How to install and configure Cognos

Step 1

Install Cognos components. This will take a lot and I recommend to restart the computer
between every three components or so, in order to clear the cache, or whatever it is that it
makes it run slower.

[edit]

Step 2

Download OracleXEUniv.exe from Oracle site and install it. Create a new user “cognos”
with any password (I chose "cognos" as well) and grant all privileges to it. (NOTE -
Character Set of the Database should be UNICODE)

[edit]

Step 3

Locate ojdbc14.jar in oraclexe\app\oracle\product\10.2.0\server\jdbc\lib and copy it to

cognos\c8\webapps\p2pd\WEB-INF\lib

If classes12.jar exists in this folder, delete it or rename it.

[edit]

Step 4

1. Download Apache 2.2 webserver free from Apache Webserver Project page and
install it.
2. Locate the file 'httpd.conf' in the <Apache webserver installation folder>\Conf
and add the following text at the bottom:

# cognos

Include conf/extra/cognos8.conf

Create the file conf/extras/cognos8.conf with the following contents:

# Cognos 8

#
ScriptAlias /cognos8/cgi-bin "C:/Program Files/Cognos/c8/cgi-bin"

<Directory "C:/Program Files/Cognos/c8/cgi-bin">

AllowOverride None

Options None

Order Allow,Deny

Allow from All

</Directory>

Alias /cognos8 "C:/Program Files/Cognos/c8/webcontent"

<Directory "C:/Program Files/Cognos/c8/webcontent">

Options None

AllowOverride None

Order Allow,Deny

Allow from All

</Directory>

<Directory "C:/Program Files/Cognos/c8/documentation">

Options None

AllowOverride None

Order Allow,Deny

Allow from All

</Directory>

Replace c: with d: or whatever drive letter you installed the Cognos software to.

Restart the Apache service.

[edit]

Step 5

1. Start Cognos Configuration.

2. Delete whatever it is under Content Manager and create a new item called
“Content Store”, of type Oracle.
 3. Edit the user and password by clicking the pen that appears when selecting the
field. User “cognos”, password “cognos”.
4. Service name is “XE”.
5. Right click on Content Store and Test.
6. If all’s right click the green play button to start the service.
7. You can close Cognos Configuration now, as the service will continue to run in
the background.

[edit]

Step 6

Test that Cognos Connection is working by calling the link http://127.0.0.1/cognos8 or

http://localhost/cognos8.

I strongly advise to right click on the Apache icon in the tray bar and select “Open
Services”. From this window, set all the Cognos, Oracle and Apache services to start
manually instead of automatically. Otherwise all these services will attempt to start
automatically on Windows startup and this takes a lot of time.

To start the services manually you have to (in this order):

1. Click “Start Database” from Oracle start menu

2. Start Cognos Configuration and click the play button
3. Start the Apache service from the tray icon

If you want to start the services manually rather than allowing then to start automatically
at system restart then create a Windows batch command file to start Cognos as follows:

start_cognos.bat
net start "Oracle"

net start "Cognos 8"

net start "Apache2"

If you don't want to keep all these services running when you have finished your work
then create a Windows batch command file to stop the services when you have finished:

stop_cognos.bat
net stop "Apach2"

net stop "Cognos 8"

net stop "Oracle"

You may want to clear up some of the Cognos server logs as part of your
startup/shutdown processing, just add the line to your startup or shutdown scripts.

erase /f /q "C:\Program Files\Cognos\c8\logs\*.*"

Don't forget that Apache also has its own log files that can grow quite large and you may
want to clear these out quite frequently.

NB - if you are using Cgonso 8.4 then you should change the name to "IBM Cognos 8"

[edit]

Step 7

1. You should now import the samples.

2. Create five users in OracleXE called gosales, gosalesdw, gosaleshr, gosalesmr
and gosalesrt. The password should be the same as the user id. Make sure to grant
them all the privileges.
3. Go to cognos\c8\webcontent\samples\datasources\oracle and extract the .gz files.
4. Under this folder run the following commands:

(Atcommand prompt not at sqlplus command window)

imp gosales/gosales@xe file = GOSALES.dmp full=y log=log.txt
imp gosaleshr/gosaleshr@xe file = GOSALESHR.dmp full=y log=log.txt
imp gosalesdw/gosalesdw@xe file = GOSALESDW.dmp full=y log=log.txt
imp gosalesmr/gosalesmr@xe file = GOSALESMR.dmp full=y log=log.txt
imp gosalesrt/gosalesrt@xe file = GOSALESRT.dmp full=y log=log.txt

[edit]

Step 8

1. In Cognos Connection select Cognos Administration and then Configuration.

2. Click the “New Data Source” button.
3. Type “gosales” for name and click Next.
4. Select “Oracle” for type and click Next.
5. Type “xe” for connection string (small caps needed). Select User ID and
Password checkboxes. Enter “gosales” for user ID and the same for password.
6. Test the connection. In case of failure restart the Oracle database.
7. If all goes well click Finish.
8. Repeat the steps for gosalesdw, and the rest.

[edit]

Step 9

1. Open Framework Manager.

 2. Open project C:\Program Files\cognos\c8\webcontent\samples\Models\
great_outdoors_sales\ great_outdoors_sales.cpf
3. If you get an error during opening try replacing localhost:80 with 127.0.0.1:80 in
Cognos Configuration gateway URI.
4. Expand Data Sources and for each data source check that the “Content Manager
Datasource” and “Schema” have the same value (gosales, gosalesdw,…).
5. Also modify the Interface (under Type) to “OR” instead of “OL”.
6. Test each Data Source. In case of failure restart the Oracle database. Save your
changes to the project file.
7. Expand Packages and publish each package (right click -> publish packages..).
8. Ignore the errors.
9. Save and exit.
10. Do the same for project C:\Program Files\cognos\c8\webcontent\samples\Models\
great_outdoors_warehouse\great_outdoors_warehouse.cpf

[edit]

Step 10

1. Copy Cognos_Samples.zip from c8\webcontent\samples\content to

c8\deployment.
2. Open Cognos Connection and select Cognos Administration -> Configuration ->
Content Administration.
3. Click New Import icon.
4. Cognos_Samples should appear in the list. Select Next, then Next again.
5. On the ‘Select the Public Folders Content’ page, select the checkbox to the left of
the Cognos_Samples package.
6. Select Next, Next again, then Import Now.

[edit]

Step 11

You should be able to see the sample database folders under local folders in Cognos
Connection.