100 TOP OBIEE scenario based interview

Questions and Answers

iqapdf OBIEE Interview Questions September 12, 2016 1 Comment

OBIEE Interview Questions and Answers :-

1. What is OBIEE?
Obiee is a Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition and it is a tool which is used to
develop enterprise wide reports. So, in simple words it is a report generation tool such as
crystal reports. OBIEE is previous called as Seibel Analytic tool before it is acquired by
Oracle that now it is called OBIEE tool.

2. What is the meaning behind OBIEE?

The initials come from Oracle Business intelligence Enterprise Edition which is a package of
BI products.

3. What Business Intelligence (BI) means by definition?

It is a protocol and a technique to analyze and report about the state of the business data at a
particular time.

OBIEE Interview Questions and Answers

4. What types of variable we find in OBIIE?

Two types exist and these are the repository variables and session variables. The first kind
remains the same anytime and gives birth to other two types: static and dynamic. The static
variable changes only when the Siebel Analytics Server administrator wants to make a
change. The dynamic variable updates every time a query is executed by a schedule from the
Siebel Analytics Server. The second type (session variables) received a new value every time
a user is logging on and this second type also splits into other two subtypes: system and non
system.
5. What does Data Level Security in OBIEE?
Its role is the control of data type and amount seen in a report. Each user may see a different
report according to the access that they have in the company.

6. What is Object Level Security?

The Object Level Security is to protect the things like folder, pages reports and dashboards
that exist in the Siebel Analytics Web Catalog.

7. What is the difference between ITS (Logical Table Source) and multiple LTS?
In the majority of our time we will deal with multiple LTS which means that multiple
physical layer tables are using data instead of a single layer table that is the conditions for
single LTS.

8. How can we use the Query Repository tool?

With this tool we can search and analyze the name and type or other descriptions from a
database.

9. How can we describe the implicit fact column?

We can define it as a joining or combination of data or columns from various tables. It is used
as a transition layer to the final result.

10. How can the management of the cache made?

It could split in three distinct ways: in the first case we can disable the cache of the server by
setting a parameter to NO from the NQConfig.INI file and then a restart of the server. This
method will stop the queries from updating or using the cache. In the second case we can
adjust the cache at every physical table from the general settings where we will find the
Make cacheable option. In this way the queries will be able to use the cache and update it.
In the third case event polling data table is used to keep an eye of the updates made on each
table.

11. Can we tell the difference between a system and a non system variable?
Yes, for example system variables are those session variables used by Siebel Analytics Web
and Sever and they we cant use them for static variables, dynamic repository or non system
session variables. On the other hand non system variables or non system session variables can
be used as a filter for users.

12. Is it possible to make new logical columns for BMM layer?

Yes it is possible and we can see this example: we can right dick on fact table and we will
find here the command to make new logical column and we can name it.

13. What is the meaning of LBM?

LBM is Level Based Metrics meaning how measure is classified in terms of dimension.

14. What is the definition and use of Alias tables?

The duplicated made for the tables of a database are called Alias tables and they are links to
the properties like rows, columns of the original tables.

15. How to handle ragged hierarchy?

It is similar to a geographic hierarchy with Continents, countries, Provinces/States/ and Cities
all defined as levels. The Ragged hierarchy comes into place when we have two different
models, one with a Provence and one without, because in that case the chosen Country does
not support Provinces or States. The second model is a ragged hierarchy.

16. Is it possible that for a single dimension logical table to have multiple dimensional
hierarchy?
Once we right click a logical table and make a new dimensional hierarchy its not possible to
make another one from the same table so for every dimension logical table we will have only
one hierarchy.

17. How can we log on as administrators in Siebel?

A dialog box from the Manage area of the admin tool can allow us to setup different user
IDs. From there if we select a user we can see that we can modify the level and save it.

18. How different levels of access authentication are classified?

The levels are in number of four and their role is to block access to various databases or
tables: 1) Operating level- without this authentication no one can get access in the application
as this is the highest level of restriction. 2) Table- every physical table can be restricted. 3)
Database- This can give total or partial access to the database by a user and a password to the
user or can restrict all the access. 4) LDAP- or Lightweight Directory Access Protocol it
provides access limits for various folders or directories.

