GeeKs Blogging @ dotCOM » Admin

Siebel – Admin Mode Flag

Madhvi Arora — Sun, 02 May 2010 07:51:19 +0000

In my last project,we had a requirement of Admin Views, so the admin users if required can change the data from frontend and not going to backend and running update queries.

Admin Views are those views in which all the records are visible to the person who has access to this view irrespective of the position of the person.

Admin views can be created by setting “Admin Mode flag” on the view to “Y”.

Following affects take palce on setting the Admin Mode Flag:
1.Visibility rules are disabled.
2.The user properties in the BC are ignored.
This means that the user properties such as “Field Read Only Field”, “BC Read Only field” get disable for the view on which this flag is set to true.
3.If the view is in Admin mode, then the following restrictions for the business components used by the applets of the view are ignored: no insert, no merge, and no update. However, if these restrictions are set at the applet level rather than the business component level, or if a field has a Read Only value of TRUE, the Admin mode does not affect them.

Vanilla examles of Admin View are: Account Administration View and the Opportunity Administration view.

But due to disabling of these user properties, we faced some practical problems. I will discuss these in my next post. Stay tuned !

Siebel – Unable to login to mobile client

Madhvi Arora — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 20:08:58 +0000

After long time I am writing a blog…

This time related to Siebel Admin
Earlier I used to work with Siebel 7.8 and now 8.1..
So quite a different experience..

In Siebel 8.1, I had successfully initilized my dbf from tool and was able to login into Siebel Tools.
But suprisingly, using same dbf I was not able to login to my mobile client and it was throwing the error,
“user id /password not correct..”

I tried everything..from reinializing my dbf to changing parameters in my client cfg…
But all atempts were in vain..
Finally I looked in to Siebel logs and found the error as “Error connecting to datasource SSD Local Db default instance”

I tool the help from one of my seniors and he recommended the following way out.. I tried, and it worked..

Just followed below mentioned steps and problem got resolved and I was able to successfully login into local client…
1. Open the ODBC Administrator.
2. Select the System DSN tab.
3. Select the local Tools datasource (by default, “SSD Local Db default instance”).
4. Click the Configure button.
5. In the configuration window, select the Database tab.
6. Clear the field labelled “Server name”.
7. Close the configuration window and exit the ODBC Administrator.

I am really happy that the issue finally got resolved, and I would like to thank my mentor for helping me. Please add a comment if this helps you sometime.. I’ll be glad to know..

Siebel – Installer hangs midway

Nitin Jain — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 02:47:21 +0000

In my website statistics, I see somebody trying to find a solution to the above problem. The Siebel Installer starts, when you start an installation. However, it doesn’t complete and it hangs somewhere in the midway. I write this just when I was having the exact same problem today (I hope that explains the smiley which opens this post!).

I am detailing below the solution I used. Hope it helps someday!

I came across this during making some specific installations on Siebel v8.1.1. I noticed that the installer ran upto 92% installed status, and then all of a sudden, just hung.

The good thing with most of these installers is that they generally indicate what stage they are on currently, and as to what exactly they are trying to do. In my case, it indicated that it was trying to register the DLL “ssceolpr.dll”, which seemed to be taking exceptionally long.

Here’s what I did:
I navigated to my Command Line. To do this, I pressed Start -> Run and typed “cmd” (hey, this is turning into “Siebel for Dummies” kind of thing!!)

type in the following on the Command Line:
regsvr32 /s d:\SiebClient\bin\ssceolpr.dll

The above command forcibly registers this DLL with the MS Windows OS

That’s it!
By doing this, I forcibly registered the DLL which was hanging when launching it over and over again. Please note that all this while the installer was still open, in the hung state. I did not kill it, or abort the installation on anything like that.

The installation just proceeded from there, and proceeded onto complete 100%.

The normal debugging in such a situation would probably be to check out the log files that are being created, scroll to the end of the Log file and verify that this is the exact step which is failing and take appropriate corrective action. Log files are the best things that us, the software developers, have done to software!

You could probably see something like, “spawning d:\SiebClient\bin\ssceolpr.dll..” or something similar in the log files if you get stuck at exactly the same place as I did.

That’s all for this post, folks!

Siebel – Case Insensitivity (CIAI) Wizard

Nitin Jain — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 02:54:52 +0000

CIAI stands for Case Insensitive and Accent Insensitive in Siebel. This can be called the first post on GeeksBlogging@dotCOM on Siebel 8 New Features.

I had discussed about some traditional methods of controlling Case Sensitivity in Siebel queries. However, in version 8.0, Siebel has introduced a new feature of the CIAI Wizard which goes a step further in controlling this functionality. This has been carried forward in Siebel 8.1 albeit with some minor modifications.

