The October updates for Oracle's Planning & Budgeting Cloud Service (PBCS) and Enterprise Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service (EPBCS) are here. This blog post outlines several new features for both applications, enhancements, removal of support, and fixed defects.
The monthly update for PBCS and EPBCS will occur on Friday, November 17 during your normal daily maintenance window.
Updates for PBCS & EPBCS
Changes to CSV Version of the Provisioning Report
This monthly update reverts the changes made to the CSV version of the Provisioning Report in the September monthly update (17.09) so that it now lists the application roles that are mapped to the predefined identity domain roles assigned to users. It also lists the groups to which users are assigned, even if the group is not assigned to any role. For example, if the user is assigned the Service Administrator role, the CSV version of the report lists one row for each application role mapped to the Service Administrator role.
Registering Duplicate Target Application Names in Data Management
Data Management supports registering target applications with the same name. This may be the case where a customer has multiple service environments and the application name is the same in each environment, or the application names are identical in development and production environments. This feature enables you to add a prefix to the application name when registering the application so that it can be registered successfully in Data Management and be identified correctly in the list of target applications.
Target applications with prefixes are not backward compatible, and cannot be migrated to a 17.10 or earlier release. Only a target application without a prefix name can be migrated to an earlier release.
Updates for EPBCS Only
Currency Conversion for Weekly Plans
If you're planning at the weekly level in the Financials business process, when you enter monthly level exchange rates in the Global Assumptions configuration task and save the form, the monthly exchange rates are copied to the weekly level. The copy is based on how you mapped weeks to months (4-4-5, 4- 5-4, or 5-4-4). This functionality applies to the Financials cube (OEP_FS) only.
Detailed Configuration for Weekly Planning
In the Financials business process, if you enable weekly planning, by default all entity and account combinations are set up for weekly planning. You can now specify that some entity/account combinations use monthly planning. This is useful when most entities use weekly planning, but certain entities use monthly planning; or when an entity plans at the monthly level except for certain accounts. Forms are updated to show the correct granularity for entities and accounts. After enabling weekly planning, to set up a custom planning granularity for entities and accounts, from the Home page, click Application, and then click Configure. Select Financials from the Configuration list, and then click Weekly Configurations.
Strategic Modeling Supports Creating and Editing Dataviews
You can now create and edit Dataviews in Strategic Modeling on the Web. In the Account View, from Actions menu, click Dataviews.
Groovy Rules Support Data Maps and Smart Push
For applications of type “Enterprise” (available with Enterprise PBCS or PBCS Plus One licenses), you can now write a groovy rule that moves the input and calculated data from source cube to target cube by either executing a Data Map (for administrators) or Smart Push (for users who have launch access to the rule).
Removal of Support
Standard Interface (PBCS Workspace Interface)
This change affects only Planning and Budgeting Cloud Service customers who activated their subscriptions on or before July 31, 2016.
The Simplified Interface, an option available in the service since November 2014, will be established as the standard across the service. As a result, the current Standard Interface, which is also known as the Enterprise Planning and Budgeting Cloud Workspace, will not be supported starting with the December 2017 update to the service (December 1, 2017 for test instances and December 15, 2017 for production instances). After the deployment of the November update to production instances on November 17, 2017, bugs or enhancements for the Standard Interface will not be addressed.
Classic Dimension Editor
For users of the Simplified Interface, effective the February 2018 (18.02) update, the Dimensions link in the Navigator will link to the Simplified Dimension Editor, which was released with the 17.05 update (May 2017). Consequently, the Classic Dimension Editor will not be supported starting with the February 2018 update to the service (February 2, 2018 for test and February 16, 2018 for production instances).
Financial Reporting Studio Desktop Client
Oracle is committed to providing a simple and intuitive user experience. To achieve this, Financial Reporting Web Studio, available since March 2016, will become the only environment for designing and building reports.
Oracle is providing additional time for users to transition from Financial Reporting Desktop Studio to Financial Reporting Web Studio. Tentative plans call for functional parity between Financial Reporting Web Studio and Financial Reporting Desktop Studio in late 2017, at which time, support for the Desktop Studio will transition to the Web Studio and distribution of the Desktop Studio will cease.
Oracle recommends that you transition to using Financial Reporting Web Studio at the earliest opportunity. Please send questions and concerns to Oracle using the Provide Feedback option in the service.
Fixed Defects
|
Defect Number |
Description |
|
26968870 |
Errors when running business rules after taking the latest patch are now fixed. |
|
26965567 |
Business rules that reference Smart Lists now correctly validate, launch, and give the expected results in Planning. |
|
26965519 |
Business rules for the ASO model now correctly validate if the rule contains a member range in the format of Jan:Jun. |
|
26897073 |
In browsers configured for the Japanese language, the labels used in Provide Feedback Utility screens now appear correctly as designed. |
|
26863693 |
The Expand All function in Financial Reports with page dimensions now works correctly. The Expand All function in Financial Reports with page dimensions now works correctly. |
|
26850877 |
The issue where some batch jobs with a "running" status could not be stopped or deleted has been fixed. |
|
26840992/ 26676546 |
The Valid For Plan Type property is now correctly migrated for all Period dimension members. |
|
26721676 |
Percentage values now display with the correct precision setting in Planning forms, even for very large numbers. |
|
26697191 |
Data load schedules are no longer deleted when monthly patches are applied. |
|
26424075 |
You no longer receive an error when selecting four or more members during report creation. |
|
26570462 |
Financial Reporting Studio now requires you to specify an application and database in order to establish the initial database connection. This eliminates the persistent issue of the server's error log message. |
| 26544159 | The dates for scheduled task lists are now displaying correctly. |
| 25171331 | With the Planning Admin Extension, when importing the HSP_View dimension onto a worksheet, Smart View now correctly displays only the default properties. |
Considerations
Using Firefox ESR 52.4.2 with Smart View
Future releases of Mozilla Firefox will be phasing out support for XUL-based add-ons such as Smart View. Starting in mid-November 2017, only add-ons and extensions built with new web extension technology will work in Firefox. Therefore, Smart View 11.1.2.5.710 only supports Firefox versions up to ESR 52.4.1. If you want to continue using Firefox with Smart View 11.1.2.5.710, do not upgrade your Firefox browser.
If your Firefox browser is set to automatically install updates, Oracle recommends changing the setting to “Check for updates, but let me choose whether to install them.” See the Firefox help for instructions on changing this setting.
To learn more about the simplified interface vs. workspace, watch the webinar replay...