19. How one can know what report corresponds to a given table?
In order to discover this, after we run the report, we must arrive in the Administration tab and
click Manage Sessions.

20. What benefits brings OBIEE usage?

1) It brings an excellent interactive, complex SI functionality and environment.
2) Increases in the insight of each individual by the role in the company.
3) Good infrastructure and Unified Business model.
4) Flexibility and good integration with every data.
5) High performance.

21. What is ibot?

Ibot is an arrangement agent, used to arrange reports to be sent across many devices such as
email, pager, mobile, other devices etc

22. What are different types of joins that are possible in OBIEE RPD?
1. Complex Join it uses multiple conditions, such as A.ROW_WID = B.ROW_WID AND /
OR A.A_WID = B.B_WID
2. Natural Join

23. How we can have two different columns from two different tables or subject areas?
Using confirmed dimensions,we can fetch many metrics across various facts, but the join
should be of same level of data detail.

24. How can we use saved filters and where we will save the filters?
Shared Folders-XYZ Folder- It have two folders
a. Prompts
b. Reports
25. Have you worked in dashboard? when we run a dashboard? how will we stop the
dashboard report run automatically?
By clicking on the cancel button, we can stop a exact report placed on the dashboard.

26. Define surrogate key.

A surrogate key is an artificially generated key, usually a number. A surrogate key, in the
level aggregate table, simplifies this join and removes unnecessary columns from the fact
table, resulting in a smaller-sized fact table.

27. Define repository in terms of Siebel Analytics.

1. Repository stores the Meta data information. Siebel repository is a file system ,extension of
the repository file. rpd.
META DATA REPOSITORY
2.With Siebel Analytics Server, all the rules needed for security, data modeling, aggregate
navigation, caching, and connectivity is stored in metadata repositories.
3.Every metadata repository can store many business models. Siebel Analytics Server can
access many repositories.

28. Explain the end to end life cycle of Siebel Analytics?

Siebel Analytics life cycle
1. Collect Business Requirements
2. Recognize source systems
3. Plan ETL to load to a DW if source data doesnt exist.
4. Build a repository
5. Build dashboard or use answers for reporting.
6. Define security
7. Based on performance, decide an aggregations and/or caching mechanism.
8. Testing and QA.

29. How does Siebel Architecture works? Explain the three layers.
There are five parts of Siebel Architecture.
1. Clients
2. data sorces
3. Siebel analytics Web Server data sorces
4. Siebel analytics scheduler
5. Siebel analytics server
o Metadata represents the analytical Model which is created using the siebel Analytics
Administration tool.
o Repository divided into three layer
1. Physical Signifies the data Sources
2. Business copies the Data sources into Facts And Dimension
3. Presentation Specifies the users view of the model ; rendered in Siebel answer.

30. If we have 3 facts and 4 dimension and we need to join would you recommend
joining fact with fact? If no than what is the option?
In the BMM layer,we can create one logical table (fact) and add the 3 fact table as logical
table source.

31. What is connection pool and how many connection pools did we have in our last
project?
: connection pool is needed for each and every physical database.
> It contains material about the connection to the database, not the database itself.
> We can use either shared user accounts or pass-through accounts -Use: USER and
PASSWORD for pass through We can have many connection pools for each group to avoid
waiting

32. Define JDK and why do we need it?

Java Development Kit (JDK), is a software package that contains the minimal set of tools
needed to write, compile, debug, and run Java applets.

33. Oracle doesnt recommend Opaque Views because of performance considerations,

so why/when do we use them?
An opaque view is a physical layer table that contain select statement. An opaque view
should be used only if there is no other option.

34. Can we migrate the presentation layer to a different server.

No we cant migrate the presentation layer to a different server rather we have to migrate the
whole web & rpd files

35. How we can identify the dimension tables and how we can decide them during the
Business/Data modeling?
Dimension tables contain descriptions about data analysts which is used as query in the
database. Every table contains a primary key that contains one or more columns; each row in
a table is uniquely identified by its primary-key value or values

36. Why do we have multiple LTS in BMM layer?What is the purpose?

To improve the performance and query response time we have multiple LTS in BMM.

37. What is the full form of rpd?

There is no full form for rpd as such, it is just a repository file which is known as Rapidfile
Database.