This is about making searches on individual columns in a Siebel Database Case Independent. Following are the simple steps to configure it for a Siebel Technical Developer:
1) Navigate to Siebel Tools and select the correct Siebel Repository. This could be important in case you have multiple active Siebel Repositories in the System.
2) In Siebel Tools, Navigate to ‘Table’ and then ‘Column’ Object Type after expanding Table in the Object Explorer.
3) Select and highlight the columns on which you wish to run the CIAI Wizard (the ones you wish to make Case Insensitive).
4) Right-click and select ‘Case Insensitivity’ from the Pop Up menu. The CIAI Wizard starts at this time.
5) Review the Configuration Settings and the Export Listing Export Directory. Take this step seriously. It could be handy in Debug operations.
6) Complete the wizard using the ‘Next’ and ‘Finish’ buttons. The Wizard will configure the columns in the Siebel Repository to support CIAI Queries.

Siebel now reroutes the queries on the selected columns to the new columns created in Step (2) above.

Important: After this process is complete, you need to apply and activate the tables, and compile into the Siebel SRF for the changes to take effect.

Upgrade: It is important for the upgrade process to complete, in case you are upgrading to Siebel 8.x from previous versions, before running the CIAI Wizard.

Good News: It is possible to revert the changes done by the CIAI Wizard in case you feel you have messed up something.

In principle, the CIAI Wizard does the following changes in the Database:
1) Set the Default Sensitivity Property for the particular columns to “DB Case & Accent” in the Siebel Database.
2) For each eligible Base column, creates a new CIAI Column with the Base column value converted to UPPERCASE.
3) Deletes old indexes, and recreates them with the Case Insensitivity as defined, referring to the new CIAI columns defined in Step (2).
4) Sets flags and performs other configuration operations in the repository to support CIAI queries

Warning:
The changes once made by using the CIAI Wizard may be undone. However, there is a flaw in the documentation. The columns that were created on the Base Table by the CIAI Wizard need to be manually Inactivated before trying to revert the CIAI Changes.

The documentation says that the CIAI Wizard inactivates the column automatically. However, in practice that is not the case! Do add in case you have had any weird experience using the CIAI.

Oracle VM Templates for Siebel CRM

Nitin Jain — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 03:05:22 +0000

In a normal case, to set up a Siebel CRM solution on a server, we would first need to separately set up the Server Operating System, Database Server and Siebel CRM. This could be quite a task and could take substantial time and resources. Why not follow the easy way out?

Oracle VM is Oracle’s Virtual Machine offering from Oracle. Virtual Machines in general allow us to set up a completely new Hardware like Software on top of our existing installations such that the new VM can be started or stopped right from within our existing Operating System without affecting any of our existing settings.

Siebel CRM is the leading CRM solution from Oracle. Oracle has recently announced new Oracle VM templates pre-installed with Siebel CRM. This means huge value addition to ISVs and clients alike where the users can just install the Oracle VM (with Siebel) on the existing architecture, and as Oracle claims, to be up and running in lesser than 3 hours!

Oracle VM templates for Siebel comprise completely of the Oracle stack. it contains:
1) Oracle Enterprise Linux – The famous connotation of Unbreakable Linux comes to my mind. Available as a Free Download from Oracle website.
2) Oracle VM – Available free of Cost.
3) Oracle Database Server
4) Oracle’s Siebel CRM

The complete set is downloaded in the form of two separate VM downloads:
1) Oracle Database VM
2) Oracle Siebel CRM VM

Highlights:
1) Full Oracle support – Since the entire stack has been provided by Oracle in this case, it could be a big pain reliever to many organizations.
2) Cost savings – These templates work on Oracle’s Enterprise Linux. The bundle is nicely priced to make a tempting offer.
3) Huge Energy and Space savings – This comes directly from it being a Virtual Machine based solution. Do we need say more?
4) Quick Start – Oracle VM solution will reduce the set up time for any Siebel Installation. We can almost bet that the time cannot be matched by the regular Siebel Installation.
5) I have always been a big fan of sourcing as many softwares from the same vendor, be it Oracle, or be it Microsoft, or SAP for that matter. Interoperability issues are largely avoided with this approach. I like that!
6) Can be integrated in an existing Siebel environment. New instances of Application Modules, Application Servers and Web Servers can be provisioned within minutes.
7) Go Green! Is that not the mantra nowadayz. Virtual machines are always a no-brainer in this regard.

One of the flaws that I noticed with the installations made available were that there was no support for 64-bit Enterprise Linux. Only 32-bit standard Linux was available in this case. I personally feel that should definitely be an option.

