1.0 The Acinta Intelligence Suite¶
Acinta is a business intelligence suite: it turns the data in your ERP, CRM and other systems into workbooks – dashboards, reports and analyses – that people use every day. It consists of a few programs, each for a different role.
The Programs¶
| Program | For | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Datashop | Everyone | Open, explore and build workbooks; metrics, filters, distributions. See 1.1 About Datashop. |
| Modeller | Administrators, consultants | Builds the data model on top of the data warehouse. See 20.1. |
| Enterprise Manager | Administrators | Users, languages, distributions and the server. See 31.1. |
| Acinta Server | – (Windows service) | Sends distributions, refreshes data, serves Datashop Web. See 33.1. |
| Datashop Web | Users with a browser | Shows workbooks on the web. See 36.1. |
| nikolAI | Everyone | The AI assistant inside Datashop. See Chapter 2. |
WebSync, which loads data from source systems into the data warehouse, is a separate product with its own documentation.
How They Fit Together¶
- Your data is loaded into a data warehouse database (e.g. with WebSync).
- In Modeller, an administrator describes the data warehouse as a data model: dimensions such as Customer and Item, and facts such as Amount.
- In Datashop, users build metrics and workbooks on the model, explore the data and share their workbooks.
- Acinta Server e-mails workbooks on schedules and serves Datashop Web.
- Enterprise Manager manages who can log in and what data they see.
Everything belonging to one organization's data model – the model, workbooks, metrics, users – is a project.
Datashop Editions¶
| Edition | For |
|---|---|
| Datashop Workbook | Opening and exploring workbooks: filtering, drilling, printing, exporting |
| Datashop Expert | Everything in Workbook, plus designing workbooks, creating metrics, filters and distributions, and the main window with all project objects |
Which edition starts is decided by the shortcut you use – see 4.1 Signing In and Choosing a Project. The former Datashop Professional edition is discontinued (build 20086): setup no longer installs it, and former Professional users start Datashop Expert.
Where to Start¶
- New users: 1.2 Launching Datashop for the First Time.
- Workbook designers: Chapter 7 Designing Workbooks.
- Administrators: Chapter 30 Installation and Updating and Chapter 20 Getting Started with Modeller.