Release 5.6.1

ADVIZOR Analyst Edition 5.6.1 Release Notes

July 1, 2010

ADVIZOR Solutions, Inc ADVIZOR Version 5.6.1 Copyright 2000 - 2010, ADVIZOR Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

This (ReleaseNotes.htm) file contains product information for ADVIZOR Analyst Edition 5.6.1 products. These release notes are available on the installation image as well as in the install directory for the product(s) you have installed.

Index

• Training materials for ADVIZOR Analyst are available here.

• Instructional videos are available online.

• New in this Release

• Platform Notes

• Installation Instructions

• Databases Supported

• Known Problems and Hints

• Technical Support

New in this Release

Features and Enhancements

The R5.6.1 version provides this change:

• A new version of the KXEN analytics software is included that provides more accurate results for continuous model targets.

The R5.6 version provides these changes:

• The ADVIZOR Server client is now implemented using the Microsoft Silverlight plugin. This provides

  • Support in more web browsers with a Silverlight plugin on PCs or Macintoshes (Intel only). This currently includes Microsoft Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome on Microsoft Windows and Safari and Mozilla Firefox on Apple OS/X. Details on compatible operating systems and browsers are here.

    • Better feature parity between the Server client and the full client software. Features previously unavailable to users of the server include all selection modes (replace, add, subtract, and intersect), export of currently selected rows from Data Sheets and Summary Sheets, and more options on chart display.

    • A redesigned visual style that is more subtle. Also, unnecessary zoom bars can be omitted.

Because of changes to the ADVIZOR project file required for this feature, you must re-publish all projects created in versions prior to R5.6 ADVIZOR Analyst to ADVIZOR Server.

Project files created with a version before R5.6 that are input to adv2advm must be re-saved as an ADV from R5.6 (or later) ADVIZOR Analyst also.

• Performance improvements have been made by pre-computing more data in the adv2advm process for updating a project off-line. Depending on the characteristics of the project, load times using the binary form (".advm") may be twice as fast or better.

• The Flight Recorder introduced in the previous release has been enhanced. The Flight Recorder tracks user actions. It is a pane in Advizor Analyst, by default on the right side of the application. It is off by default, but can be displayed using the "View" menu. User actions are recorded to the Flight Recorder. The Flight Record may also be annotated with notes and images of charts may be captured to it, making it a place to record notes, observations, and results during an analysis session. The Flight Record may be printed, or items from it may be copy and pasted (or dragged) to other desktop applications.

The Flight Recorder now records actions as "constraints", text descriptions of the graphical interactions with charts. Recorded Flight Actions can be replayed using these text constraints. These have the advantage of being usable even if the data has changed.

The Flight Recorder can be used in two modes to re-do previous actions:

1. You can repeat previous actions.

2. You can go to a previous state.

See the User Guide for more details.

• The color scale used by the Heat Map can be modified by specifying colors to be used for high values, middle values, and low values. This can be used to reverse the color scale or to use another range of colors. This is via the chart Property Explorer.
• Expressions in the Expression Builder now support a new operator, "in", that can be used to test a field for any of a set of values. This replaces a sequence of conditions. For example, this:

field in {'a', 'b', 'c'}

is the same as this:

field == 'a' || field == 'b' || field == 'c'

See the Expression Builder documentation for more details.

Defects

Approximately 13 existing defects have been fixed. In particular, with the introduction of the Silverlight-based Analyst AE Server client, the capabilities of a user of the server on now closer to a user of the full client software.

Platform Notes

ADVIZOR Analyst Requirements

Operating System

• Microsoft Windows XP SP1

• Microsoft Windows Vista 32 or 64

• Microsoft Windows 7 32 or 64

• Microsoft Windows Server 2003 SP1 or Windows Server 2008. (See Installation Instructions below for a note on Windows Server 2008 considrations.)