The real adoption and corresponding reviews, though, will take some time to come. Till then, let’s wait and watch to see how it shapes up!

Siebel – Run Case Insensitive queries

Nitin Jain — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 09:41:15 +0000

This is a nice tip I ran across. All the Siebel Developers use Siebel Tools and Siebel Web Client extensively. And, each one of us run over a hundred queries daily. However, when querying for some data, for eg. a Business Service Name in Tools, Siebel generally demands we enter the correct case. To streamline the process and improve productivity, I continuously keep making minor modifications in my environment settings.

Method 1:
Open your corresponding CFG file in Edit mode (for Tools or for the Client). Navigate to the corresponding section for the Datasource, Sample, Local, Server or some other custom section. Search for the following parameter and update the value from FALSE to TRUE.

CaseInsensitive = TRUE

This parameter is available in both the Siebel Tools and the Siebel Client CFGs, both on the Local and on the Server.

Method 2:
This method will work on the Server.

In the Siebel Web Client, login with Server Admin priviledges. Navigate to the following path:
Sitemap -> Administration – Server Configuration -> Profile Configuration (tab)

Query for the ‘Profile’ with the name, “Server Datasource”.
From the bottom-most applet, search for the parameter with Alias, “DSCaseInsensitiveFlg”. The parameter would have the ‘Name’, “Database Case Insensitive Flag”. Set the value to TRUE.

And you are ready to go.

Warning:
There is a field level setting that makes the query on that particular field Case Sensitive or Insensitive. It appears as a property with the name “Use Default Sensitivity” corresponding to every Business Component field.

Siebel Help says it would work with only the Id fields, and only those Id fields which are exposed corresponding to the Business Fields. We cannot set this for eg. for the field, ‘Id’, corresponding to ROW_ID in the Database Column. However, in practice, this property seems to work for all the Varchar type fields.

Ensure the flag in this field is ticked, such that this value is always, TRUE.

Be fast, be more productive, Outperform!!

Siebel – Automatic User Logout

Nitin Jain — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 02:59:19 +0000

Logging out a user automatically, when the user does not explicitly logoff.

This one came up as a request from NP on GeeksBlogging@dotCOM. I believe this would possibly be a very frequent issue and a common problem in almost all the Siebel Installations. The users generally come from a Sales background. They hardly care how they actually close the Siebel Application. In most cases, they just press the (X) button on top of the Browser window, rather than explicitly selecting File -> Logout.

In this case, though the Browser is closed, the session parameters in the server, and the Database Connection remains open. This is a major issue in many of Siebel Development Environments.

Here we explain how to get around it. I have been working on multiple solutions regarding this. But, following is the most elegant one I found. In Siebel Communications, if you look at the Server Architecture carefully, you would notice that there is a Business Service in Siebel Tools, “Communications Client” which does all the magic. You can add the following Server Script to the Service_PreInvokeMethod this Business Service.

I have tried adding some comments at appropriate places in the code. Let me know how it works.

function Service_PreInvokeMethod (MethodName, Inputs, Outputs)
{
/* “ShellUIExit” is the method that is called at the time of exit from the Siebel UI */
if (MethodName == “ShellUIExit”)
{
var bs_CommSvr = TheApplication().GetService(”Communications Client”);
var ps_inp = TheApplication().NewPropertySet();
var ps_out = TheApplication().NewPropertySet();
var m_pValue;
m_pValue = Inputs.GetProperty(”m_pMediaStatusMgr”);

if (m_pValue !=”")
{
/* A user could potentially have multiple sessions open from the same machine. This is an added check for security purposes. */
bs_CommSvr.InvokeMethod(”IsTheLastSession”, ps_inp, ps_out);
var Is_Last = ps_out.GetProperty(”LastSession”);
if (Is_Last == “1″)
bs_CommSvr.InvokeMethod(”LogOutCommandName”, ps_inp, ps_out);
}
}
return (ContinueOperation);
}

In case this is not working, I would like to know your views on the topic.
Further research underway, I will keep updating this post.

Siebel Server Verification – EVT Tool

Nitin Jain — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 02:37:32 +0000

Verifying the health of our Siebel Server Environment is the primary concern of any sane Project Manager to have spent such large sums of money in setting it up in the first place. We have already introduced a couple of very useful tools to analyse performance and other bottlenecks in the past. Here, I will try to cover one of the prominent tools used extensively in the process.

It is called the Siebel EVT Tool, or the Environment Verification Tool in Siebel. It helps Siebel Administrators verify the configuration, of Siebel Business Environment. Errors and Potential problems in a Siebel Implementation can readily be found out through this tool.

It can be used for verifying, Database Servers, Siebel Servers, Siebel Gateway Servers and/or Siebel Web Servers. It, at times, interacts directly with the Operating System, and it is run usually from the Command Line.

