Different user rights per Frontend (e.g. Excel (R) / Web (D))
It would be awesome if one could grant users different rights per Frontend (Excel vs Web). In Theory it makes sense to treat them the same (you are either allowed to change a value or you are not) BUT in real life Excel is far more complicated and counter-intuitive to use. Especially if you roll-out to 100s of users you can not be sure if someone messes up plan figures just by analyzing them (it can happen so fast and without any notice) - typical answer: "...but I haven't saved - for sure." It would be extremely helpful to grant the users rights for analyzing with Excel (R) and plan in Web (D).
If you manage this with different logins you need twice as much licenses and also have to rely on the users to stick to the rules.
ADMIN RESPONSE
Oct 10, 2023
Thanks for the idea. We have recently shipped this in the latest release of Jedox. Please check it out and tell us what you think!
There is now a new right object "cell data Excel" to separately manage cell permissions for Excel and Web.
In addition to this, could there be an Excel Viewer license? Similar to Web viewer license but in Excel only? This way, users used to Excel can view reports, analyse data, drill through, drill down, filter, etc all in Excel, but of course, no write-back functonality. There seems to be a huge demand for this in ANZ.
@Dominik Lenz I think this option would be already a big help. We have a lot of users that wish for this option because they fear to change data and therefore reject using Excel at all. We also investigated using a Reverse-Proxy sitting on another port handling only read-only API calls to the OLAP (decided against it in the end). (Original author of this Feature Request)
from our understanding, this seems like you're not asking really for a security feature (in terms of user rights), but that this is mainly about convenience - just preventing users in Excel from making acciedental inputs?
So, would it also be sufficient to have for example a button in the Excel Ribbon, or a setting in the Excel Addin options, to enable / disable writeback? This button would of course be under control of the user (by contrast to a solution via user rights), but it still could help to prevent such unwated inputs.
Correct me if i'm mistaken, but there is now an option in the Rights Objects called "cell data Excel to do exactly this.
I know at least one Customer how want do that. We discuss that for a longer Time.
In addition to this, could there be an Excel Viewer license? Similar to Web viewer license but in Excel only? This way, users used to Excel can view reports, analyse data, drill through, drill down, filter, etc all in Excel, but of course, no write-back functonality. There seems to be a huge demand for this in ANZ.
@Dominik Lenz I think this option would be already a big help. We have a lot of users that wish for this option because they fear to change data and therefore reject using Excel at all. We also investigated using a Reverse-Proxy sitting on another port handling only read-only API calls to the OLAP (decided against it in the end). (Original author of this Feature Request)
Hello,
from our understanding, this seems like you're not asking really for a security feature (in terms of user rights), but that this is mainly about convenience - just preventing users in Excel from making acciedental inputs?
So, would it also be sufficient to have for example a button in the Excel Ribbon, or a setting in the Excel Addin options, to enable / disable writeback? This button would of course be under control of the user (by contrast to a solution via user rights), but it still could help to prevent such unwated inputs.