Starting up Cognos

[hurricane]

Based on the number of questions I see on this site about how to get things working, I am a little leery of my ability to install this myself. Do I need a software expert to install and keep it running, or is it something that someone with limited computer knowledge, such as myself, can handle? Does IBM provide adequate support?(because it seems like if they did this site wouldn't be necessary) Thanks in advance to anyone who can give me some reassurance.

[PolzovatelCognos]

In order to fully answer your question, we would need to learn more. For example, how many users would you be supporting? In other words, how many users will be utilizing the Cognos product? Or would this just be you? What is the business need and what are the goals in mind? How many data sources will you be reporting against? Who will be modeling the data/creating the reporting packages? Etc.

In my opinion, the IBM Cognos documentation (the Administration & Security Guide, the Architecture and Deployment Guide, the Installation and Configuration Guide, etc.) provides adequate information to get you started and learning the product. However, it would all depend on how much background you have in the various technologies, such as web servers (setting up the web server), authentication, authorization, etc.
I have been both the Cognos admin & modeler for some time at my workplace. Although we have about 100 Cognos users, these users do a lot of reporting and report scheduling in the system to assist in their day-to-day job functions (i.e., accounting, processing, etc.). I was able to install, setup, and learn the product(s) on my own by utilizing the IBM Cognos documentation and of course, via hands-on experience. My background, however, is completely in computers, programming, etc.