Community Knowledge Base

Advance your overall Anaplan knowledge and understanding

[Start Here] Anaplan Optimizer
In this series, we will teach you what Optimizer is, how it can help your organization solve complex business challenges, and when to use it. We will approach this in 2 steps: Where to start with Optimizer? (this article)How to setup Optimizer – hands-on exercisesFor territory assignmentFor transportationAnd moreWhat is…
Run your integrations on Camel
Integration is one of the key implementations for most enterprise solutions. It involves connecting different applications and transforming a huge amount of data on a daily or ad-hoc basis. Different iPass tools are available in today's market to make the integration easy to use without any coding. They provide a good user…
OEG Best Practice: The MOBILE way: Best practices for building in the UX for mobile devices
To achieve the ultimate Connected Planning experience, Anaplan users can use the mobile app to stay on top of their data from anywhere. With Anaplan at your fingertips, creating pages with mobile in mind has never been more important. To design and build pages that look and work great on mobile, use the MOBILE method to…
Update Current Period Action
From April 24, 2021, model builders will be able to update Current Period via an action. Workspace Administrators (WSAs) can always update the Current Period manually via the Model Calendar, however, this may not always be convenient. The Update Current Period action enables the WSAs to increase efficiency and reduce…
Summary Calculations With the User List
Even though the Users list does not have a top member assigned to it, with the release on April 24, 2021, model builders will be able to use the following summary functions with the Users List: SUM, LOOKUP, ISFIRSTOCCURRENCE, CUMULATE, ALL, ANY, AVERAGE, FIRSTNONBLANK, LASTNONBLANK, MAX, MIN, RANK. Lookup First, let’s look…
Understanding Errors and Rejected Lines When Importing Data Via APIs
The objective of this article is to provide a quick explanation on the responses that APIs can provide when an import is submitted, in particular regarding the dump logs generated. This content is suitable for Model Builders comfortable with APIs. * When Does an Import Create a Dump File? * Import in a Module * ‘Failed’…
Reducing Saves in Data Hubs
Data Hubs typically include large lists or numerous lists; both contribute to longer save durations. Model saves block other model actions, so we want to reduce the frequency of saves as much as possible. Reduce the Frequency of Saves First, put the data hub model into Deployed Mode. Learn more here: Enabling and Disabling…
Memory usage from text concatenation
We know that2.02-04 Text Strings are bad for Anaplan models and that text functions and formulas using text are the slowest (slow in comparison to similarly-sized numeric formulas). One of the biggest contributing factors to the poor performance of text is the impact on the memory used by Anaplan. The following diagrams…
Retail: Markdown Planning
Summary As a buyer, you are responsible for managing your price reductions to a monthly markdown budget. But markdown management at your company is not that straightforward. You must also adhere to the company’s pricing policies when considering a new price for your items, including having to use price tiers, percentage…
Increase end user adoption with smart filters
* Problem statement * How do we solve this with smart filters? * Customer examples * How to model smart filters * Size and performance considerations * Upcoming functionality * Conclusion Problem statement Anaplan users are often moving from an Excel environment (with the flexibility to filter, search, and sort data…
Anaplan Connect: Master Script
Prerequisites: * This article is designed for those more advanced with Anaplan Connect. * Utilizing CA Certificates is the best practice for Anaplan Data Integrations. The Master Script is best leveraged with CA Certificate authentication in the individual scripts for security purposes. If you would like to learn more…
[Start Here] Power BI - This is how we use it. Part 1: The basics.
Welcome to the best practices series about the Anaplan Connector for Microsoft Power BI. This is the first of a three-part series designed to help you understand why and how to use the Power BI connector by covering the basics, the set-up, and a real use case. Let’s begin with Part 1: The Basics. What is the connector for…
Power BI - This is how we use it. Part 3: Use Case - Leveraging Power BI Service.