38. How we can disable cache for only 2 particular tables?

We can disable cache in the physical layer, by right clicking on the table there we can have
the option which define cacheable

39. How we can split a table in the rpd given the condition. ( the condition given was
Broker and customer in the same table) Split Broker and customer.
We have to make a dubbed table in the physical layer.

40. What type of protocol did we use in SAS?

TCP/IP type protocol.

41. Can we have multiple data sources in Siebel Analytics?

Yes, we can have multiple data sources in Siebel Analytics.

42. How we can deal with case statement and expressions in siebel analytics?
By using expression builder we can create case statement whenthen.. end .
43. What do you know about Initialization Blocks?
> Init blocks are used for instantiating a session when a user logs in.
> To make dynamic variable we have to create IB to write sql statement.

44. Explain query repository tool?

> It is utility of OBIEE /Seibel Admin tool
> allows us to examine the repository metadata tool
> It Examine relationship between metadata objects like which column in the presentation
layer maps to which table in physical layer
> for example: search for objects based on name,type.

45. How can you bypass siebel analytics server security ?

It can by-passed by setting authententication type in NQSCONFIG file in the security section
as:authentication_type=bypass_nqs.instanceconfig.xml and nqsconfig.ini are the 2 places

46. Where we can add new groups and set permissions? Explain what is R?
We can add groups by going to manage>security>add new groups> We can give permissions
to a group for query limitation and filter conditions.

47. What are the things we can do in the BMM layer?

We can do Aggrigation navigation ,level base matrics, time series wizard, create new logical
column, comlex join.

48. Where are passwords for userid?

Passwords for userid are in siebel analytics server repository .

49.Define pipeline.
Pipelines are the stages in a particular contract, valuation, economics etc.

50. What are the Key Configuration Files in OBIEE?

The key configuration files in OBIEE 11g are NQSConfig.ini, NQSCluster.ini, odbc.ini,
instanceconfig.xml

51. Give a brief introduction of OBIEE?

Oracle BI Enterprise Edition (sometimes simply referred to as Oracle Business Intelligence)
provides a full range of business intelligence capabilities that allow you to:
Collect up-to-date data from your organization
Present the data in easy-to-understand formats (such as tables and graphs)
Deliver data in a timely fashion to the employees in your organization

52. What Is the Oracle BI Presentation Catalog?

The Oracle BI Presentation Catalog stores the objects, such as analyses, dashboards, and
KPIs, that you and other users create using Oracle BI EE. Users have their own personal
folder (My Folders), where they can store the objects that they create. The objects in a
personal folder can be accessed only by the user who created and saved the content into that
folder. Users can add sub-folders to their personal folders to organize their content in the way
that is the most logical to them.
You can also store objects in shared folders where other users or groups can access the
objects. A combination of business logic security,catalog object security, and data level
security determines who has the ability to view data and objects, edit objects, and delete
objects from the catalog. Your administrator creates and maintains the catalogs shared folder
structure.

53. What is OBIEE 11G?

Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition (OBIEE) 11g is the most significant release
of OBIEE since 2006.

54. Explain the main features of OBIEE 11G?

Oracle Business Intelligence is now more integrate with the Oracle Fusion Middleware
software family.
Oracle WebLogic Server replaces Oracle Application Server and Oracle Containers for Java
(OC4J).
Oracle Business Intelligence 11g Installer replaces the installer that was used in previous
versions of Oracle Business Intelligence. It can perform software installation and
configuration steps in the same process or separately in their own processes
This release add the following administration command-line utilities:
Oracle WebLogic Server scripting tool (WLST) for managing the Oracle WebLogic Server
domain.
OPMN and the opmnctl commands for the Oracle Process Manager and Notification Server.
A database repository must be created before installation of the components with the
Repository Creation Utility (RCU) tool
Log centralization via the web log viewer
In addition, Oracle Business Intelligence is now deployed in a clustered configuration by
default. Because of this, the default ODBC DSN for the Oracle BI Server points to the
Cluster Controller by default, rather than to the Oracle BI Server

