Guidelines for Marketing Reports

Hello,

I'm using CS2007 to serve banners on a website. I'm looking for some guidelines to provide my client advertising statistics, mostly concerning Ad Requests.

I already setup a SQL Server 2005 Report Server, but i can't get any info on how to configure it to get the CS2007 banner information.

Any help will be greatly apreciated.

Thanks.

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Guidelines for Marketing Reports

Duncan Woods
Hey Jorge,

Are you selecting the option to "Import all log files since last import" If so, there could be multiple reasons for you not being able to see the IIS log files.
- You will only be able to see previous log files in DTS log file view. This means that the current IIS log will show up in the view. For instance, if you have your IIS set to log on a daily basis, you will only see the previous day's log files in the DTS log view. Same if you are logging hourly (You will only see the previous hour). The reason behind this is that IIS locks the file so that the DTS task cannot use this file until IIS releases the lock.
- If you have already imported a IIS log file (with the same name that is), you will not be able to see that log file in the dts view.
- If you have recently changed the IIS logging frequency and not synchronized the IIS log setting with Commerce Server, then you will not see the log files correctly. An example of this is if you change IIS to log from daily to hourly. If you do this, you need to open Commerce Server Manager, expand Commerce Sites and your site, right click on your site name -> All Tasks -> Synchronize Web Server Properties.
If you are using the option to manually pick your IIS log files, then you need to make sure the directory is correctly set. By default, it's C:\windows\system32\logfiles. You should most likely set this value to be: C:\Windows\System32\LogFiles\W3SVC1.

I hope this helps and let me know if you have any additional questions/concerns.

Thanks

Alan
Marcos Bertoldi
The documentation covering the datawarehouse/analytics was recently released to the MSDN Library on the web (it isn't part of the RTM docs). You'll want to dig into them as a starting point to understand the concepts of how Commerce Server captures data for analysis. In particular there is a section that has a brief overview of the Advertising Reports.
- Developing with the Data Warehouse Analytics System
There is a ReportInstaller.exe tool is hidden away in the Tools folder of the Commerce Server program files folder. In addition the Report Defintion Language files are in the RDLs folder. Using the tool is covered in the Deployment section of the documentation:
- How to Install the Data Warehouse Reports
That should get you started. Feel free to ask more specific questions after reviewing the above information.

Cheers!
Colin
igor23ba

Hey Jorge,

Yes - There is a DTS task called "Prepare Reports". This task performs the Datawarehouse processing on the Analysis Server. This should be done after all the DTS tasks are complete (i.e. this should be the last task that executes).

Hope this helps.

Alan
BMcDowell
Hey,

In order to get the CS 2007 Reports to show up, you need to do the following:
1. Unpackage and add the DW.pup resource to your application.
2. Setup/Configure Sql Server 2005 Reporting Services (you have already done this, according to your post)
3. Run the ReportInstaller.exe tool (This is located in %ProgramFiles%\Commerce Server 2007\Tools directory)
4. Run all the DTS Tasks to transfer the data from runtime databases to the data warehouse database.
You should then be able to see the reports. Also, be sure to checkout the documentation as others have noted. The webcast is beneficial as well on how to extend the DW/A.

Let us know if you have additional questions or need more information.

Thanks

Alan
JIM.H.

Hey Jorge,

Did you run the Web Log Import DTS Task The request are processed from the IIS logs via Commerce Server Marketing events (you will see CEVT=.... in the event log).

Let me know.

Thanks

Alan
ceiling

Hello Alan,

My log files are located on two different servers. I'm now processing the files locally on the Report Server and trying to automate the task.

For now i have one more question: the DTS import tasks include the Datawarehouse processing on the Analysis Server, or this has to be done after the DTS execution

Thanks,

-- Jorge
MikeEllerton

Jorge,

You might also consider watching the TechNet webcast covering this topic, as it walks through how to set up some additional tasks (such as click-thru capture).

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/comm/2007/webcasts.mspx

It's the second one on the page.
Tamizhan

Hello Alan,

Thanks for the help. I'm running the Data Warehouse Import Wizard to create the DTS Tasks. The log file locations appear to the correct, but on the following step "Select the log files to import" the list is empty.

What am i doing wrong

-- Jorge
Lillia
Hey Jorge,

It's the same criteria as below but it must have not been attempted to import before.
- You will only be able to see previous log files in DTS log file view. This means that the current IIS log will show up in the view. For instance, if you have your IIS set to log on a daily basis, you will only see the previous day's log files in the DTS log view. Same if you are logging hourly (You will only see the previous hour). The reason behind this is that IIS locks the file so that the DTS task cannot use this file until IIS releases the lock.
- If you have already imported a IIS log file (with the same name that is), you will not be able to see that log file in the dts view.
- If you have recently changed the IIS logging frequency and not synchronized the IIS log setting with Commerce Server, then you will not see the log files correctly. An example of this is if you change IIS to log from daily to hourly. If you do this, you need to open Commerce Server Manager, expand Commerce Sites and your site, right click on your site name -> All Tasks -> Synchronize Web Server Properties.
Have you changed the format of your log files in any way or tried to import them multiple times

Thanks

Alan
chris441962

Hello Alan,

Thanks for the reply. I was sucessful in the configuration you provided, but the reports are incomplete:

In the Advertising_Reports > Campaign_Item_Summary the column "Ordered Impressions Balance" has the correct values, but the column "Requests" is empty.

Any suggestion

-- Jorge
Travis Baseflug

Hello Alan,

I was able to process sucessfully some log files (the Report Server shows the data correctly), but now i have specific log files that are not imported, even though the Data Warehouse Import Wizard doesn't show any errors whatsoever (in this case I'm manually selecting the log files).

Also, if i choose for the Import Criteria "All logs since last import", the new log files don't show on list after becoming available on the folder i provide on the configuration. What's the logic behind this option

Thanks in advance.

-- Jorge
Guidelines for Marketing Reports

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