ibi WebFOCUS Reviews

I use it for supplying and developing business intelligence (BI) solutions, data management and reporting applications, and for the development of complete web-based applications. It's a versatile and very powerful toolset that covers a lot of ground. 

We focus on empowering businesses to unlock their data to support productivity, efficiency, managing risks, and informed decision-making. WebFOCUS is ideal for that. It provides a scalable data and analytics software platform.

We use it for all sorts of applications - data analysis, data capture, reporting applications. Most of our clients have intricate needs, and that's why they went with WebFOCUS. Simpler tools just wouldn't suffice.

WebFOCUS goes beyond just dashboards. It's also used for operational reporting, making it crucial for mission-critical systems. In fact, a core strength is that it's not "just" a BI tool; it can be used to build complete applications.

It is the best tool because of its all-in-one nature. Data integration, ETL, data migration, everything is handled within the same platform. Then, on the front end, it offers portals, reporting, distributed analysis, and more.

For customers who have data in the right structure and right format, the WebFOCUS Designer tool is very powerful. It allows them to create self-service reporting applications.

Documentation could definitely be improved.

I have been using software from ibi (Information Builders) since 1987. 

I would rate the stability at least a nine out of ten. 

I would rate the scalability a ten out of ten. It's highly scalable and can handle significant data volumes.

Our customers in southern Africa range from medium sized businesses to large enterprises.

WebFOCUS handles growing data volumes in terms of scalability. In this aspect, I would rate it a nine out of ten because it does ultimately depend on the scalability of the underlying data source.

We don't always reach the right person. Sometimes, we get junior-level reps who aren't as knowledgeable as we are. 

Additionally, when we log calls, they usually involve advanced requirements, and the resolution timeline isn't always fast enough.

Neutral

I would rate my experience with the initial setup an eight out of ten, with ten being easy. 

While the actual installation and configuration might take only a few hours, the real work lies in connecting to and understanding data sources, which can vary depending on complexity.

The majority of our clients opt for on-premises deployment.

I would rate the pricing a five out of ten, with ten being expensive. 

Overall, I would rate the solution a nine out of ten.

I work for an insurance company, and we are currently managing four major projects. These projects are distinct solutions designed to serve both internal and external purposes. Internally, they cater to our marketing department by helping them assess potential sales opportunities and evaluate ways to offer more cost-effective insurance options to customers. We also have projects focused on financial analysis, where we scrutinize the costs associated with incentives provided by insurance companies to doctors, healthcare providers, and facilities for encouraging individuals to undergo preventive health measures like blood tests and check-ups. The goal of these internal projects is to gain a better understanding of whether we should continue offering these incentives and, if so, how we can optimize them.

Our primary focus is on handling large amounts of summary data, and in that regard, WebFOCUS serves us well. Having used it extensively for many years, I've witnessed its evolution and what it can achieve.

It stands out for its ability to work across different platforms, support mainframe data, offer cloud integration, automate report scheduling, and provide a robust scripting language. It also excels in generating large, customizable PDF reports and offers versatile output format options. Its multiple report design methods make it a versatile choice for organizations with various reporting and analytics needs.

The challenge lies not in what the tool can do but in how you use it and understand the data. The key isn't just the capabilities of the tool but how well it's used, the understanding of the data, and the relevance of the analysis to the situation at hand.

I have been working with it for thirty five years.

In our experience, we have witnessed instances where we've had major applications serving banks, and federal agencies, and handling massive amounts of data seamlessly. We've successfully managed systems dealing with billions of transactions per second, and it demonstrated its ability to handle such large-scale operations effectively.

It provides standard support that is typically included with the license purchase. You can access the details of their service level agreement requirements by downloading their documentation. They also offer an option called "gold support," which is available for an extra cost, usually a percentage of your license fee. This premium support package provides more extensive assistance, including dedicated customer support. We currently use this service, as it offers a higher level of support.

Positive

The installation process typically involves setting up two key components: the reporting server, responsible for data access, and the client, which provides the front-end HTML and connectivity. Installing the reporting server takes around fifteen minutes, and the client installation consumes approximately twenty minutes. There are additional configurations that may be needed, depending on your specific requirements. These can include database connections, and setting up security through mechanisms like Active Directory, LDAP, SAML, or Ping Identity, among others.

These tools require users to seek out training on their own or rely on the training provided by the tool vendors. The availability of training materials and courses can vary, and it's essential for individuals to invest time and effort in mastering these tools. As for how WebFOCUS stands in this landscape, it's challenging to provide a precise rating, but I would say it's in the running alongside other popular BI tools. I would rate it around an eight out of ten, acknowledging that there's always room for improvement. 

At Blue Cross Blue Shield where I work, we have 54 different systems. They are divided into projects. We provide queries against either Db2 or Microsoft extracted data. You can write an SQL code against a COBOL file. You can type in there, you can read and write any type of data sets, big or little, and you can merge things.

