The document discusses issues encountered when trying to use EVDREs (Essbase Variable Definition Report Elements) in SAP Analytics Cloud (formerly known as EPM 10). Key findings include that EPM 10 does not fully support EVDREs, the EVDRE migration tool breaks expansion tables, and using EVDREs disables important report editing functionality in EPM 10. It is recommended for a new "greenfield" implementation to avoid using EVDREs and instead utilize native EPM 10 reporting functionality.

1. 5/30/2016 EVDREs Do Not Play Nicely with EPM 10
https://www.column5.com/blog/evdres­do­not­play­nicely­with­epm­10 13/19
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For those of you working EPM 10 and contemplating using EVDREs,
this blog should be of help to you and ideally save you time!
Background: A leading headphone manufacturer is deploying EPM
10 Microsoft to replace an Excel based solution of a ton of linked
spreadsheets; therefore, we are not replacing a legacy system, nor
upgrading from a previous version of BPC to have a clean slate.
Trying to be clever consultants, we decided to take the VBC APPSET
accelerator (BPC Version 7) and migrate the existing 24 templates
into EPM 10.
We tried to maximize efficiency and deliver customer value by not having to re­invent the wheel, but it doesn’t always
work out that way, and there is nothing wrong with that.
What we found is that EPM 10 does not really like, nor fully support EVDREs. In fact, it is our experience now that the
only reason to use an EVDRE in EPM 10 is if you have an existing set of reports to migrate, and the client does not want
them re­written in EPM 10. You would still have to “retrofit” these we think. If there is a “greenfield” environment like with
this company, then we strongly recommend you avoid the use of EVDREs completely and use the native EPM 10
functionality.
Here’s what we found out (the hard way):
1­You can’t even type =evdre() in Cell A1 and launch the wizard. We get the error message of “#ERR: Application Name
cannot be null” when trying to build a report the “old­school way of Version 7”.
2­The EVDRE Migration Tool basically breaks the Expansion tables. We tried this at various stages of conversion to
include finally getting the old EVDRE to work. We suspect we have not figured out how to use this in an appropriate use
case. If anyone knows, please comment!
3­You have to hand­build the Options table and remove these options:
GroupExpansion
QueryEngine
QUERYVIEWNAME
SQLONLY
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2. 5/30/2016 EVDREs Do Not Play Nicely with EPM 10
https://www.column5.com/blog/evdres­do­not­play­nicely­with­epm­10 14/19
Otherwise you will get this error message: “The following option is not a valid BPC for NetWeaver
option:GROUPEXPANSION.” Once you remove GROUPEXPANSION the error continues until the other 3 above options
are deleted from the options table.
4­Macros do not work.
5­EPM 10 Report Editor is disabled when EPM 10 detects an EVDRE statement. If you open a report with EVDRE the
Edit Report button is immediately greyed out. Once you close the report, the Edit Report button comes back to life.
6­EVDRE report wizard is disabled.
7­When EPM 10 detects an EVDRE statement, the report editor and “drag” dimension sections are disabled.
The VBC still has value. We will use the VBC reports and templates as a visual model for formatting and structure, and
can leverage the Format Painter tool and design; however, we will be building a master template from scratch with EPM
10.
We sincerely hope this helps you avoid the issues we encountered!
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