I recently started working with a new PC and I noticed that it did not have the TM1 Perspectives Excel add-in enabled. Obviously, therefore I did not have the TM1 Perspectives Ribbon included in Excel and could not do what I needed to do.
Please note that if you are using Planning Analytics for Excel (PAX/PAfE) add-in, please see this post.
So I thought I would do a quick blog that will guide users on how to enable Perspectives in Microsoft Excel. What this does is then automatically add the Perspectives add-in to Excel on your PC so that TM1 automatically opens each time you start Excel and the TM1 Perspectives Ribbon is automatically added to your Excel ribbon.
Note that you cannot use Perspectives with Planning Analytics Workspace. Perspectives only works with a direct connection to a TM1 server.
Also note that you cannot have both Perspectives and Planning Analytics for Excel concurrently active on the same PC.
Follow These Steps to Enable the TM1 Perspectives Excel Add-in
- Open Microsoft Excel
- Go to File (or Home button in Excel 2007), Options (Excel Options in 2007)
- Select Add-ins from the Excel Options tab
- Check if IBM Cognos TM1 Perspectives is listed in the Active Application Add-ins section at the top of the list.
- If not, click on “Go” beside the Manage Excel Add-ins dropdown.
- Click Browse
- Navigate to something like “c:/program files/ibm/cognos/tm1_64/bin/” (ie the bin folder inside the TM1 installation location).
- Select “tm1p.xla” and click OK
- On the available Add-Ins selection dialog box ensure that Perspectives is ticked and then click OK again.
- You should now see the TM1 ribbon available at the far right end of the Excel menu.
Ad-hoc Usage of TM1?
There’s no need to worry if you don’t want Perspectives to open each time you start Excel. Here’s what you can do. Just go to File, Open, and navigate to the same “tm1p.xla” file identified above. After that, use your Recent file list to open it when needed. Or alternatively, you can also put a shortcut to tm1p.xla on your desktop or in your Start menu and open it whenever needed.