EVT Tool is driven by a vanilla “ent.ini” file (NEVER use this file directly). Multiple parameters can be specified against multiple checks, in this controlling evt.ini file.

We can possibly bifurcate and divide these checks on the basis of parameters like, the Operating System in use, or the Database in use.

Upon installation, the EVT Tool appears as an Executable, .EXE file under the Siebel Root Directory, and can be run directly from the Command Line. There are many Command Line options available, to suit the working of the tool as per our requirement.

The Outputs from the EVT Tool may be taken in any of the following formats:
Text
TextFile
HTML
HTMLFile

The Siebel EVT Tool is a very useful, versatile tool, that can be really handy at times. It can generally churn out extremely useful information which can go a long way in Server Performance Analysis.

Siebel Admin – Gateway Name Server – An overview

Nitin Jain — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 14:50:37 +0000

We discussed about the basic Siebel Server Architecture in our previous posts. I will try to elaborate on some of them as per my understanding one by one. I amm trying to detail out the Siebel Gateway Server today.

The first thing we need to understand is that Siebel Gateway Server is a LOGICAL Siebel server, and not a PHYSICAL Siebel server. Its primary purpose is to provide the services of a Name Server. It is for this reason that it is also referred to as a Siebel Gateway Name Server.

This server comes the highest in the hierarchy (there is actually no such thing, but good from understanding point of view), and can contain multiple Siebel Enterprise Servers within it.

A Siebel Gateway Server contains the following information within it:
Definitions & Information about the Siebel Server Component Groups and the Siebel Server Components
Connection Parameters & other connectivity information

It is the connectivity information it contains, which actually links Siebel Servers to the outside world, and allows us to access Siebel by just entering a URL. A Siebel Gateway Server interacts with the Web Server, which receives the actual HTTP requests.

There is an important file by the name of “siebns.dat” which houses all the information discussed above. The availability of various Siebel Components (both vanilla and custom) is saved here. The Server Components who need any resources from some other Server Components, then ask the Name Server for the Availability & Connectivity Information.

Setting up failover clusters is a common way of ensuring high availability Siebel Servers nowadays.

Siebel Server Architecture – an Introduction

Nitin Jain — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 03:05:40 +0000

You may call this an introductory tutorial. Siebel as we all know, is quite a complex maze of many different objects and components working together to provide a successful CRM implementation. This topic is very trivial. Yet, I have noticed many professionals with multi-year experience discussing basic Siebel Architecture questions with me.

I am trying to outline a general architecture in a simple environment. Some of the most common jargon that you would come across when thinking in this direction are:

Siebel File System:

This refers to the actual hard disk space that is configured at the time of setting up of Siebel Servers. Siebel writes a lot of files on its own, for eg. the Log Files. Siebel Servers will use Siebel File system to store data and the physical files used by Siebel Thin Clients and the Enterprise Servers.

Siebel Database Server:

All data at the end of the day, has to be stored in a Database. In case of Siebel, the backend database may be IBM DB2, Oracle DB, etc. This database may be set up on the same server box as the Siebel Server, however, it is strongly recommended to set it up separately on a separate machine in the Network.

We create a lot of records when working with any CRM system. These may be Account Data, Contacts data, List of Products, etc. All this data is saved in the Siebel Database. All Siebel tables, indexes, seed data, etc. are saved in this Database.

Siebel Application Server:

This is the actual Siebel Application Server which performs the tasks. A Siebel Server Installation is implied to mean a Siebel Application Server Installation.

Siebel Enterprise Server:

This is a logical grouping of the Siebel Application Servers discussed above. An Enterprise Server may have just one Siebel server, but, generally in Production environment, it contains, multiple Siebel Application Servers in the grouping. Lots of components, and their groups are defined at this level in the hierarchy, and control most of the Siebel Server environment.

Siebel Gateway Server:

It generally contains the Siebel Name Server, which is from amongst one of the most important components in Siebel System. This is a logical server which has the grouping of single/multiple Siebel Enterprise Servers. The Gateway Server provides a consistent backing of the Siebel Enterprise Server configuration data. It has the Siebel Connectivity information, and controls connectivity via the Siebel Connection Broker, also called SCBroker.

Siebel Web Server:

This is the Web Server which will receive all requests and forward it to the Siebel Servers, just like in a typical Web Access scenario. This could be IIS on Windows, or Apache, or anything similar.

Siebel Clients:

These are of many types, all with different characteristics – Sample, Dedicated, Thin, Mobile. These are the different clients which access the Siebel Application. I will not dwelve into the details of each one of them here.

