Setting Up Excel Logging to Pulse with Extend

The following article describes the steps to set up Excel logging to Pulse with Extend. If you are trying to set up Excel logging to Pulse with the new Excel Add-ins Excel Logger, you need to go to this article:

• Setting up Excel logging to Pulse with Excel Logger

Pulse uses the Extend toolbar to monitor how Excel is used by TM1 users. The Extend toolbar communicates back to the Pulse server each time a user creates, saves, opens or closes a TM1 enabled Excel workbook. A TM1 enabled workbook is one that contains at least one of the following formulas: TM1RPTVIEW, VIEW, DBRW, DBR or DBS.

NOTE: For Extend to determine a workbook has TM1 formulas it must have access to the cells, therefore workbooks that are locked via with passwords will not be logged.

Extend needs be installed on each users PC or in the Citrix environment so that it is open while users are using TM1. Follow the steps below to setup up Extend.

Configure Extend on Your PC First

Before you can roll out Pulse to all of your users you should make sure everything is working on your PC. You can also use the configuration as the basis for the roll out to other users.

1. Download the latest version of Extend: Extend Downloads
2. Unzip the contents of this Extend release and save to your PC, i.e. C:CWExtend
3. Select the correct version of Extend, most users will be using the 32 bit version.
4. Copy the Extend license file (cwxtndlic.ini) to the same directory as the CWExtendXL.xla (i.e. x86 directory). 
   NOTE: If you don’t have a license file you should open the CWExtendXL.xla add-in and send an email with a screenshot of the domain to your local Cubewise office.
5. Open the Toolbar by double-clicking on CWExtendXL.xla.
6. Click on the Options button on the far right of the CW Extend ribbon.
7. Enter into the Pulse server address providing the full URL, i.e. http://TM1SERVERNAME:8099
8. Click OK to save the settings.
9. Close Excel and then reopen.
10. Open both the TM1 (tm1p.xla) and CW Extend (CWExtendXL.xla) add-ins.
11. Open up TM1 Server Explorer.
12. Login.
13. Open a cube/view and slice the contents to Excel.
14. Check in Pulse to see if the information has logged to the Pulse server: 
    Reports -> User Analytics -> Excel Workbooks Open (you must be logged in).

If you can see a record as above the logging from Extend to Pulse has been configured correctly.

Bundling Extend for Deployment

Now that you know that Extend can successfully log back to the Pulse server you need create a package that can be deployed to all of your users.

1. Open up Windows Explorer and type into the address bar: %AppData%CWExtend
2. Press {Enter} to open that directory
3. Inside the directory you will find a number of files, copy the cwxtndxl.ini file and paste into the directory containing CWExtendXL.xla.
4. Using your favourite text file editor open cwxtndxl.ini
5. Find the setting UPDATE_STAMP and set its value to todays date in reverse order, i.e. 20150625. Adding this setting will ensure that any current Extend settings will be overwritten with the these ones.
   UPDATE_STAMP=20150626
6. Save the file and close.
7. The directory now contains all of the files you need to deploy.
8. You can remove the convey.exe (as above) from the directory as it is not required.

Deploying Your Extend Package to PCs

If TM1 is installed on individual PCs you will also need to install Extend on each computer to take advantage of the Excel logging features in Pulse. How you do this will depend on the package deployment tools used in the organisation. An overview of the steps in below:

1. Copy the content of directory created above to the users PC, this can be any directory, such as C:Program FilesCWExtend
2. Create a short-cut to the CWExtendXL.xla file in one of the following locations to start Extend automatically when a user open Excel (do not put the actual files in this location):
   • The users roaming profile: %AppData%MicrosoftExcelXLSTART
   • Excel shared XLSTART directory:
     • 32bit Windows:
       • Excel 2003: C:Program FilesMicrosoft OfficeOffice11Xlstart
       • Excel 2007: C:Program FilesMicrosoft OfficeOffice12Xlstart
       • Excel 2010: C:Program FilesMicrosoft OfficeOffice14Xlstart
       • Excel 2013 (Office 365): C:Program FilesMicrosoft Office 15RootOffice15XLSTART
     • 64bit Windows:
       • Excel 2003: C:Program Files (x86)Microsoft OfficeOffice11Xlstart
       • Excel 2007: C:Program Files (x86)Microsoft OfficeOffice12Xlstart
       • Excel 2010: C:Program Files (x86)Microsoft OfficeOffice14Xlstart
       • Excel 2013 (Office 365): C:Program FilesMicrosoft Office 15RootOffice15XLSTART 
3. Extend will now open automatically each time a user open Excel.

Deploying Your Extend Package to Citrix

Deploying Extend to Citrix is much easier given you only have to deploy it once per server. 

1. Copy the content of directory created above to the users PC, this can be any directory, such as C:Program FilesCWExtend
2. Create an Citrix Application opening Excel, TM1 and Extend via their paths, this will depend on the version of Excel and TM1. An example for Office 2010 is below:

   “C:Program FilesMicrosoft OfficeOffice14Excel.exe” “C:Program Filesibmcognostm1_64bintm1p.xla” “C:Program FilesCWExtendCWExtendXL.xla”