Contributor add-in for Excel

[jeffowentn]

Is this only available to "modeler" licenses or can Contributor web users also use the Excel Add-In?

[ericlfg]

Hey Jeff,

I'm not sure how your license is configured at IBM Cognos, perhaps you can reach out to your account rep and confirm.  I don't know if there's any additional cost in licenses based on how an end user would access the contributor online portion?  There's really only two ways:
1. Through the normal contributor client accessed by the online portal;
2. Opening Excel (on a machine that has the contributor excel add-in), connecting to the application through the add-in section.

I would expect that, because the contributor excel add-in is included as part of the client install stream, it's available to any user that has a need to use contributor.

My 2 cents.

Cheers.

[jeffowentn]

Eric, thanks.  I have the web client installed, but I do not see the .xla file available to add it to Excel Add-ins...is it stored in a different location?

[ericlfg]

I can't recall if there's an automatic install provided by hitting the website off the top of my head.  There is, however, a specific install that you can perform from the Client install media (issetup.exe)

[jeffowentn]

any idea if there is an MSI for it?

[jeffowentn]

Any idea how to install the Contributor add-in for Excel for Contributor web-only users?  Is there an MSI to push?

[ericlfg]

Hey Jeff,

As far as I know (and anyone correct me if I'm wrong), the only way to get the Contributor Excel Add-in (CEA) installed is to use the install media specifically for the CEA.  You could then package that up into an executable or maybe an .msi package and push it out to the end users.. 

Cheers

[jeffowentn]

Ok, thanks for the help...let me see what I can come up with...

[ericlfg]

Hey Jeff,

I completely forgot that I replied to this thread a couple days ago. ;)  Sorry, long day.  To answer your question, I'm not aware of any MSI that's provided to do the CEA install.  There's only the ISSETUP.exe available from the client install media, which you already know about.

Good luck.

[jeffowentn]

I may try simply grabbing the contributor.xla file and dropping in the right place, opening Excel, and adding the add-in.  ???  I'll keep you posted.

Jeff

[ericlfg]

Hey Jeff,

Unfortunately that won't work ..  there are a number of background components that need to be installed for it to work (.ocx and .dll files).  If you do a client install and only install the CEA, navigate over to the install directory and open the bin folder, you'll see what I'm talking about.

I even gave this a quick try and received a number of Active X component can't create object errors.

Cheers