Hyperion Planning Utilities

Hyperion Planning comes loaded with several utilities that come in very handy. Knowledge about what those utilities are, what they do, how to use them, the proper syntax to run them can be of huge benefit during routine as well as ad hoc activities in the EPM world.

In regards to the EPM 11.1.2.1 version, the Utilities reside in the Planning1 directory (default) in the application server where you have Planning installed and configured. In my case, the folder is \\appserver\d$\oracle\Middleware\user_projects\epmsystem1\Planning\planning1. It might be different depending on how you have configured Planning.

Here, I have tried to list some of the utilities that are available in the Planning1 folder and a brief description regarding what they do. If you are interested to know more about any of them, Oracle document library is a great resource. I have also written blogs on some of those utilities. So you can feel free to search for them.

Note: Most of the utilities (may be all) are case sensitive, so please take great care during type those commands and their syntax.

OutlineLoad.cmd – The mother of all the processes to load metadata in Hyperion Planning, this is a very handy utility using which you can load metadata in Planning application. CSV, TXT files can be used to for default dimensions as well as user-defined dimensions, attributes, and UDAs. Make sure the metadata or data file is formatted correctly.

The following is a common syntax. It has some other parameters as well.

OutlineLoad [/S:server] /A:application /U:userName [/E:outputFileName] [/I:inputFileName/D[U]:loadDimensionName|/DA:attributeDimensionName:baseDimensionName][/X:exceptionFileName] [L:logFileName]

FormDefUtil.cmd – The form definition utility comes in very handy if you want to export the forms in planning application and import in a different target environment, for example, export-import between development and production, or so forth. You can export either a single form or all the forms in a planning application. It creates an XML file(s) which you can use to import in the target environment.

Syntax

FormDefUtil.cmd export Name_of_Form servername username Application_Name.

In case you are exporting all the forms, replace “Name_of_Form” with “-all” and in case you are importing, replace “export” with “import.”

ExportSecurity.cmd and ImportSecurity.cmd – By using the ExportSecurity utility in conjunction with ImportSecurity.cmd, we can export and import access permissions across applications. Running this utility creats a secfile.txt file which can be used to import security in the target environment or application. Before running the ImportSecurity.cmd utility, we need to edit the secfile.txt file to make sure we have the right names.

The syntax for ExportSecurity.cmd is

ExportSecurity.cmd /A=Application_Name,/U=admin_username (can use other parameters as per need)

For example, If the name of the application is khoonks and username is nirmal, the syntax would look something like:
ExportSecurity.cmd /A=khoonks,/U=nirmal (you can add other parameters as required)

The default location where the resulting secfile is created is what we call the "bin" folder. The location in 11.1.2.1 (my environment) is oracle\Middleware\user_projects\epmsystem1\Planning\planning1.

We can specify the output file name/location by using the parameter "TO_FILE"
In the following example,
username is nirmal, application is khoonks, and we would like to export the resulting security file to a file named "mysec.txt" in E:\my_folder.
So the syntax would be something like:
ExportSecurity.cmd /A=khoonks,/U=nirmal,/TO_FILE=E:\\my_folder\\mysec

Moreover, we can also use the (-f) option to encrypt the password while doing the security export. In this case the syntax of a batch script to call the ExportSecurity.cmd would look something like:

call D:\oracle\Middleware\user_projects\epmsystem1\Planning\planning1\ExportSecurity.cmd -f:D:\oracle\Middleware\user_projects\epmsystem1\Planning\planning1\passwordFile /A=appname,/U=ADMIN,/TO_FILE=E:\\samplefolder\\subfolder\\mysec_secfile

The above script will create a file called mysec_secfile.txt inside the "subfolder" folder in the specified path. 

NOTE: In the above example, there is a space before "-f" and after "passwordFile"
The utility is very sensitive in terms of case and spaces. Therefore, make sure they are correct.

ImportSecurity.cmd “appname,username”
For example, if the app name is khoonks and username is nirmal, the syntax would be:
ImportSecurity.cmd "khoonks,nirmal"

ProvisionUsers.cmd – The provision users utility can be used to synchronize Planning users, groups, and roles in Shared Services console with Planning application and with Essbase.

Syntax is

ProvisionUsers /ADMIN:admin_user /A:Application_Name

SortMember.cmd – The sort member utility can be used to sort dimension members outside of Planning. This is an alternate for sorting members in Dimensions tab in Planning web. If you want to sort members without having to open planning, you can use this.

The syntax is

SortMember servername admin_username password Dimension member_name descendants ascend

Other parameters such as descend, etc can be used as per requirement.

Apart from these utilities, there are other utilities as well which can come in handy in Planning administrative job.

You can go and check the Planning1 folder to see and find out what the other utilities are and what they do.

FormDefUtil.cmd – a way to export and import Planning Forms

FormDefUtil is a pretty decent Planning utility that can be used to export planning data forms from one environment to another. Being a planning utility it resides in the Planning1 folder (at least in the 11.1.2 version of EPM).

Path - D:\oracle\Middleware\user_projects\epmsystem1\Planning\planning1.

In order to launch the FormDefUtil utility

            Open the command Prompt

            Go to the Planning1 folder where the FormDefUtil utility is.

From here you can either export or import forms by typing in the required syntax

If you want to export all the forms that you have you can type in

FormDefUtil export –all server username application (FormDefUtil export -all localhost admin sampleapp)

If you want to export only one form, you can type in

FormDefUtil export FormName server username application (FormDefUtil export retirement localhost admin sampleapp)

The above export command creates an XML file that you can import in a different environment.

In order to import form in the target planning app, you can type in

FormDefUtil import –all server username application (FormDefUtil import -all localhost admin sampleapp)

SOME MORE

All forms within an application:
FormdefUtil.cmd export -all localhost khoonks (username here) normal (application name here)

it will ask for password

One form that you want to export:
For example, if you want to export a form named "Other Expenses" from the "normal" application, the syntax would be 

FormdefUtil.cmd export "Other Expenses" localhost khoonks normal

It will ask for password.


After the execution of the script, the output fill will be seen in the Planning1 folder > D:\oracle\Middleware\user_projects\epmsystem1\Planning\planning1. 
Output is an XML file and it is something like "Other Expenses - Capital.xml"

In order to import only one app, you can type in

FormDefUtil import filenamepluslocationoffile server username application (FormDefUtil import formname.xml localhost admin sampleapp)

After you run the command, if it asks for the password, type in the password and wait for it to run.

There are other parameters that you can use with the FormDefUtil utility. You can refer to http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E17236_01/epm.1112/hp_admin/frameset.htm?ch12s06s04.html for more information.