Other Software

• Features interfacing to Microsoft Office applications require Office 2000 or later. Output to formats specific to Microsoft Office 2007 is not currently supported, however.

• Access to Microsoft Excel spreadsheets or Access databases is currently only possible from 32 bit version of ADVIZOR Analyst. On 64 bit operating system, you must still install the 32 bit version.

Hardware

• Any current, business-focused PC or laptop.

  • We do NOT recommend computers with low-end, entry level processors.

• 2 GB of RAM or greater (See Note below). 4GB and a 64 bit operating system are required required for larger volumes of data, above 2 million rows.

• Graphics display processor with at least 512MB of video RAM

  • Either shared or dedicated video RAM is acceptable

  • Always use the most recently available drivers for the graphics display processor (contact the vendor to obtain them)

• Video display resolution of 1024 x 768 or greater

• Video display color depth of 16 million colors

• CD-ROM drive

• Mouse or compatible pointing device

NOTE: For a given dataset, performance of the ADVIZOR Analyst software is dependent on:

• Amount of RAM

• CPU

  • Processor speed

  • Processor architecture/technology

    • Amount of cache

    • Number of cores

in that order. Multiple cores are currently only used by ADVIZOR Server.

When deciding on a computer to use or buy, opt first for as much RAM as possible within economic constraints; however, once the amount of RAM has been decided, opt for the fastest and most powerful CPU that satisfies economic constraints.

The amount of RAM required is highly dependent on your application data. The minimum amount of RAM is determined primarily by:

• The amount and type of data being loaded into memory

  • The number of rows

  • The number of fields

  • The type of data in each field

    i. Alphanumeric (string) ii. Numeric or Date

• Your particular ADVIZOR Analyst application design

As a rough estimate of the amount of RAM required for your data, find the file size of each data file you intend to load when the data is in the form of a text file and sum the file sizes. Additional RAM will be required for your intended ADVIZOR Analyst application; however, in most cases the RAM required for data will be the most significant contributor. Beyond these general guidelines and within economic constraints, more RAM and faster processors will almost always maximize your ADVIZOR Analyst application's performance. Consider provisioning any PC or laptop with future expansion in mind.

ADVIZOR Server

Client Web Browser

• Windows: Internet Explorer 7 or 8, Firefox 3, Safari, Google Chrome.

• Mac OS/X: Firefox 3, Safari.

Server Operating Systems

• Windows Server 2003 - 64 bit only

• Microsoft Server 2008

Use of the 64 bit versions of server operating systems is required.

Other

• IIS 5.0, or newer, installed and running prior to installation of the Microsoft .NET Framework

Hardware

• Any current, server class computer, with multiple processor cores.

• At least 8GB of RAM is recommended.

  • Each distinct project accessed by users requires its own memory space

    • RAM should be increased as the number of distinct projects accessed grows

  • Multiple users accessing the same project do so with minimal additional RAM overhead

• No graphics display processor is required

• Segmenting projects to additional servers must be considered as the user and project load grows.

We recommend that the ADVIZOR Server software run on its own server hardware.

Beyond these general guidelines and within economic constraints, more memory and more and faster processors will almost always maximize your ADVIZOR Server's performance. Consider provisioning any server hardware with future expansion in mind.

Installation Instructions

1. Prior to installing ADVIZOR Analyst/X, remove prior versions of ADVIZOR Analyst using Add/Remove Programs.

2. Insert the CDROM into your CD drive. Double click on Setup.exe in the root directory on the CD.

3. If you are instructed to remove a prior version of an ADVIZOR Analyst Edition product, proceed as directed, or use the operating system's "Add/Remove Software" facility.