The type of client most commontly used is the Siebel Thin Client. In this case, the user accessing the Siebel Application, need not install any component on his local machine. He can just type in the URL of the Siebel Application in his Web Browser, and Siebel Login page pops up. The user may login with his valid credentials, and continue with his processes within the Application.

Siebel does install a few add on components for the Web Browser on its own. However, if the user has Admin rights on the machine, most of this stuff will be automated. In case the user is not the Administrator of the machine, some of the components may not install properly, leading to a hampered navigation in the Application.

The above is a simple outline, which can vary greatly with each environment, its requirements and limitations. Especially, when it comes to clustered, failover, high availability systems, and all, things begin to get complicated.

I will try to cover each one of these in more detail in further posts.

netstat command

Nitin Jain — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 15:40:12 +0000

Hi all,

All of us have faced huge performance related issues. When it comes to Siebel, things can only be called murky! The OOB solution itself puts up a few questions. I say this as per my naive understanding and experience

Sorry for being away from this blog for so long. It’s just that almost all the writers on the panel have really been too occupied with their regular jobs.

Anyways, getting the Siebel server performance out of the way, the next thing that comes to anybody’s mind is to check the performance of the physical Server Box itself. I mean the Server Operating System and the processes that it is running. This is where we can make use of the netstat utility.

netstat, or the Network Statistics as we may call it, is a simple command line utility. When used with proper parameters on the command line, it can be used to monitor:
1) Incoming Network Connections
2) Outgoing Network Connections
3) Network Interface Statistics
4) Some Network Routing information that I could see.

It is available on most of the common Operating Systems like Windows, UNIX, etc.

It is generally used to find Network Problems, and more so to find the Network Usage by the number of open Network Connections, for Performance related measurements. A typical netstat output could look like:

Active Connections

Proto Local Address          Foreign Address        State
TCP    :1218      :8080 CLOSE_WAIT
TCP    :2841     :1400 ESTABLISHED
TCP    :4651      localhost:62514        ESTABLISHED
TCP    :5152      localhost:3863         CLOSE_WAIT
TCP    :62514     localhost:4651         ESTABLISHED

etc..

A simple dos help utility look up revealed the following options to this utility on my Win XP based machine:

Displays protocol statistics and current TCP/IP network connections.

NETSTAT [-a] [-b] [-e] [-n] [-o] [-p proto] [-r] [-s] [-v] [interval]

-a            Displays all connections and listening ports.
-b            Displays the executable involved in creating each connection or
                listening port. In some cases well-known executables host
                multiple independent components, and in these cases the
                sequence of components involved in creating the connection
                or listening port is displayed. In this case the executable
                name is in [] at the bottom, on top is the component it called,
                and so forth until TCP/IP was reached. Note that this option
                can be time-consuming and will fail unless you have sufficient
                permissions.
-e            Displays Ethernet statistics. This may be combined with the -s
                option.
-n            Displays addresses and port numbers in numerical form.
-o            Displays the owning process ID associated with each connection.
-p proto      Shows connections for the protocol specified by proto; proto
                may be any of: TCP, UDP, TCPv6, or UDPv6. If used with the -s
                option to display per-protocol statistics, proto may be any of:
                IP, IPv6, ICMP, ICMPv6, TCP, TCPv6, UDP, or UDPv6.
-r            Displays the routing table.
-s            Displays per-protocol statistics. By default, statistics are
                shown for IP, IPv6, ICMP, ICMPv6, TCP, TCPv6, UDP, and UDPv6;
                the -p option may be used to specify a subset of the default.
-v            When used in conjunction with -b, will display sequence of
                components involved in creating the connection or listening
                port for all executables.
interval      Redisplays selected statistics, pausing interval seconds
                between each display. Press CTRL+C to stop redisplaying
                statistics. If omitted, netstat will print the current
                configuration information once.

Usage Example:

netstat -aon

This utility can be of immense use on analysing server performances where we are quite sure that the server is running slower than nowmal. It could possibly be running some junk tasks from the now defunct softwares that we no longer need.
Try it, and tell me what you see on your PC!

Siebel – Forcing User Logoff

Nitin Jain — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 11:26:18 +0000

Hi all,

Somebody recently asked me if there is a way that we can force the user to Logoff from the current session, under some specific conditions. My simple research in Siebel Tools and around it brought up the following alternatives.

Vanilla Business Service Methods:
1) BS Name = LS Medical Product Issue Service
Method = Logoff

2) BS Name = Mktg Saw Service
Method = Logoff
Input = ServerId (This is the Analytics Web Server Id from which to Log off)

3) BS Name = FINS IBC Login Adapter
Method = Logout

I saw this as a very poweful Business Service with methods like, GetLoginId, GetLoginProperties, GetLoginState, GetNewMessageId, Login and of course, Logout. I could not find too much documentation around this BS in both the Bookshelf and Metalink. I will research more and try to post my findings here.

