If your PowerCubes take too long to open in the IBM
Cognos 8 Web studios, we recommend that you run a command
line utility named pcoptimizer, supplied with IBM Cognos 8,
to improve runtime performance. This optimization utility is suitable
for older PowerCubes when the model no longer exists or the data
used to build the PowerCube is no longer available.
In Transformer Version 7.3 Maintenance Release 2 and subsequent
releases, you have the option of making this optimization an automatic
part of the build process, by adding an entry to your trnsfrmr.ini
file or by creating the required environment variable on UNIX. If
you use this method, the optimization process also enables drill-through
access on all PowerCube measures by default.
There is an expected, but slight, increase in PowerCube size
and build times. However, in most production environments, runtime
PowerCube performance improves significantly.
Back up your target PowerCube as a precaution, and then
navigate to the IBM_Cognos_8_installation_location/bin directory.
On Windows, open a command line window and run PCOptimizer.exe.
On UNIX, enter the following line to run the optimization
command line utility:
pcoptimizer [-t] [-v] [-h] <cubename>
where <cubename> is
the fully qualified PowerCube or time-based partitioned control cube
name with the .mdc extension, if the PowerCube resides in the same
location as pcoptimizer. Otherwise, <cubename> is
the full path with the .mdc extension.
Note: This method only supports metadata extraction.
To set up user-configurable drill-through, you must use Transformer
and specify automatic optimization. Wildcard character support is
not currently available. You must therefore invoke the utility once
per PowerCube. If <cubename> is not provided, the program enters
an interactive mode, prompting you for a PowerCube name and accepting
keyboard input. The optional parameters are as follows:
On Windows, to enable automatic optimization for all PowerCube
builds, locate the trnsfrmr.ini file in the installation_location\cern\bin
directory, open it in any text editor, and add the following entry:
EnablePCOptimizer=1
Optimization is now turned ON for all PowerCube builds.
On the Windows command line, to optimize a specific PowerCube
build, type the following:
trnsfrmr -DEnablePCOptimizer=1 -cm <model_path_and_filename>
On UNIX, to enable optimization for all PowerCube builds
during the current session, use the -D flag or define the environment
variable EnablePCOptimizer in the trnsfrmr.rc file(s).
Tip: To disable the feature, change the value of your
optimization setting to zero or remove the definition.
After your PowerCubes build, you can open the relevant
log files and confirm that the following entries appear:
Start updating of 'cube_name' with optimized metadata.
. . .
End updating of 'cube_name' with optimized metadata.
This indicates successful extraction of the metadata needed to
optimize the opening of each PowerCube in IBM Cognos 8.
Note: There is no harm in optimizing a PowerCube that
has already been optimized.
