Building a dashboard, and connecting it to a database using Query as a Web Service

If you’re building a dashboard, and connecting it to a database using Query as a Web Service

Query as a Web Service: 

QaaWS is a Business Objects client tool that creates a web service, based on a query, that connects directly to a universe

QaaWS

With QaaWS, you first create a query using the familiar query panel. QaaWS will convert this into a web services and provide you with a WSDL. This is a URL that points to the definition of the query, which is stored in the Business Objects repository.

1. From the Windows start menu, locate Query As A Web Service.
2. Log onto the repository. If you’re not sure how, check the help for details. The QaaWS guide that you’ll find at help.sap.com doesn’t actually explain how to create a query. That can be found in Building Queries with SAP BusinessObjects Web Intelligence Query - HTML
3. Go through the steps of the wizard to create the query. First I’ll create Revenue by Category which is simply one dimension and one measure.
    
4. Next up is Top 10 Cities by Revenue, again, fairly simple since there is a Rank function built in to QaaWS.
   
5. Lastly, we will create the query that returns the top 20 products based on sales for the last three months, and for each shows the average revenue per sale per month, over the last 12 months.

Consuming the Data in Xcelsius

Query as a Web Service

With your web service defined and stored in the repository, now you only need to create a connection to that web service and define what cells the output belongs in.

1. Open Xcelsius.
2. Click Data > Connections.
3. Click Add > Query as a Web Service.
4. Paste the WSDL into the WSDL URL field and click import.
   
   
   This URL can be found in the QaaWS interface when you have your web service selected.
   
5. Now bind the output of the connection to the cells in your spreadsheet.