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Component Diagram

The following diagram shows the interconnections between a single instance of the BI Presentation Services and its associated components (all ports shown are the defaults):

BI Presentation Services Instance Perspective

BI Presentation Services Clients

The BI Presentation Services instance listens on port 9710 for requests from multiple J2EE Servers with BI Presentation Service Plug-ins, which in turn relay web traffic. It also listens for requests from the active instance of the BI Scheduler on port 9710.

Supporting Processes

Multiple BI JavaHost instances (on port 9810) and the Chart Image Server – PopChart Image Server from CORDA Technologies (on port 2100) – provide supporting services to the BI Presentation Services instance.

Session Initiation

Each client session is bound to a particular BI Presentation Services instance and to a particular BI Server instance for the lifetime of the session. At the beginning of a session the BI Presentation Services instance uses the ODBC Data Source and the Oracle BI Server driver to connect to the active BI Cluster Controller, which listens on port 9706. This will be the Primary Cluster Controller (PCC) if this controller is available; otherwise, it will be the Secondary Cluster Controller (SCC). The active BI Cluster Controller will pass back to the BI Presentation Services instance the host name of the BI Server with the fewest sessions. Thereafter the BI Presentation Services instance will connect directly to the allocated BI Server via the ODBC Data Source. All BI Servers listen on port 9703 for incoming requests.

When the BI Presentation Services instance needs to contact the active Scheduler it again requests the host name from the active BI Cluster Controller. Thereafter it connects directly to the active Scheduler instance, which listens on port 9705.

Presentation Catalog

Information about requests, dashboards, and administration details is written by each BI Presentation Services instance to a Presentation Catalog. Two configuration options are available. In the first, each BI Presentation Services instance has its own local Presentation Catalog, stored on the same machine:

BI Presentation Services Instances with Local Catalogs

Alternatively, each BI Presentation Services instance can use a Common Catalog, held on a shared file system (such as NAS or SAN):

BI Presentation Services Instances with Common Catalog

The latter configuration is much easier to manage. A Presentation Catalogue can contain a very large number of files, so care needs to be taken in choosing the file system, and in minimizing any background activity performed on the file system while the BI Presentation Services instances are running.

Failover

The set of BI Presentation Services instances offer native load balancing and failover.

When a BI Presentation Service instance fails, an error message is returned to the client application. In the case of a web user, any unsaved work is lost, and the user will have to login again and establish a new session with a different BI Presentation Services instance (the relogin is handled automatically when SSO is employed). On receiving an error, the active BI Scheduler will continue with the job after establishing a connection to a different BI Presentation Services instance (it uses the BI Scheduler tables to determine the current state of the job when the connection was terminated).

Configuration Files

Each BI Presentation Services instance reads a local configuration file “instanceconfig.xml” from directory “<oracleBIData Home>\web\config” at startup. This file will contain a reference to the credential store, file “credentailstore.xml”, which will be read in turn, usually from the same directory.

The key tag sets in file “instanceconfig.xml” are described below. Text in red indicates an element that may need to be configured according to the implementation context. Wrapped text should appear on a single line in the configuration file.

Credential Store Reference

The reference to the credential store has the following format:

<CredentialStore>
<CredentialStorage type=”file” path=”<oracleBIData Home>\
web\config\credentialstore.xml”/>
</CredentialStore>

ODBC Data Source

The ODBC Data Source that a BI Presentation Services instance uses to contact a BI Cluster Controller or a BI Server instance has the following tag format:

The default data store is called “AnalyticsWeb”.

Presentation Catalog

The path to the local or common Presentation Catalog is specified as follows:

<CatalogPath><oracleBIData Home>\
web\catalog\<catalog name></CatalogPath>

Where multiple BI Presentation Services instances are employed, the following tag sets are required to specify the criteria under which the BI Presentation Services cache is updated.

Clustered Controllers

The following information identifies the means by which a BI Presentation Services instance connects to a clustered controller:

<Alerts>
   <ScheduleServer>
      ccsPrimary="<primary cluster controller server>"
      ccsPrimaryPort="<client controller port>"
      ccsSecondary="<secondary cluster controller server>"
      ccsSecondaryPort="<client controller port>"
   </ScheduleServer>
</Alerts>

These values must match the values of the corresponding parameters held in configuration file “NQClusterConfig.INI” in directory “<oracleBI Home>\server\Config”: “primary cluster controller server” => “PRIMARY_CONTROLLER”; “secondary cluster controller server” => “SECONDARY_CONTROLLER”; and “client controller port” => “CLIENT_CONTROLLER_PORT” (default 9706).

JavaHost Processes

The set of BI JavaHost servers will be the same as the set of BI Presentation Services servers since a JavaHost instance is always, and only, installed when a BI Presentation Services instance is installed. If each BI Presentation Services instance is to access its local JavaHost instance, then no additional configuration is required. But if the BI JavaHost instances are to be clustered and load balanced, then the following tag sets are required:

The “javahost port” must match the value of the “Port” tag (default 9810) in file “config.xml” in directory “<oracleBI Home>\web\javahost\config”.

Credential Store File

File “credentialstore.xml” (assuming a minimal security implementation) must contain the following tag set:

<sawcs:credential type=”usernamePassword” alias=”admin”>
<sawcs:username><username></sawcs:username>
<sawcs:password><password></sawcs:password>
</sawcs:credential>

where “username” and “password” must match the respective values of the “AdminName” and “AdminPswd” tags in the Scheduler’s “instanceconfig.xml” file, in directory “<oracleBIData Home>\scheduler\config” (the “AdminPswd” value will be encrypted and must be created with the Job manager or the “schconfig” command line utility).

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