Now that you know the basics of the Power BI connector and how to set it up, let us move to a real use case; Why using Power BI Service could help you to get the most of the Power BI connector? The blocking nature of exports When a user performs an export, the model is blocked from usage (entering or manipulating data).…
Power BI - This is how we use it. Part 2: Setup [Updated March 2022]
[Update: March 2022 - Limit increased to 5GB] In Part 2 of our Power BI - This is How We Use It series, we're diving into how to setup the Power BI connector. Need a refresher on the basics of Power BI? See Part 1. Ready? Let's start. Anaplan export setup Anaplan connector for Power BI supports Export actions to extract…
Managing frequent structural changes during development
Imagine the following scenario: You need to make regular structural changes to a deployed model (for example, weekly changes to the switchover date). You can make these changes by setting revision tags in the development model. However, you also have a development cycle that spans the structural changes. What do you do?…
Using Python 3 with the Anaplan API
* Getting Started * Authentication * Getting the Information Needed for Each Script * Uploads * Multiple Chunk Uploads * Single Chunk Upload * Imports * Exports * Actions * Processes * Downloading a File * Deleting a File * Standalone Requests Code and Their Required Headers * Get Workspaces List * Get Models List * Get…
Import and Automate Current Date Import to Anaplan Using Python
Connect or Python Summary As a supply chain Anaplan data integration modeler, you might be asked by your business partner to display actuals for elapsed periods and forecasts for unelapsed periods. If you are not using the current period, which must be manually updated by a workspace administer, and you want to automate…
How to Clear Data in Anaplan
Overview I came to Anaplan from different database technologies in support of Enterprise Performance Management (EPM), and it was a common activity to ensure that the forecast or plan periods were clear before planning began. These other technologies allowed you to use a scripted language (e.g. SQL) to be very specific…
Copy Branch Workaround for the User Experience
The ‘Copy Branch’ action hasn’t currently made its way onto the UX, so I was recently challenged by @Paul to create a workaround. This is my relatively simple solution, which could be amended for “Assign” by deleting the items in the ‘copy from’ list once copied. It should be noted that it is not a best practice for users…
Balanced vs. unbalanced hierarchies
One of the foundational elements of any Anaplan model is hierarchical lists. When creating hierarchies there are two basic choices: balanced or unbalanced. In this article, we'll look at the differences between balanced and unbalanced hierarchies, areas where they behave differently in Anaplan, and some questions to…
HyperModel: five tips to improve your experience
Are you considering HyperModel for your ecosystem, or have you recently deployed it? Fantastic! We've compiled a shortlist of the top five tips to help make kicking off your HyperModel experience as smooth as possible. Check out these top five tips to improve your experience: 1. Recognize that the Hyperblock has not…
User list subsets—a workaround
Dealing with the Users list has been pretty straightforward with Anaplan. All the users with access to the model come up in the module when used as a dimension. The Users list is handy when we need to set up end user-specific filters but, unlike general lists, Anaplan does not give us the ability to create a subset of the…
Organizing list subsets
The ordering of list subsets in Anaplan has always been an enigma to me, like a type of Anaplan acts in mysterious ways adage. I always thought, who am I to question the inner workings of our beloved platform in the cloud? In this article, I'll address the topic of organizing subsets. If you work like me by adding list…
Modeling Video Series #1: Flexible Time Mapping
Anaplan models have pre-defined time settings that offer flexibility for scenarios such as: when fiscal and calendar timescales are both in the same model, tracking irregular weekly patterns, and rolling weekly forecasts. Watch this video for a detailed demo that walks you through setting up and modeling these various time…
Modeling Video Series #3: Alternate Hierarchies
Anaplan model hierarchies follow a single structure where a parent rolls up to a single parent. Our flexible modeling structures allow you to map a child into a different hierarchy to meet your organization’s most unique planning and reporting needs. Watch this demo video to learn how our modeling techniques can create…
Modeling Video Series #2: Signage Convention
With Anaplan, aggregation logic is additive to have a “natural” feel. For example, positive values are added to totals, while negative values are subtracted from said totals. However, there are some instances in which values that display as positive need to actually be subtracted from totals. Check out this demo video to…
Leverage the dashboard import tool to migrate from Classic to UX
If your organization is currently utilizing a suite of classic dashboards, it is well worth looking to migrate your front end to the Anaplan UX. Not only will the modern, fresh looking presentation of the UX greatly enhance the experience for your end users right now, migrating will also provide you with the base from…
Understanding Anaplan's UX with analogies, FAQs and best practices
There are a lot of questions being asked about Anaplan's latest UX (formerly NUX) and its usage. Although there are fantastic recordings available on Community and enough material on Anapedia, the goal of this article is to provide valuable detail in the form of FAQs and analogies to support faster ramp-up for Anaplanners…
Version Settings as Production Data
After the November 14th platform update, Switchover, Edit From, Edit To, and Notes will no longer be updated via an ALM sync. Spoke models will need to be updated individually via an import or the Anaplan UI. The most optimal way to manage version settings going forward is by setting up module imports from a hub model.…
Integrate Anaplan with Siri and iOS shortcuts
We now live in a connected world, and Anaplan provides us with Connected Planning—but what about extending that connectivity even further? Every day, we carry mobile phones in our pockets that are amazing in the possibilities they offer to our lives. Anaplan has a great mobile app so that you can review your dashboards and…