55. Explain Oracle Business Intelligence Applications?

An Oracle BI application consists of pre-built, industry-specific Oracl e BI interactive
dashboards and Oracle BI reports that are built using industry best practices and address key
functional areas within an organization. Oracle BI applications are integrated with operational
applications to provide business metrics in reports, in context with an organizations business
function and industry.
Oracle BI applications include Extract Transform Load (ETL) routines to extract, transform,
and load data into the Oracle Business Analytics Warehouse.
Security in Oracle BI:
OBIEE allows a high degree of control over access to elements in Oracle BI applications. The
security mechanism comprises Business logic object security, Presentation Catalog object
security and Data level security.
Drilling Down in Oracle BI:
In OBIEE, you can drill down from a dashboard or report to an actual item in the database.
For example, if you work in sales, you can drill down to the city level within a sales report,
and observe that there is a large sale pending in Paris. If you are using an Oracle Siebel
operational application, you can then drill down on the pending sale and go directly to that
opportunity in the Oracle BI application.

56. Define repository in terms of OBIEE?

Repository stores the Meta data information.The extension of the repository file is
.rpd.With OBIEE Server, all the rules needed for security,data modeling, aggregate
navigation, caching, and connectivity is stored in metadata repositories. Each metadata
repository can store multiple business models. OBIEE Server can access multiple repositories
Repository is divided into three layer,
Physical Represents the data Sources
Business model the Data sources into Facts and Dimension and apply business logic
Presentation Specifies the users view of the data rendered in OBIEE answers client

57. What is the end to end life cycle of OBIEE?

OBIEE life cycle:
Gather Business Requirements
Identify source systems
Design ETL to load data to the Data Warehouse
Build a repository
Build dashboards and reports
Define security (LDAP or External table)
Based on performance, decide on aggregations and/or caching mechanism.
Testing and QA.

58. What is the purpose of Alias Tables?

An Alias table is a physical table with the type of Alias. It is a reference to a physical table,
and inherits all its column definitions and some properties from the physical table. A logical
table source shows how the logical objects are mapped to the physical layer and can be
mapped to physical tables, stored procedures and select statements. An alias table can be a
reference to any of these logical table source types.
Alias Tables can be an important part of designing a physical layer. The following is a list of
the main reasons to create an alias table:
To reuse an existing table more than once in your physical layer (without having to import it
several times)
To set up multiple alias tables, each with different keys, names, or joins
To help you design sophisticated star or snowflake structures in the business model layer.
Alias tables are critical in the process of converting ER Schems to Dimensional Sachems.

59. What is Authentication? How many types of authentication do we have in OBIEE?

Authentication is the process by which a system verifies a user with the help of a user ID and
password. It checks if user has the necessary permissions and authorizations to log in and
access data. There are 4 main types of Authentication in OBIEE:
Operating system authentication
External table authentication
Database authentication
LDAP authentication

60. What is aggregate navigation? How do you configure the Aggregate tables in
OBIEE?
Aggregate tables store pre-computed results, which are measures that have been aggregated
(typically summed) over a set of dimensional attributes. Using aggregate tables is a very
popular technique for speeding up query response times in decision support systems.
Ex: If you observe that most of the queries are fired on aggregated values like yearly or
monthly data rather that day level data then to speed up the report we can create an aggregate
table containing month level and year level data and map it to the respective logical table and
set the aggregation levels in the content tab of LTS.
61. Difference between a session and repo variable?
Session variables are similar to dynamic repository variables in that they obtain their values
from initialization blocks. Unlike dynamic repository variables, however, the initialization of
session variables is not scheduled. When a user begins a session, the Oracle BI Server creates
new instances of session variables and initializes them.
A repository variable has a single value at any point in time. Repository variables can be used
instead of literals or constants in Expression Builder in the Administration Tool. The Oracle
BI Server substitutes the value of the repository variable for the variable itself in the
metadata.
Unlike a repository variable, there are as many instances of a session variable as there are
active sessions on the Oracle BI Server. Each instance of a session variable could be
initialized to a different value.

62. What kind of sources can be connected to OBIee?

OBIee can be plugged on Relational Databases, Cubes or Flat files, with the following
constraints :
The sources must be modeled as star schemas or snowflakes schemas in order to have an
efficient and safe behavior.
In case of multiple sources directly in OBIee used together, be aware that OBIee will
conduct the needed joins itself, and OBIee is not a database.

