Troubleshooting Financial Reporting Studio Login Errors - Basic Requirements/Prerequisites

Troubleshooting Financial Reporting Studio Login Errors - Basic Requirements/Prerequisites [ID 1109585.1]
		Modified 22-AUG-2011     Type TROUBLESHOOTING     Status PUBLISHED

In this Document
  Purpose
  Last Review Date
  Instructions for the Reader
  Troubleshooting Details
     Overview of Hyperion Financial Reporting Studio Login Process:
     The following prerequisites must be met to successfully log into FR Studio:

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Applies to:

Hyperion BI+ - Version: 9.3.1.0.00 to 11.1.1.3.00 - Release: 9.3 to 11.1
Information in this document applies to any platform.

Purpose

This article is intended to assist Hyperion Support Analysts in troubleshooting Hyperion Financial Reporting Studio Login issues. 

Last Review Date

May 25, 2010

Instructions for the Reader

A Troubleshooting Guide is provided to assist in debugging a specific issue. When possible, diagnostic tools are included in the document to assist in troubleshooting.

Troubleshooting Details

Overview of Hyperion Financial Reporting Studio Login Process:

When a user logs in to Hyperion Financial Reporting (FR) Studio, it first makes an RMI connection to the FR RMI Registry (also called the Communication Server). The RMI registry returns connection information for FR Studio to use to communicate with the FR Server. FR Studio sends the authentication information to the FR Report Server using the port returned by the RMI service. The FR Report Service establishes a TRCP session with the core services and authenticates/authorizes the user using the credentials passed from FR Studio. After authenticating the user, the FR Report Service passes the TRCP session information back to FR Studio. FR Studio joins the existing session and communicates with the GSM/Core services to get additional information on repository content to display in Studio.  Click here to view a graphical description of this process.

The following prerequisites must be met to successfully log into FR Studio:

1.  Verify user is provisioned to use FR Studio - The minimum required role to connect is “Report Designer,” if the user is not provisioned with this role, the user will get an “Access Denied” error. Ensure the user is provisioned with the “Report Designer” role in Shared Services. To use Workspace or the Web Preview functionality in FR Studio, the user will also need the “Explorer” and “Viewer” roles. See the Shared Services Administration Guide for information on user provisioning. The Version 9.3.1.X guide can be accessed at:

http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E10530_01/doc/epm.931/hyp_security_guide.pdf

The version 11.1.1.X guide is available at:

http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E12825_01/epm.111/epm_security.pdf 

The  version 11.1.2.0 guide is available at:

http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E17236_01/epm.1112/epm_security.pdf

2.  Review the FR Studio User’s Guide for applicable firewall or NAT settings – The FR Studio User’s guide outlines server-side configuration settings needed to allow FR Studio to connect through a firewall or when the server is using Network Address Translation (NAT.) The Version 9.3.1.X FR Studio User’s Guide can be accessed at: 

http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E10530_01/doc/epm.931/fr_user.pdf

The version 11.1.1.X guide is available at:

http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E12825_01/epm.111/fr_user.pdf

The version 11.1.2.0 guide is available at:

http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/E17236_01/epm.1112/fr_user.pdf

Click here to view the applicable sections in the User Guide Table of Contents. 

3.  Verify that the required FR Services are running – FR Studio connects to the FR RMI Service, FR Reporting Server Service and BIPlus Core/Agent Services during the login process. Verify these services are up and listening. See KM Article 1109448.1 for instructions on verifying the status and listening ports of the Reporting and Analysis services on Windows and UNIX.

4.  Verify that the hostnames of the FR Services server and core/agent server are properly resolved on the FR Studio workstation – From a command prompt, run “ping hostname”. If the hostname is successfully resolved and the target host is reachable, ping returns:

If the hostname cannot be resolved at all, ping returns:

In this case, verify that the hostname you are using is correct. If the hostname is correct/valid, the name cannot be properly resolved on the FR Studio Workstation; contact the network administrator to correct the name resolution issue. 

If the network administrator is not available, the IP and hostname can be added to the “C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts” file on the FR Studio workstation. This should be considered a temporary measure since it could cause maintenance issues later on if the IP address for the host changes. Hosts file entries are entered in the format:

IPAddress hostname alias1 alias2 … aliasN 

• IPAddress is the IP Address of the host 
• hostname is the name primarily associated with the IP 
• alias1 alias2…aliasN are optional alias names that may also be used to access the host.

Click here to see a sample Windows hosts file.

If the hostname can be resolved, but the server is unreachable, ping returns:

Confirm that the IP address shown in the message matches the IP address of the target host. If not, the FR Studio workstation is resolving the host name to the wrong IP address. Contact the network administrator for assistance. If the Network Administrator is not available, the IP and host name can be added to the hosts file as described above. 

If the IP is correct and you have verified that the target host is running, there is most likely a network configuration issue (firewall, protocol blocking, port blocking, etc.) preventing ping from reaching the host. Contact the network administrator for assistance.

5.  Verify connectivity to the service ports from the FR Studio workstation – Run “telnet” from a command prompt to verify that the FR Studio workstation can successfully connect to the FR and core/agent services. The syntax of the telnet command is:

telnet HostName port

or 

telnet IPAddress port

o HostName/IPAddress is the hostname/IPAddress of the server where the service is running
o port is the port number on which the service is listening. 

To test the FR services from the FR Studio workstation, run the following commands:

Service	Command	Comments
FR RMI Service	telnet FRHost 8299	• FRHost = Host where FR Reporting Server service is running • 8299 = Default RMI port. See KM 1109448.1if the RMI service is using a non-default port.
FR Reporting Server Service	telnet FRHost frSvcPort	• FRHost = Host where FR Reporting Server service is running • See KM 1109448.1 to identify the frSvcPort.
GSM Service	telnet GSMHost 6800	• GSMHost = Host where core/agent service is running • 6800 = Default GSM port. See KM 1109448.1 if the GSM service is using a non-default port.
RM Service	telnet RMHost rmSvcPort	• RMHost = Host where Repository Manager service is running • See KM 1109448.1 to identify the rmSvcPort.

If the connection is successful, the command prompt will clear and display a flashing cursor in the upper left-hand corner of the window. To exit the telnet session: 

1. Hit the right bracket (“]”) key while holding down the Control key.
2. Enter “quit” at the “Microsoft Telnet> prompt and hit Enter. 

 If the telnet command is unable to connect to the specified host/port, the command prompt displays a message similar to: 

If you are unable to connect using telnet after verifying that the service is up/running on the specified host and listening on the specified port, there is most likely a network configuration issue (firewall, protocol blocking, port blocking, etc.) preventing telnet from reaching the host/port from the FR Studio workstation. Contact the network administrator for assistance in resolving the issue