4) BS Name = Communications Client
Method = PreferenceLogout

With the numerous methods to this BS, it seems more related to the Call Center application and CTI.

5) BS Name = SAWSessionServiceSoap
Method = Logoff

All the BS and the methods above can be directly used in Workflows or scripts. One immediate utility that I can think of is to forcibly logoff user sessions whenever we notice a user trying to access data or views that he should not be allowed to access.

We noticed in our implementation that the Logout method sends the SWECmd = Logoff to the Siebel Web Engine. This seems to be the recommended solution by Oracle above all the others. We can easily call the following code in Browser Script, when trying to do this through scripting for our purposes:
top.location = “start.swe?SWECmd=Logoff”;

We also noticed the Command, “Logout” in the Tools Object Explorer which can terminate the user session.

Please add to this in case you feel it is inadequate, or missing some details. I will update this post with the findings as we progress around this.

Siebel – EnableServiceArgTracing – Logging Messages

Nitin Jain — Tue, 26 May 2009 06:51:54 +0000

Hi,

We have already discussed at quite a length the logging methods, the most prominent of these being the usage of vanilla Siebel EAI Queues. You can read about the entire series through the following links:
A meeting with Siebel EAI
Siebel – EAI Queue
Siebel – EAI Queue – Usage
Siebel – EAI Queue – a Critique’

I recently came across another vanilla method (EnableServiceArgTracing) to log the messages. Using this, the various Siebel logs can be created, and the Input and the Output messages to some of the Business Services can be written in XML format to a file. These XML files would appear as Siebel Dump files with a “.dmp” extension. These can be read off any standard text reading tool like Notepad, Editplus, Notepad++, etc. This process works with EAI Siebel Adapter and EAI Dispatcher business services.

Usage
Read about the detailed Local logging in Siebel here.
Set the Siebel SIEBEL_LOG_EVENTS environment variable value to:
3 – Input property set as Output in case of Error will be received
4 – Both Input and Output property set would be received

Be ready to receive huge Log files in your Siebel Log directory, and exceptionally slow Siebel performance after enabling this. Logs are now being created for every step, so this is all the more logical.

Set the Server parameter, “EnableServiceArgTracing” to “TRUE”.
In case of dedicated, local, or sample based testing, edit the following sections in the .cfg and set the following:

[EAISubsys]
EnableServiceArgTracing = TRUE

Restart Siebel and you are ready to go.

Now, whenever a process is run, it would create logs. Also, in the same directory you would see .dmp, or the Siebel Dump files being created. These are XML files which would have the Input and Output property sets contained. You can open and view these in any text editor.

The names of the files created are in the format:
_input_args_.dmp OR,
_output_args_.dmp

The main advantage of this method is that it does not require any changes, or switches in the main process to get the debugigng information. So, it is as clean as can be. Also, we can do this easily on any environment, TEST or any other.

The main disadvantage I see with this approach is that it logs Inputs and Outputs of only the EAI Siebel Adapter and the EAI Dispatcher Business Services. More usually, the integration is done using many other services, wherein a proper logging and error handling architecture becomes mandatory. So, I cannot do away with the other fancy stuff I generally incorporate into my architecture for that reason I guess!

I wish Siebel provided an easy way except studying Logs, to know which all Business Services or Workflows were invoked, and what all inputs and outputs were provided, whenever a complex process was invoked. It would make my life so much easier..

Siebel – Enable Detailed Logging – Local

Nitin Jain — Mon, 25 May 2009 12:30:36 +0000

Very often we come across scenarios wherein the process is not really clear through the interface exposed to us. We generally need to go into detailed logs at various levels to understand the internal process, and as to which all parameters are flowing at each step in the flow. The server level settings are different. I will cover here, as to how we can enable or disable detailed logging of Siebel processes in our Dedicated, Local or Sample environments. We can use it to understand complex Siebel processes in detail, for eg. eConfigurator and ePricer related flows.

This is something very trivial, and I guess most of you would already be implementing this in your personal set-ups. However, just for the purpose of making and retaining notes here, I will add this post.

We would be modifying some Operating System Environment variables here.
I have my desktop running on Windows XP. In this case, right click on the ‘My Computer’ icon, and select ‘Properties’.
Navigate to the Tab labelled ‘Advanced’.
Press the button ‘Environment Variables..’
In the section for ‘User Variables”, look for the variable named, “SIEBEL_LOG_DIR”. If not already present, create one. In my case, I gave it the value, “D:\\SiebelLogs”. All Siebel Logs will now be created in this custom directory rather than the vanilla Siebel directory under Siebel Install directory.
Similarly, create another User Variable with the name, “SIEBEL_LOG_EVENTS”. The value of this variable can vary between 0-5, with 0 indicating the lowest level of detail, and 5 indicating the maximum level of details. A log level of 5 creates extensive logs very large in size owing to the high level of details.
Save and close.