We're supporting millions of cases. People can go to our website and find every one of their queries. Every doctor visit, what happened at the visit, and that type of stuff. We also provide information for providers. We've also created things for groups and companies that are nationwide and have their own plan, with their logo and reports, so their HR people can access the information. 

Previously, I set up a series of WebFOCUS HTML pages that would run a job and query when you clicked on them. I worked at a university, and we could get any historical data about how many people were in a major for the last 10 years by gender, race, sex, or whatever. We could generate close to 800 different reports just with one prompted page. 

The solution has what is called a mainframe product. It runs on any operating system: Windows, Linux, whatever. Their history goes back to the 60s. While they were on the mainframe they basically invented a core language, or their own scripting language. That language has been used since the 60s and is in all of their products, so if you get to a command line prompt, you can do pretty much anything. Tools like Tableau, Crystal, SAP, and BusinessObjects don't have this scripting language, so they expect you to do everything through SQL. A lot of the tools out there are GUI or ETL-based, but you can do all of that within this core language. 

The solution can read and write 500 different types of outputs. You can read and output an XML file. You can write output takes in Excel or CSV files and you can write out to databases. All of that is built in.

Another thing they do that's a little bit unique is that you can read a file and then put out a hold file, which is a temporary file in its own binary format. When you're doing very complex inner and outer joins on SQL, you don't know if the data is right or if your filtering is correct. In WebFOCUS, you can go off to table A, do something, put it out to a temporary or permanent file, then go to table B, do a bunch of stuff, put out a file, and then join the two hold files. You can join up to 32 different files simultaneously in one run, which is a unique feature that I haven't seen in any other tool.

They have a scheduling product called ReportCaster that is rock solid. It works, and it can do load balancing, so if you have tons of schedules on the first week of the month, it can kick off multiple clients to run simultaneously and off they go.  If you're into a mainframe product, they're unique. You may not think they can run TCP/IP on a mainframe, but they do.

It is a versatile tool. Now, since they got bought out by TIBCO, there's more of a push on the GUI front end and analytics. 

Their latest release is called 9.0, and they added some new functions. This solution used to get awards on the level of documentation before they were bought out by TIBCO. Lately, though, they're releasing the product with major changes that are not documented at all. We've caught them on that. We'll ask technical support, "Where is this?" They'll say, "Oh, it's in the manual." We say, "No, it's not. The manual's wrong." Then they say, "Well, here's a screen print showing...Yeah, that's wrong," so we say, "You no longer do that. That doesn't work this way. How do we do it?" Their answer is, "We'll get back to you." I've been fighting with the company support for the last eight weeks to document something that is not currently documented. I know how to make it work, but no one else does because they haven't posted that. The product gets pushed out and the information is sent to documentation, and the documentation says, "Yeah, we'll get around to it when we get around to it." If there were to be any improvements right now, their documentation needs to get in sync with their product.

I have 30 years of experience with this product. 

Log4j was an issue that hit everybody last year, and we had the solution in place within an hour from the vendor. We suggested something that was an alternative solution and they said, "Yes." That resolved the issue for any external-facing site from WebFOCUS. There was a vendor-supplied solution, which they had certified and verified, within a week, but we were able to patch it until we got that solution. That wasn't the case for other software. Some of those people were like, "Well, you have to upgrade the whole thing."

The IBM product application server requires more work to keep up and running than the amount of people needed to run WebFOCUS. It's stable and once it's up and running, it keeps running. 

I worked for this company for a while, so I know that one of the accounts was a big bank that merged with another big bank that merged with another Wall Street big bank. They deal with billions of transactions in milliseconds. Another bank that I worked with in Toronto does all of the ATM transactions for the entire country. There are federal agencies, including military that used this product. NASA used it for a long time.

When TIBCO purchased them, the people changed, but the new tech support people are good. The license agreement for response time changed, so there are options. Blue Cross is part of the gold support, and we get good support. We can get an answer within an hour on any question.

I just did an entire install this morning. It took me about an hour, but that was only because I was writing some documentation. It is very straightforward. Their documentation generally works. The customization of things is very fluid. They allow a lot of customizations, but they're changing where some things are located now.

A team of four people maintain the solution, and we also work on three other solutions simultaneously.  

In the past, Information Builders has provided sort of like a quick start to get you up to speed. They help you install it and include training. Ask about that because there may be some mentoring available. They provide professional services for people who need to get up to speed fast and don't want to take six weeks of classes.

I would rate this solution as a ten out of ten.

The solution is used primarily for analytics.

A lot of our employees are familiar with the solution. It is like a legacy solution for us.

The most valuable feature is building ad hoc reports.

The solution can be improved by adding more automated options for reporting. I would like to see more user-friendly instructions for employees that only use the solution on a monthly basis.

I have been using the solution for a couple of months.

The solution is stable.

I rate the solution seven out of ten.

The Maryland State Department of Education will be using WebFOCUS to analyze financial data including State appropriation levels and financial performance in educational institutions throughout the State of Maryland. Later, WebFOCUS will be used to predict student actions and school performance among other reporting areas.

