As an administrator, you can broadcast reports and dashboards by e-mail. It enables business users to analyze report data without necessarily having to log on to the system and navigate to the report. This blog will help you to understand how to create a broadcast and some broadcast options.
Create a Broadcast
Let’s imagine a common scenario. You are a manager and you would like to receive weekly reports about your team Ticket numbers (i.e. number of closed tickets, number of tickets being processed). You know there is a report which shows this information and you would like to receive it via e-mail once a week.
To broadcast an analytical object, follow these steps:
1. Go to Business Analytics work center.
2. Go to Broadcasts work center view.
3. Click on New.
4. Select an Object Type (i.e. report or dashboard).
5. Create a Broadcast Name.
6. Select the object you want to broadcast (i.e. report or dashboard name).
*In this example, we are selecting a report which brings those information required. We used ‘All Tickets’ report to get those information on team tickets numbers. That way, the broadcast will deliver a report which shows all information about Tickets based on selections applied and it will give you an overview about that.
7. Create a subject and a message for the e-mail.
8. Add recipients e-mail addresses.
Image/data in this Blog Post is from SAP internal systems, sample data, or demo systems. Any resemblance to real data is purely coincidental.
9. Select a Format.
Options Available for Reports: CSV (*.csv), HTML, Microsoft Excel (*.xlsx), Spreadsheet (*.xml), Web Browser Link.
Options Available for Dashboards: HTML, Web Browser Link.
10. Select a Scheduling.
If you want to broadcast the report or dashboard sporadically, select No Schedule.
If you want to schedule the broadcast for the report or dashboard, select Periodically, and set how frequently the report is to be broadcast along with the start and end date for the schedule
11. Save it.
If you selected ‘No Schedule’, you can run it manually using ‘Start Now’ button.
If you selected ‘Periodically’, you will be able to see the broadcast schedule (i.e. Next Run) when checking it in the Broadcasts work center view.
Broadcast Options
User Specific Data
If you are broadcasting a report, after selecting some recipient which is a business user in the system, you will have an option named ‘User Specific’. This option enables you to decide if the recipients will receive data according to their authorizations (i.e. report language, access restrictions, date format). Please note that when the ‘User Specific’ checkbox is unselected, the data is broadcast using the authorizations of the user who creates the broadcast.
Broadcast Bursting
Bursting feature allows you to broadcast reports to multiple recipients by e-mail instead of selecting many recipients manually. This feature will allow you to send reports to e-mail recipients that are part of the report result. You can select a characteristic in which the e-mail addresses are maintained and the system can determine the recipients from this information.
Different than a normal broadcast, the entire data will not be sent to all recipients. The report will be filtered for each recipient based on their e-mail addresses, which is identified by the values of the attribute you select. In other words, the characteristic selected as ‘Attribute for E-mail’ will filter by each user’s e-mail and then send the result via broadcast. This ensures that every recipient only receives the data filtered for their e-mail address.
Please note you need to select a characteristic which shows valid e-mail addresses.
Tips/ Common Questions
When you schedule a broadcast, a background job picks up all broadcasts that are scheduled for a certain time. Therefore, it is always advised to divide the broadcasts into several batches and schedule them in a way that spreads the execution (i.e. scheduling broadcasts for different hours/days).
The user who created the broadcast must be active and unlocked. If the user is locked or inactive, the broadcast will not be sent.
Please ensure that the ‘Send all e-mails to business partners’ option is selected in the ‘E-mail and Fax Settings’ in the Business Configuration work center.
Please ensure user selected as a recipient is assigned to the report you’re broadcasting.
For further information and troubleshooting help on Broadcast, you can refer to these following documents:
3021208 – Users Receive Reports via Broadcast, but in Different Languages
2396255 – Broadcast Processing Did Not Finish After 60 Minutes
2053900 – How To Use the Broadcast Bursting Feature
2039107 – Broadcast Does Not Send Out Emails
2585650 – Broadcast E-mails are Not Received by the Recipients
2459656 – Broadcast Start Time in “Next Run” Wrong
2646474 – Broadcast Bursting not Working – Broadcast is not Sent
If you have any feedback or questions, please feel free to leave a comment. Alternatively, you can also check out the community and ask questions here.
Hope you enjoyed reading about this analytical feature available in SAP Cloud for Customer. I will keep coming back to provide you more details about Analytics in Cloud for Customer. Stay tuned.