Now, every new session of Siebel Tools or Siebel Web Client will start creating logs in the directory pointed to by SIEBEL_LOG_DIR according to the Log level set in SIEBEL_LOG_EVENTS. This can help in detailed understanding and debugging of most processes, before we execute them on the server.

Siebel- Close Browser window when logging off

Madhvi Arora — Fri, 22 May 2009 04:43:16 +0000

In case of standard interactivity applications like eSales , eService, when user logs off, he is directed to the page through which he logged in the application. But there is a requirement to close the IE when user logs off. Here we are doing this for eSales Application. This can be done in following manner:

• Create a new .swt file say “LogOffDestination “ which contains following HTML script:

•         Now place this .swt file in \WEBTEMPL\, \WEBTEMPL\ and \WEBTEMPL.
•         In Siebel tools, navigate to “Web Template” object in Object Explorer. Create a new web template say “LogOff Destination” and give this new “LogOffDestination.swt” in the “File Name” property of the “Web Template File” object.
•         Now Navigate to “Web Page” object in Object Explorer. Create a new Web Page say “Log Off Destination” and set “LogOff Destination” Web Template you just created in “Web Template” object.
•         Now navigate to “Application” object in Object Explorer. Query for “Siebel eSales”. Now change web page in “Logoff Acknowledgement Web Page” from the given value to “LogOff Destination”.
•         Now compile “Web Template”,”Web Page” and “Application” objects in the srf.
Now when you log out from the application, it will close the IE.

Siebel 7.x – Party Model Changes

brijesh — Wed, 20 May 2009 20:40:24 +0000

After introduction of party model, the table structure (as far as EIM is concerned) have changed tremendously. The largest data model change involves the Party model, which I think is basis of post siebel 7 releases. Accounts, Organizations, Internal Divisions, Contacts, Employees, Positions, and Households are all party entities and are the logical extension table of S_PARTY and they all have the corresponding entry in S_PARTY base table and the data is brought into the business components through an implicit join (PLEASE NOTE THEY ARE NOT EXPLICIT JOINS).

Some of the major data model changes are also related to this new model. Employees and Contacts have been combined into the same table (S_CONTACT) and similarly, internal and external Organizations have been combined into one table (S_ORG_EXT), in pre 7 releases of siebel employees and internal organizations are stored in S_EMPLOYEE and S_ORG_INT respectively means there tables have gotten obsolete.

The S_PARTY table is the primary table and is the single entity to store all party types – organization units (both external and internal), positions, access groups, user lists, households, contacts, and employees.

So in nutshell following are the new tables or we can say modified functionality tables in siebel:
• S_USER (For siebel Users)
• S_CONTACT (contacts, employees)
• S_ORG_EXT organizations (internal, external)
• S_POSTN (positions)
• S_ORG_GROUP (Households)
• S_PARTY_GROUP (Access Groups: To implement data security one of the major changes)
• S_USERLIST (user lists)
• S_BU (Internal Organizations)

Non-person party entities will have directly or indirectly ralation with employees and contacts.

Data Migration Changes:

All relation based tables have changed in post 7 releases the following tables have gotten obsolete:

Old Table (pre 7 release)	New Table (post 7 release)
S_ORG_REL	S_PARTY_REL (hold relationships between account and party entities)
S_CONTACT_REL	S_PARTY_REL (hold relationships between contact and party entities)
S_PER_ORG_UNIT	S_PARTY_PER (hold relationships between account and party contact etc. or more generic it stores the ralationship between party and person)
S_ORG_INT	S_ORG_EXT (For both internal and external organization.)
S_EMP_POSTN	S_PARTY_PER
S_EMPLOYEE	S_CONTACT
S_POSTN_RPT_REL	S_PARTY_PER

Siebel – Remove About SRF Window

Nitin Jain — Wed, 20 May 2009 05:35:49 +0000

In my previous post, I had discussed as to how we can control how we can control the data being displayed in the Siebel Client, About SRF window. You can read the article here.

One impromptu question came up from the audience, “What if I want to limit opening of the About SRF window itself in the first place?”. I said, “Nice question!”.

Try out the following steps to disable the About SRF window itself from Siebel Web Client.

