Macros in Cognos Planning

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Cognos Planning – Contributor Administration Console



What is a macro?

Macros are used in Cognos Planning to automate the work. By using these, you save some steps with a name and next time when you need to perform those steps you just call that macro to execute those steps.

They are like macros in office or commands in a batch file.


How macros in analyst and contributor differ?


Macros in Analyst– Analyst macros are created mainly by recording. By recording I mean that you perform certain steps on the front end and analyst records those steps for macro (keep a look at those steps). When you stop recording, you see the steps you perform, are listed in analyst. You can then save those steps with a name.

Macros in CP– Contributor- in contributor the macros' steps (the basic building blocks of macros) are already stored. You just need to use those steps. That also means that you can't add your own step to do something. You can just use those steps to perform the series of tasks. This will soon be clear.


How to create a macro in Cognos Planning - Contributor?

You can create a macro in contributor by using following steps-

1. Launch the contributor and from the left hand side tree structure, select Macros




2. From the right hand side click on 'New' to start creating a macro. A box to fill in the details of macro pops up.





Give macro a name.
Tip: While giving name to macro follow the below naming convention.
<Application Name with underscores instead of spaces>_<Macro step with underscores instead of spaces>


Fill the authentication mode.
OS Sign on- this is used in trusted connection where you don't need to fill in username and password.
Basic Sign on- if you select this then you need to fill in those username and password which you use to connect to analyst.
Default-
Username- Administrator
Password- (Leave the field blank)

Then click 'OK'

3. Once you click 'OK' a box opens up. You can select the step which you want to perform.



4. After selecting the step the details form for that step opens in which you need to fill all the details for that step.

5. After filling in all the details it is advisable to click on 'Validate' to check whether you've filled all the mandatory details.

Tip: Validate doesn't check whether you've filled in the correct details or not, it just ensures that you've filled all the mandatory ones. If you've filled an incorrect detail, it's up to you to check that.

6. 'New' button on Details page- On clicking the 'New' button, the current step is saved and a new step-3 page opens to add a new step to macro.

7. This is how you create a macro.


Advantages-

Macros make the processing faster by combining the steps.