4. If you are using the adv2advm tool, it requires these additional steps:

    cd/d c:\Program Files\ADVIZOR Solutions\Analyst
    for %i in (Vz*.dll) do @regsvr32 /s %i

5. On Windows Server 2008, security warnings are issued by the Operating System when the machine is in the default configuration because of Internet Explorer Enhanced Security Configuration. These occur because a component version of the web browser is used by ADVISOR Analyst. These warnings may be eliminated by disabling Internet Explorer Enhanced Security Configuration. See http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd883248(WS.10).aspx for more details. There is no security issue from the use of this web browser component because it never accesses any Internet web sites.
6. To have a custom web site icon displayed with ADVIZOR Server pages, copy the file "favicon.ico" from the ADVIZOR Server directory ("c:/Program Files/ADVIZOR Solutions/ADVIZOR Solutions/ADVIZOR Server AE/" by default) to the IIS root directory ("c:/INetpub/wwwroot" by default).

Databases Supported

• Microsoft Excel. Microsoft Excel files can only be read with the 32 bit version of ADVIZOR: see note below.

• Microsoft Access. Microsoft Access files can only be read with the 32 bit version of ADVIZOR: set note below.

• SalesForce.com

• MS SQL Server (version 7.0 or later)

• Oracle (version 9i or later)

• ODBC interfaces to databases:

  • NOTE: ODBC DSN configurations must be defined as "System DSNs" through Windows prior to trying to use them in ADVIZOR.

  • Microsoft ODBC for Oracle - MSORCL32.DLL

  • SQL Server - SQLSRV32.DLL

  • Pervasive drivers

    • Pervasive ODBC Client Interface - W3ODBCCI.DLL

    • Pervasive ODBC Engine Interface - W3ODBCEI.DLL

  • MySQL driver

    • MySQL ODBC 3.51 Driver - MYODBC3.DLL (MyODBC-3.51.11-2-win.msi - when used with MySQL version mysql-essential-4.1.13-win32.msi)

Note: For Microsoft Access, Microsoft Excel and text files, you MUST use the non-ODBC options in the Data Wizard.

Known Problems and Hints

• All projects created with a version of ADVIZOR Analyst before R5.6 must be re-published to ADVIZOR Server using ADVIZOR Analyst R5.6 or later. Projects that are input to adv2advm must be republished also.

• See the special Install Instructions above if you are using adv2advm.

• Microsoft Office data formats (Excel, Access) can only be read with the 32 bit version of ADVIZOR. You must install the 32 bit version of ADVIZOR Analyst even on a 64 bit version of Windows to access these data formats. These formats cannot be read directly by ADVIZOR Server, since it is only available in a 64 bit version. Use adv2advm to create a project for use on ADVIZOR Server if these formats are needed.

Technical Support

When submitting a problem to Technical Support, email is the preferred mechanism ([e-mail]). In the email, please provide as many of the following as possible:

• Your name & contact information including phone number

• The name of the product you are using and its version number

• Your license key used to install the product

• A detailed explanation of what you were doing that led up to the problem.

• Screen shot(s) and/or exact text of any error information

• Errors are logged to a file at:

C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\ADVIZOR Solutions<product name>\error.log

Or

C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Local Settings\Application Data\ADVIZOR Solutions\error.log on Windows XP

Replace <product name> with Analyst or AnalystX, etc. as applicable to your product.

• Machine's System Information file created from the "System Information" saved as type ".nfo"

• Operating system's Application event log in .evt format so that we get the detailed event descriptions

• If you're having a database access problem, submit all relevant DB information, including DB vendor, DB version, whether the DB is local or remote, whether or not you are able to access the DB using vendor or third party supplied query tools, etc

• If you encounter an error/exception and are offered the opportunity to forward diagnostic information, please do so. However, note that you can help reduce the time to resolution by also including details of the actions that led to the event. Our ability to rapidly understand the problem is significantly increased when we know all the details.

If you cannot find answers to your questions using the online help "Table of Contents", "Index" or "Find" tabs, or in this release notes file, have your application license number handy and contact us:

Call the ADVIZOR Solutions, Inc Technical Support line during business hours (8:00 AM - 4:30 PM Central time, Monday - Friday) at +1.630.971.5250