http://altinoren.com/ Gokhan Altinoren's Blog and Projects en-us Gokhan Altinoren Fri, 08 Dec 2006 23:00:36 GMT newtelligence dasBlog 2.3.9074.18820 gokhan@altinoren.com gokhan@altinoren.com http://altinoren.com/Trackback.aspx?guid=f91029bb-e07e-4a3d-adf7-f1e138cd48ff http://altinoren.com/pingback.aspx http://altinoren.com/PermaLink,guid,f91029bb-e07e-4a3d-adf7-f1e138cd48ff.aspx Gokhan Altinoren
At work, I'm devoting a fair amount of my time to SQL BI concepts lately. One of the exciting concepts (there are many, believe me) of SSAS on SQL 2005 is Key Performance Indicators. A KPI is the creme de la creme of all the data aggregations. It's the final display of knowledge extracted from the vast amount of data to answer questions like "Based on such and such criteria, are we profitable?".



Since KPIs are mostly for non-techies, it's best to display them in a dashboard like scenario, where SharePoint is a good example. A handy newcomer in dashboard scene is Vista Sidebar, and displaying KPI data on the Sidebar was the most logical exercise for Sidebar development for me with the release of Vista:



Without perfecting that, WPF/E came out and I wondered if I can display KPIs in a Sidebar gadget using WPF/E. Result? I CAN'T. I don't know if it's the security settings or is it the WPF'E engine's fault but, the javascript method in Loaded event does not get called for a .xaml file if it's run in a Sidebar.

<Canvas xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/client/2007"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
    Loaded="javascript:OnLoaded">
  <Canvas x:Name="kpiCanvas" />
</Canvas>

Here's the code for the WPF/E thing (gadget? applet? app?). Note that, everything's fine in IE:
KPIDS.rar (7.21 KB)

Notes:

• WPF/E currently doesn't like .gif images in IMAGE tags. <Image Source="star.png" /> is fine but  <Image Source="star.gif" /> fails without an error, or it's the case for me.
  
• I lost (accidentally overriden) the source for KPI sidebar gadget (the one without WPF/E, two images above) but you can easily build one from the given source. Change "createKPI" in kpiLibrary.js to render to html instead of xaml.
• createFromXaml is a nice method but, we'll have programmatic access to the object model won't we?
• Although the current form of WPF/E is nice, I won't touch another CTP of it untill I can code in C# against it. JavaScript is sooooo boooring.
• Follow the steps below to setup remote XMLA access to SSAS through web services. It's required to access KPI data remotely:
  Configuring HTTP Access to SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services on Microsoft Windows Server 2003.
  

http://altinoren.com/PermaLink,guid,f91029bb-e07e-4a3d-adf7-f1e138cd48ff.aspx http://altinoren.com/PermaLink,guid,f91029bb-e07e-4a3d-adf7-f1e138cd48ff.aspx Fri, 08 Dec 2006 23:00:36 GMT <br> At work, I'm devoting a fair amount of my time to SQL BI concepts lately. One of the exciting concepts (there are many, believe me) of SSAS on SQL 2005 is Key Performance Indicators. A KPI is the creme de la creme of all the data aggregations. It's the final display of knowledge extracted from the vast amount of data to answer questions like "Based on such and such criteria, are we profitable?".<br> <br> <img src="content/binary/kpi.png" border="0"> <br> <br> Since KPIs are mostly for non-techies, it's best to display them in a dashboard like scenario, where SharePoint is a good example. A handy newcomer in dashboard scene is Vista Sidebar, and displaying KPI data on the Sidebar was the most logical exercise for Sidebar development for me with the release of Vista:<br> <br> <img src="content/binary/kpi_sidebar.png" border="0"> <br> <br> Without perfecting that, WPF/E came out and I wondered if I can display KPIs in a Sidebar gadget using WPF/E. Result? I CAN'T. I don't know if it's the security settings or is it the WPF'E engine's fault but, the javascript method in Loaded event does not get called for a .xaml file if it's run in a Sidebar.<br> <br> &lt;Canvas xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/client/2007"<br> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"<br> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <b>Loaded="javascript:OnLoaded"</b>&gt;<br> &nbsp; &lt;Canvas x:Name="kpiCanvas" /&gt;<br> &lt;/Canvas&gt;<br> <br> Here's the code for the WPF/E thing (gadget? applet? app?). Note that, everything's fine in IE:<br> <a href="content/binary/KPIDS.rar">KPIDS.rar (7.21 KB)</a> <br> <p> </p> <img src="http://altinoren.com/content/binary/kpi_dashboard.png" border="0"> <br> <br> Notes:<br> <ul> <li> WPF/E currently doesn't like .gif images in IMAGE tags. &lt;Image Source="star.png" /&gt; is fine but&nbsp; &lt;Image Source="star.gif" /&gt; fails without an error, or it's the case for me.<br> </li> <li> I lost (accidentally overriden) the source for KPI sidebar gadget (the one without WPF/E, two images above) but you can easily build one from the given source. Change "createKPI" in kpiLibrary.js to render to html instead of xaml.</li> <li> createFromXaml is a nice method but, we'll have programmatic access to the object model won't we?</li> <li> Although the current form of WPF/E is nice, I won't touch another CTP of it untill I can code in C# against it. JavaScript is sooooo boooring.</li> <li> Follow the steps below to setup remote XMLA access to SSAS through web services. It's required to access KPI data remotely:<br> <a href="http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/sql/2005/httpasws.mspx">Configuring HTTP Access to SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services on Microsoft Windows Server 2003</a>. <br> </li> </ul> <img width="0" height="0" src="http://altinoren.com/aggbug.ashx?id=f91029bb-e07e-4a3d-adf7-f1e138cd48ff" /> KPI SQL BI SSAS Vista WPF/E