Log into Siebel Tools.
Navigate to ‘Application’ in the Object Explorer. In may case, “Siebel Automotive”.
Notice that the Menu property corresponding to this Application reads, “Generic WEB”.
Navigate to ‘Menu’ in the Object Explorer in Siebel Tools.
In the ‘Menu Item’ below the ‘Menu’ in OE, search for the record name as “Help – About SRF”, or the Caption as “About SRF…”.
Set the corresponding property, ‘Inactive’ to TRUE.
Compile into Siebel SRF and Go!

You should no longer see the ‘About SRF’ option in the ‘Help’ menu.

Just as I said with my previous post on hiding data from the About SRF Applet, you can play around with similar other entities as well. Let me know if this helped you. Cheers!

Siebel – Unable to launch Local Client

Nitin Jain — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 07:09:20 +0000

Hi all,

I was making a fresh install of Siebel yesterday, when something very strange happened. I could not launch my Local Client. This was even more strange because:
1) I could successfully launch my Sample Client
2) I could successfully launch my Local Client when invoking it in Debug mode from within Siebel Tools!

I was installing an instance of Siebel 7.8.2 for the concerned. My operating system in use is Windows XP.

My Sample client was opening successfully. This meant my Internet Explorer settings are fine, and the executables to execute one after the other are installed fine.

I could launch my local client from within Tools using the same CFG file and the login parameters indicated that my configuration of the CFG file was fine, and I was using the correct login credentials. This also concluded that it was not an issue of license keys. I was left in the blue unable to think of as to what the possible reason could be.

I tried increasing the Logging level to maximum, trying to find out what is really hampering the launch of local client. I noticed that there were no errors being indicated in the log files being created. Just that the log files would be created successfully for some time, and then, the entire process would halt. The log files stopped being updated after a certain point, without indicating any error.

On comparing the log files of client launch in debug mode and without debug mode, the only difference was that the log file size in Debug mode was much larger, the log files were being updated properly right till the end and that the debug mode Local client was working fine.

Now, the million dollar question: then how was the problem resolved?

On top of the base install of 7.8.2, I installed the patch 7.8.2.8.
When I tried launching the Local client now, it worked beautifully without hanging.

I am still hunting for the possible difference that the patch installation made, which enabled the successful launch of my Local Client. Any pointers from anybody?

Siebel – Unable to check out objects

Prachi Sharma — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 15:34:29 +0000

I will discuss the following most prominent ways to enable or disable object level check-outs in Siebel here:
1) EnableObjectCOCI parameter
2) Allow Object Locking

I will explain these terms here.

Siebel brings about lot of new features in every new release. One of the very useful improvements in Siebel 7.8 was “object level check-out” in Siebel Tools. For those who started working directly on Siebel 7.8 and above, uptill Siebel 7.7.x, Siebel had the concept of Projects. A project in Siebel was a logical grouping of various objects – Workflows, Business Services, BCs, Applets, etc. We had custom projects for EAI, Configuration, Pricing, B2B, etc. And, we could only check out or check in projects! This was really time consuming.

I remember waiting for days in some cases, for someone to check in the project, because I wanted to work on some other object that she was not working on, but was in the same Siebel project. With object level locking, an individual can work on individual objects (an Applet, BC, or Business Service, etc.), and some other member can simulaneously check-out some other object whether or not in the same project. This greatly increases productivity, speed, and quality.

However, I had a lot of friends coming upto me, that even though they had Siebel 7.8 or above installed, at times their object level check-out was not enabled for some objects. Either it was not enabled at all, or for some particular objects.

There are two parameters in Siebel which control the Object level check out in Siebel

1) EnableObjectCOCI parameter
This parameter is present in the ‘[Siebel]‘ section (generally present on top) of the tools.cfg file. Your tools.cfg file would be located in the folder, “/Tools/BIN/ENU”.
This parameter must be set to TRUE to enable the object level check out.

1) Allow Object Locking
This is a new column in Siebel Tools against Projects in Siebel Tools. For most projects, this flag is ticked TRUE by default. But, I have noticed that for Upgrade related projects, it is set to FALSE. In case you created custom project in Siebel Tools, this flag must be set to TRUE.

Though this has helped increase speed, it has still not solved the problem. I still have to wait for long period sometimes for my friends to check-in the commonly used objects like ‘Quote Item’ BC and the like. I am wondering about one thing now. What is the real use of having projects now? If I can check out objects, why do we still have projects? I can’t think of any place where we cannot do with objects, and projects are still required. After all, projects are only a logical grouping of some objects. Right?

Though checking out objects is trivial at times, and taken for granted, I have also had a few of my friends discussing about checking out Workflows in Siebel. I have also heard people claim that is one thing still not possible without checking out the entire project. I will try to cover this problem in future posts.