Last Tuesday, Oracle released new patches for Essbase and friends (EAS, APS, and Essbase Studio). The Patch Set Update brings the new version to 11.1.2.3.505. Here are the relevant patch numbers for your reference:
| Product: | Patch Number: |
| EAS Server | 19613844 |
| EAS Console MSI | 19613853 |
| APS | 19509172 |
| Essbase Studio Server | 19509186 |
| Essbase Studio Console MSI | 19509181 |
| Essbase Server | 19906085 |
| Essbase Runtime Client | 19906081 |
| Essbase Client | 19906103 |
| Essbase Client MSI | 19906079 |
I think that it’s great that we now have Oracle Essbase, APS, EAS, and Studio all on the same patch versions again. The readme files actually state, “Oracle recommends using the same version of all Essbase portfolio products (Essbase, Essbase Administration Services, Hyperion Provider Services, and Essbase Studio) and components (server, client, runtime client, API, and JAPI).” Given that, if you want one of these patches, you should install them all.
The majority of the content in these patches are various bug fixes that are covered in the readmes for each patch. The Essbase server patch appears to focus on performance optimization and stabilization; however, there a couple of noteworthy items in that readme.
There was a new calculator command added with Essbase 11.1.2.3.500 that was not documented. It is SET CALCDIAGNOSTICS. This command enables diagnostic logging for CALCPARALLEL and FIXPARALLEL commands. This logging is not on by default, since there is some performance overhead. This feature is designed to help in tuning parallel operations, then it should be turned off.
Here are the example from the Essbase 11.1.2.3.505 readme:
Examples
The following example enables diagnostic logging for all parallel calculations in the calculation script.
SET CALCDIAGNOSTICS { LOGSIZE 4; };
FIXPARALLEL (2, @IDESCENDANT(“US_Market”))
AGG (“Product”);
ENDFIXPARALLEL
The following example enables diagnostic logging for a specific FIXPARALLEL block.
FIXPARALLEL (2, @IDESCENDANT(“US_Market”))
SET CALCDIAGNOSTICS { LOGSIZE 4; };
AGG (“Product”);
ENDFIXPARALLEL
Sample Diagnostic Log Output for FIXPARALLEL
The following sample output pertains to FIXPARALLEL parallel calculation.
OK/INFO – 1012899 – Statistics for [Calc1.csc], FIXPARALLEL of index [1] at line [14]: Number of FIXPARALLEL Threads = [2], Total Tasks = [261], Min/Max/Avg Thread’s Time = [103.453]/[103.519]/[103.486] secs.
OK/INFO – 1012899 – For [4] Longest tasks, next rows display : Time(secs), Thread_id, (Task_index/Task_count), Task_id, Member-combinations.
OK/INFO – 1012899 – 15.131, 1, (30/132), 53, [ID_051341].
OK/INFO – 1012899 – 10.759, 2, (124/129), 211, [ID_050092].
OK/INFO – 1012899 – 9.690, 1, (42/132), 125, [ID_052230].
OK/INFO – 1012899 – 7.192, 1, (38/132), 105, [ID_052073].
OK/INFO – 1012899 – Summary for thread[1]: Total Time = [103.519] secs, Total Tasks = [132].
OK/INFO – 1012899 – Longest tasks executing on thread[1] : Time(secs), Thread_id, (Task_index/Task_count), Task_id.
OK/INFO – 1012899 – 15.131, 1, (30/132), 53.
OK/INFO – 1012899 – 7.192, 1, (38/132), 105.
OK/INFO – 1012899 – 9.690, 1, (42/132), 125.
OK/INFO – 1012899 – Summary for thread[2]: Total Time = [103.453] secs, Total Tasks = [129].
OK/INFO – 1012899 – Longest tasks executing on thread[2] : Time(secs), Thread_id, (Task_index/Task_count), Task_id.
OK/INFO – 1012899 – 10.759, 2, (124/129), 211.
The diagnostic output is organized into 3 sections.
Under the known issues section, I did see this interesting tidbit:
To avoid abnormal application shutdowns,
o Do not use the DELAYEDRECOVERY configuration setting in essbase.cfg, and in particular, do not set it to FALSE
o Do not run the MaxL statement alter database recover freespace.
There are a few other documentation updates listed at the bottom of the Essbase readme, mostly clarifications on a few points from previous readmes.