You probably know how to start the BEx Query Designer, but having a short explanation of it and its layout, can help you better understand the BEx Query Designer’s functional areas and the other details that you need to know before working on the BEx Query Designer.
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How to start the BEx Query Designer?
To start the BEx Query Designer, click on the start menu button on your computer screen, click All Programs and go to Business Explorer menu and select Query Designer. A log in box appears for logging into your BW system; type your username and password then press the okay button to log in. That’s it! The BEx Query Designer opens up.
To get quick access to the BEx Query Designer you can add it as a shortcut on your desktop screen or task bar menu or pin it to start menu.
BEx Query Designer Screen Layout
When you log on to the BEx Query Designer, you are presented with an interface like this:
You can see there are seven sections in the screenshot above, which make up the components of the BEx Query Designer screen layout. These seven sections are as follows:
- InfoProvider Section
- Characteristic Restrictions (Filter Section)
- Default Values (Filter Section)
- Columns (Rows/Column Section)
- Rows (Rows/Column Section)
- Properties/Tasks Section
- Messages Section
Here is the brief overview of these sections:
InfoProvider Section
The InfoProvider area of the screen is the first section in the BEx Query Designer. It lists all the available fields that can be added to our query, such as characteristics, key figures, attributes and calculated figures and so on.
Filter Section
Characteristic Restrictions
The Characteristic Restrictions section is part of the filter section in the BEx Query Designer interface. It is used whenever you want to restrict your query to a certain number of records based on specific characteristic values. All you do is drag and drop your characteristics into this are and then add a filter.
Default Values
The Default Values section lists the characteristics and their associated default values that you can assign.
Rows/Columns Section
The Rows/Column section includes the following areas:
Free Characteristics
This area is a container in which you add fields ‘addition’ fields that a user can choose to add into their query at run-time.
Columns
This area contains fields selected from the InfoProvider section that you want to add to your query. Fields added here will display as Columns in your query output.
Rows
This area is similar to the Columns area in that you add fields selected from the InfoProvider section that you want to add to your query, but it differs in the way the data is presented when the query is executed. Fields added to this section will display as Columns in your query output.
Preview
This area just shows a representation how your query will look when it runs in the BEx Analyzer.
Properties Section
Properties
Every component that you add to your query, contains properties. In the properties section you can make specific changes such as descriptions, display settings, characteristic aggregation, show/hide result rows etc.
Tasks
Tasks is a tab in the properties section. This areas shows changes (depending on the query objects) that are highlighted in the Filter or the Rows/Columns section. It highlights the errors in your query and suggest different actions to fix those errors.
Messages Section
This final area of the screen is used to provide feedback to us while we are creating our queries. It checks our query on the fly and tells us if we have any errors in our queries as well as displaying warning messages. It can show messages about any error that your query contains.
There is also a ‘Where Used List‘ tab which is a very handy referencing tool. When you select an object in your query the Where Used List can show you where that object is being used or reference in you query.