Cognos vs Business Objects

[spicysudhi]

Hi

What are the (dis)advantages going for cognos and business objects when related to BI? Can I request a thread of comparision between the products here?

regards,
sudhi

 

[drlex]

A glib answer would be Cognos advantage - better product, BO advantage - cheaper price.
See thread401-588106 and thread401-311628 for previous thoughts on these products, but remember, in a Cognos forum, there's going to be a natural slant .

Which you choose should depend on what you want to do with BI: a reseller/vendor will usually be more than happy to make a pitch for a sale and show how his/her product will be appropriate for your needs.


soi la, soi carre

 

[MDXer]

Having used cognos and having had detailed technical discussions and demos of both products I feel that Cognos is a stronger BI Tool although very component driven. BO's primary product is ROLAP reporting which can tend to be slow and in some instances less desirable. Although BO does offer a MOLAP ad-hoc query tool it is pretty featureless and probably one of the weaker MOLAP tools on the market. BO's MOLAP Tool is for reading cube data only. Last I had heard they had no cube engine and worked only on Microsoft Analysis Services Cubes, which isn't a bad thing. Cognos however has the whole BI suite of tools including rolap reporting and MOLAP cubes.

as drlex said it comes down to what you need out of the product.

Shoot Me! Shoot Me NOW!!!
- Daffy Duck

 

[DoubleD]

Having only worked a little with BO, the only advantage I know of is the fact that BO's adhoc reporting capability allows more functionality for advanced users than Impromptu.

Pain is stress leaving the body.

DoubleD

 

[johnherman]

Want to spend a little money? Check out these 3rd party evaluations.

http://www.evaltech.com/products.html

-------------------------
The trouble with doing something right the first time is that noboby appreciates how difficult it was.
- Steven Wright

 

[schampheleer]

I've been working intensively with both vendors for a long time. I agree more or less with DoubleD but all has changed now with the arrival of ReportNet! Although not perfect (perfection is not of this world is is by far the best tool on the market. And much more is to come with the integration of PowerPlay, PowerPlay Studio and MDB access...

Although BO's products are far from bad, the question is what their current roadmap is now they have taken over Crystal. It is still not clear for me which way they want to go and what the future offering will look like.

FOr the next x months, Cognos is your safest bet.

 

[Exie]

Hi,

This is an interesting topic really. My employer currently licences over 9 different "reporting" tools. We've found one of the most used to be SAS.

For us, Cognos & Web Focus are by FAR the highest support. I know most people think of SAS as just a stats tool, but once you get over the programming element, its so much more predictable than Powerplay/Impromptu.

For me the cognos tools are great to deliver something quickly and get runs on the board and meet most of the buisness needs. But technically, I still think impromptu & powerplay are weak in terms of flexibility and stability.

I wonder if anyone has any thoughts about other vendors like Hyperion ? We have SQR which is a prick to develop in and we'll probably retire this soon.