Information Builders allows decision makers to harness the power of data to make strategic decisions that will advance the goals and objectives of the organization. WebFOCUS offers the ability to obtain data in real-time and in a format that can be customized for the intended audience with tremendous ease.

The features that I have found the most helpful is the WebFOCUS portal and InfoAssist. The portal allows users to display information in multiple containers that when combined, paint the perfect picture of the organization. InfoAssist places reporting power in the hands of the power user.

The service levels are remarkable. The products are great as well. Information Builders should create a way to create predictive models without having to be a statistician.  

Because IBI continues to provide its customers with innovative solutions that are in demand, I believe the solution is very stable.

The scalability of WebFOCUS is perhaps the most impressive feature of the solution. WebFOCUS can be used for organizations, both large and small.

We have used Cognos which can be complicated for casual users.

The ROI that I have achieved was approximately $300k in the first year.

The cost is reasonable, the initial setup can be complicated, so FastTrack is suggested.

We've considered Cognos and Tableau.

Our hearing offices use WebFOCUS reports to manage SSA OHO daily workload. We also use it to do ad-hoc reports.

WebFOCUS helped SSA OHO manage our daily workload, get cases out quickly and help American people to get their disability claim processed on time.

We use WebFOCUS AppStudio and Report Caster. WebFOCUS is very flexible to use, and a quick learning tool for new developers. So it's easier to bring a developer on board.

If IBI can make each release of WebFOCUS consistent, we don't have to make changes for each release, it will be very helpful.

WebFOCUS is quite stable after you fully test your reports.

The scalability of WebFOCUS is very good, it can handle large amounts of data from different data sources in a manageable time manner.

IBI customer service/technical support team is very responsible, great experience.

Since I joined SSA, our group was using WebFOCUS, and no change since then.

We did it in-house.

No

It's a great reporting tool, keep up good work!

Developer for MI web solutions. Working on 7.7 now moving to 8.02 in a Windows environment. Working with disability MI and need to be able to respond quickly to Congress and field users.

Has made it easier to produce reports quickly along with dashboards and charts able to respond quickly to congressional inquiries.

Reporting canvas makes it easier to put reports together quickly. Meta data canvas allows us to create complex relationship once to be used often.

IIt would be nice to have it easier to embed native sql. Release process in our set up is not the safest since it requires changing paths.

Pretty stable.

Used for many large-scale applications.

Overall positive.

For MI, some users used EPM. I didn't use that personally, however. The last solution I used was Cobol. Outdated technology.

Another group had responsibility for most of the setup. My part was fairly straightforward.

Both vendor and in-house.

A separate committee explored other solutions like Tableau.

Overall it is a user-friendly and powerful solution.

Overtime; Transaction Times; Wait Times; State Stats Data Use AppStudio to create reports, deploy it to the portal.

The tool helps in planning and management, decision making and optimizing resources, analyzing data and coming up with an excellent report presentation.

All features are awesome and helpful in so many ways. Predictive analytics is a great tool. ReportCaster is cool too.

Making it more user-friendly and providing good documentation as user reference guide, online guides, etc.

The customer service and technical team are very knowledgeable and respond promptly to requests, email or phone calls. Always are very helpful and courteous.

No.

Technical support does all that. Very prompt responses to requests.

Exceptional level of expertise of vendor team.

It is very scalable and caters to business needs of any type.

No.

The product is very stable. Customer service is always available and is exceptional.

We provide disability data MI to our agency. Our environment setup with version 8 is under one server for all environments (DEV, VAL, Analysis & Production). We are currently converting our applications from 7.6.02 to 8.2

Our BI Tools group have determined that we will be using WebFOCUS for most of our MI. So, now we have uniformed most of the applications into WebFOCUS.

We like using Report Caster with our applications. We just started using Report Library, which will help the users look into one product.

We will be using the conversion process soon. I hope this will be an easy process converting from 7.6 to 8.02.

I have no issues.

The folks in my branch also use Focal Point and consistently look at the IBI site.

We are getting good support from my end of the picture.

We switched from EPM to WebFOCUS.

For WebFOCUS 8, it has been very trying to get used to new version.

We are using IBI. I was not part of the install team.

They did but I do not know the products.

Report developer, Correction and Rehabilitation, Business Analysis, monthly report, Average Daily Population of Offenders.

Report rewriting is easy, use like the format. Offenders court data is easy to write and analyze data.

Web App Studio, and write a report via SQL or using report writer. I can write SQL using developer and export the state to app studio.

The interface can be more user-friendly, learning the product via a classroom format. App studio needs to copy report without issue renaming.

Good.

Great.

Have not used them much, however my coworker has used them and had great results.

Crystal Reports, switch to make the report writing more easy for the user.

Complex, the DB configured the system.

Both vendor and in-house.

Yes, still learning.

Yes, upgrade Crystal Reports to 2016.

I like the product.