSFN intranet site is a good place to search for information. It has links to many aspects of

FSFN:

Main FSFN Documentation Site (http://fsfn.dcf.state.fl.us/)

The Data Warehouse site has links to spreadsheets that describe the structure of the universes, a data

dictionary, and overviews of several of those universes:

Data Warehouse (http://fsfn.dcf.state.fl.us/datawarehouse.shtml)

The Video tutorial that was presented to the FSFN User Group on how to merge data from two different

universes using BOE in the FSFN environment is located on the Center for Child Welfare’s site:

Merging Universes (http://centervideo.forest.usf.edu/fsfn/boe032014/boe032014.html)

The DCF provided guide on how to set up a scheduled BOE SFTP data feed is located on the Data

Warehouse page:

BOE SFTP How Do I Guide (http://fsfn.dcf.state.fl.us/docs/datawarehouse/BOE%20SFTP%20How%20Do%20I%20Guide.pdf)

Conclusion

We have covered a lot of information in this document, but have by no means covered everything. You

have discovered the basics of the BOE Reporting Environment. You can find, open and even send reports

to others. With the right access, you have even seen how to create a simple report. There is a lot of

opportunity left to expand your knowledge of BOE. Explore the many reports available in BOE and

discover the powerful features of the report builder! Try building a report with a graph or creating a

dashboard.

http://fsfn.dcf.state.fl.us/

http://fsfn.dcf.state.fl.us/datawarehouse.shtml

http://fsfn.dcf.state.fl.us/datawarehouse.shtml

http://centervideo.forest.usf.edu/fsfn/boe032014/boe032014.html

http://fsfn.dcf.state.fl.us/docs/datawarehouse/BOE%20SFTP%20How%20Do%20I%20Guide.pdf


Glossary

CSV (Comma Separated Values) – A text file where each value is normally separated by a comma. There

are several variations used as the separation delimiter but a common one is the pipe character (|).

Another common option is to enclose values with quotes.

Internet connectivity – The references to internet connectivity throughout this document are more than

just connecting to the internet. Even though some websites require only general connectivity, some

require access to the DCF network. This is normally transparent to users when connecting using their

office network or remotely using a VPN connection such as Aventail.

SFTP (SSH Secure File Transfer Protocol or Secure File Transfer Protocol) – For our purposes this is an

application that allows a user to log into an FTP server and download files in a secure method. WinSCP

is the FTP application referenced in the DCF documentation. Another common open source (free) FTP

application is Filezilla.

Merge Universes - Merge is just a technical term that means to link together with a common element. A

quick example would be if you have a list of people with their phone number and another list of the

same people with their address. You could easily merge the two lists together using the person’s name

as the common link.