63. Explain the Architecture of OBIEE 11g and function of each components?
OBIEE Comprises Presentation Services,Oracle BI Server:
The user constructs sql and passes it to the Analytic Engine and then the Oracle BI (Analytic
Engine) describes the physical sql to the Datasources and recover the data back to the Engine
and presents to the presentation Services .

64. How we can extract sql from OBIEE for reports?

There are many ways to extract the sql:
a. Change the request and click Advanced in that you get xml code and also the actual sql.
b. In the catalog Manager click Tools-Create Report . In the Create Report Window > Click
Request SQL and save the sql to the physical path in your PC.
c. Enable Loglevel to 2 in the OBIEE 11g Administration Tool from Manage-> Security and
enable the log level to 2 by clicking properties for the user, then go to the NQQuery.log in
BI_HOME/OracleBI/Server/Logs.You will find the SQL for that User.
d. By clcking Administration->Manage sessions-> view sql.

65. How can you sort in Reports in OBIEE 11g?

Click on modify and then click on sort (order by icon) on the relevant column in the criteria
pane.

66. How we can do different types of narrative Reports in OBIEE?

By clicking modify request and Narrative View and by giving @1 for the first column result
and @2 for the 2nd column and so on and we can also give a heading for No Results by
clicking the Narrative view.

67. How will you create Interactive Dashboards ?

By clicking on Administration and Manage dashboards and by adding column selector we
can create interactive Dashboard.
68. What is write-back in obiee ?
We can give a column as updatable and then view the reports,this option is called write back
option.

69. How will you execute Direct SQL in OBIEE?

By clicking Direct Database Request below the subject area in we can execute Direct SQL in
OBIEE.

70. How OBIEE Developer can create report from two subject areas?
From the Criteria Pane of the Report Created from First Subject Area
come to the bottom of the page and click combine request. By this we can create report from
two subject areas.

71. How we can Port changes for dashboards, reports, rpd from development to
production?
For the RPD we can use the Merge option in Admin Tool and for dashboards and reports we
can use Content Accelerator Framework.

72. What are the different types of variables in OBIEE 11g? explain
There are two types of variables in OBIEE 11g.
a. Repository variable:
This variable is used for the whole repository.
b. Session variable:
session variable are of two types: system variable and non system variable.
System variable uses NQ_SESSION. Examples of non system variables are user defined
filters.

73. How will you enable or disable caching in the system level and table level?
In the NQSConfig.ini file use ENABLE under CACHE Section for System Level
For tables, if we want to enable the cache at table level , open the repository in offline mode
This should be different from the current repository and click enable or disable the cache .

74. How will you go about adding additional column to the repository in the
presentation layer?
Check if the table is already existing if so add in physical layer ,then click on BMM and then
Presentation layer, then reload server metadata ,then it will be visible to all users.

75. How will effect the changes for a report , if for certain users only the column
heading in the report should be changed?
Using session variables for that user.

76. What is a table alias in OBIEE 11g? Where and how will you create it?
Table alias is used for creating self joins. Table alias can be created by right clicking the table
in the physical layer then click alias.

77. Have you created Hierarchy in OBIEE 11g. if so where and how?
Yes, we can create hierarchy in BMM Layer of OBIEE in dimensions for the dimension
tables. This can be done by right clicking the dimension table and click create dimension and
then we can manually define the hierarchy and its levels.
78. What is Level Based Metrics? How we can create it?
Level-base metrics means, having a measure held at a certain level of the dimension.
Examples Monthly Total Sales or Quarterly Sales
To create a level based measure, create a new logical column based on the original measure
.Drag and drop the new logical column to the appropriate level in the Dimension hierarchy.

79. What are the different layers of OBIEE 11g Repository?

Physical Layer,
Business Model
Mapping Layer
Presentation Layer.

80. What is Authentication? How many types of authentication.

Authentication is the procedure by which a system confirms, through the use of a user
a. Operaing system authentication
b. External table authentication
c. Database authentication
d. LDAP authentication

81. What is a bridge table ?

If we want to connect two tables where there is no relationship we can use a thrid bridge table
for connecting them which will have same columns in both tables.

82. How Time based triggered report can be generated?

Using Scheduler ibots we can generate time based triggered report.

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