After logging on to Cognos, you’ll be at the Welcome Page. We’ll use Query Studio for this example, so from the Welcome Page click “Query my data” in the list of options on the right. When asked for the desired package, navigate to the “Finance Data Warehouse” public folder and click “OUS FIS Data Warehouse.” All of Cognos’ reporting tools start this same way: by asking you to select a package.
After a few seconds, the Query Studio “canvas” will appear, with a “Menu/Insert Data” pane on the left side of the screen that lists the data subjects (such as ‘General Ledger’). If you click on the triangle to the left of the data subject name, a list of data objects (such as ‘Campus’, ‘Fiscal Calendar’ and the ‘General Ledger’ object) will drop down. If you then click on one of the data objects, a list of the data attributes in that data object will appear. These data attributes are the pieces of data that are used to make a report.
Select a data attribute and drag it onto the report canvas. If this is the first time you’ve worked with the data source, you’ll be prompted for a user ID and password. This is the same user ID and password that you use to log on to BI Query (it’s probably not the user ID and password that you used to log on to Cognos).
Tip #1: After entering your credentials, make sure to check the box labeled “Remember my user ID and password when connecting to this data source”. This will be a great time-saver, since you won’t need to sign on to the data source again. It’s safe, too, since your access is still secured by your Cognos log-in.
Once you’re signed on and getting data, feel free to explore what Query Studio can do. Also try out (from the Welcome Page) the option “Author Business Reports” (which runs Business Insight Advanced).
Tip #2: Cognos Query Studio (and several other reporting tools) will only work properly in Internet Explorer. They appear to work in Firefox, Chrome, etc., but certain key features will not do anything in any other browser than IE.
