Some important points/enhancements in OBIEE 11g when compared to OBIEE 10g are listed below

1. OBIEE 11g uses WebLogic Server as the application server as compared to Oracle AS or OC4J in OBIEE 10g.

2. The clustering process in much easier and automated in OBIEE 11g. 3. We can now model lookup tables in the repository. 4. The new UI called Unified Framework now combines Answers,

Dashboards, and Delivers. 5. A new column called the hierarchical column in introduced. 6. BI Publishers is fully and seamlessly integrated with OBIEE 11g. 7. New time series functions PERIOD ROLLING and AGGREGATE AT

are introduced. 8. In OBIEE 11g we can create KPIs to represent business metrics. 9. The aggregate persistence wizard creates indexes automatically. 10. The session variables get initialized when they are actually

used in OBIEE 11g unlike OBIEE 10g where they were initialized as soon as a user logs in.

11. OBIEE 11g now supports Ragged (Unbalanced) and Skipped Hierarchy.

12. You can also define Parent-Child hierarchy in OBIEE 11g as well.

13. SELECT_PHYSICAL command is supported in OBIEE 11g. In OBIEE 11g there are some changes in the terminology as well.

iBots are renamed as Agents. Requests are renamed as Analyses. Charts are renamed as Graphs. Presentation Columns are renamed as Attribute Columns.

What are the primary differences between the OBIEE 10g and 11g security models and what happens during upgrade?

Security Task/Object OBIEE 10g OBIEE 11g

What happens during upgrade from 10g to

11g?

Define Users Default N/A. By default, By default, existing users

and Groups in RPD file using OBIEE Admin Tool

users are defined in embedded WLS LDAP via FMW EM Console, or alternatively, in external LDAP.

and groups migrated to embedded WLS LDAP. Existing groups are automatically mapped to an Application role.

Defining security policies

Policies in the catalog and repository can be defined to reference groups within a directory.

Policies are defined in terms of application roles, which map to users and groups in a directory.

10g catalog groups are automatically migrated in the upgraded catalog and assigned the same privileges, access and membership.

“Administrator” user

Unique user with full administrative privileges.

No single user named tor full administrative privileges. Administration can be performed by any user who is member of BIAdministrators group.

“Administrator” user automatically added as member of “BIAdministrators” group in embedded WLS LDAP and granted Administrator role. The user specified during OBIEE 11g installation (i.e. “weblogic”, “biadmin”) is also a member of the BIAdministrators group.

Repository Encryption

Available on sensitive elements only - i.e. user passwords, connection pool passwords, etc.

Entire RPD encrypted via a password.

Prompted to set a repository password while running the upgrade assistant. Do not lose this password as there is no feature to recover a lost password.

External Authentication and OBIEE Initialization (Init) Blocks

Init blocks are required for external PDAP or external table authentication.

Init blocks not required for WLS embedded LDAP. Init blocks are required for external LDAP or external table authentication.

Upgraded RPD will continue to point to 10g LDAP or external tables. Initblocks may need to be modified to ensure that depreciated, or reserved word, variable names are renamed. NOTE: If you intend to use another LDAP server, such at Oracle Identity

Management (OID), then you must upgrade to the embedded LDAP server. Please see Upgrade Guide for further details.

Catalog Groups

Defined in Presentation Server Administration link

Available for backward compatibility. Use of Application Roles in FMW EM Console recommended.

Existing groups will be migrated. Recommendation is to use application roles instead. Privileges on catalog objects may be granted to an application role via BI Presentation server Administration link.

SA System Subject Area Optional

Available for backward compatibility and requires init blocks and external tables. Use of Embedded LDAP is recommended.

Upgraded 10g RPD will point to external tables, Initblocks may need to be modified to ensure that depreciated, or reserved word, variable names are renamed.

“Everyone” Presentation Server Group

Default Replaced with AuthenticatedUser role.

“Everyone” group migrated to AuthenticatedUser role.

Actually, this blog repeats what I think was a misunderstanding of the Oracle bi development group: in 10g the best practice is NOT to include users in the RPD, but to maintain users and their properties (including group and webgroup memberships) in an external table. Somehow, this fact was left out of 11g security model, as I understand it.

New Features in OBIEE 11gR1 For Data Modeling

Support for Ragged, Skip-Level and Parent-Child Hierarchies

Hierarchical Subject Area ColumnsLookup Logical TablesID Columns for Descriptive ColumnsLTS Priority OrderingRepository PasswordsDeployment of Repository Files using

Fusion Middleware Control