Introducing Discoverer
Oracle Discoverer Tutorial

	Introducing Discoverer	Oracle Discoverer Tutorial

Discoverer 4i Plus is the Internet version of the award-winning Windows product, Discoverer Plus (Release 4.1). With Discoverer, business professionals like you can get and analyze data that you know is in your company's database without having to understand difficult database concepts. Using Wizard dialogs and menus, Discoverer guides you through the steps to get and analyze data that supports your business decisions. Discoverer does most of the hard work for you.

Using Discoverer to support your business decisions

As a business professional, you rely on a broad skill set to make effective and profitable business decisions. You rely on your education, experience, and instinct to make the right decisions when money is at risk. With the addition of empirical data, you can make better informed decisions.

Currently, many large organizations hire highly-paid information technology (IT) professionals who get data out of databases and provide it to decision makers. This process can be slow and costly. And typically, very few people benefit from the knowledge derived by this method. However, with Discoverer, you or anyone else with the right access privilege can get data from databases delivered right to your desktop computer. With Discoverer, get the information you need, make better informed business decisions, and share your business decisions with other people in persuasive ways.

Click here to start each lesson.

About the Tutorial

This tutorial explains concepts and procedures that you need to successfully use Discoverer to support your business decisions. The tutorial describes only the most common and basic tasks. For more detailed information or instructions on advanced topics, refer to the Discoverer 4i Plus online Help or the Discoverer 4i Plus User Guide.

The data and worksheets you use with the tutorial are based upon a fictitious video store. The video store database includes sales, inventory, and store data. Although your business may not be quite like the video store's, the basic concepts are the same. The video store scenario is provided to give you a business context for using Discoverer.

Note: In order to connect to the video store database, your Discoverer Administrator must provide you with the correct login name, password, and database name.

The tutorial assumes that you are a busy professional with little time for training and that you have a specific and immediate business goal in mind for using Discoverer. The lessons are designed so that you can finish them all at once or finish each lesson separately. The total time to complete all the lessons is approximately 3 hours. Each lesson also begins with an estimated time to complete just that lesson.

The tutorial also assumes that you know how to use a Web browser and know the standard conventions of your computer's operating system, such as maximizing and minimizing windows and printing files. However, the tutorial does not assume that you understand database concepts, the SQL language, or how to retrieve data from a database.

How the lessons are divided

The five lessons in this tutorial guide you through the necessary steps to get and analyze data that supports your business decisions. The lessons teach you how to connect to your company's database, get the data you want, analyze the data, and then share it with other people. As you become more familiar with Discoverer, you will find a workflow that works best for you. Right now, as you learn Discoverer, keep the three-step process described below in mind. The lessons are organized to help you remember this sequence of steps:

Get the data you want.
Analyze your data.
Share your results with others.

Each lesson begins with a summary of the topics covered in that lesson.

Lesson 1 introduces you to the Discoverer work area, its Wizard dialogs and menus, and also defines key terminology that will help you use Discoverer.
Lesson 2 describes how to get the data you want from your company's database.
Lesson 3 describes Discoverer tools that you use to analyze your data; for example, grouping and sorting.
Lesson 4 describes different ways you can share your results with others; for example, as an Excel spreadsheet or an HTML page.
Lesson 5 summarizes all the tasks you have learned so far.
Most of the tasks in each lesson are self-contained and start with the Tutorial Workbook Video Stores Analysis. This means that there are no prerequisite steps required for most of the tasks. Therefore, you can generally start tasks without having first completed previous parts of the tutorial.

When working with the Tutorial Workbook Video Stores Analysis, do NOT save the file after each session, so that you keep the original Workbook unchanged. Alternatively, make a copy of the Tutorial Workbook Video Stores Analysis and work with your copy so that you can always return to an original version if required.

If you are unable to finish any task, in Lesson 5 you can review that topic in its previous lesson without repeating the entire tutorial. Use Lesson 5 as a self test to find out if you need to repeat a lesson or need to refer to the online Help for more detailed information.

Advice on using the Tutorial

If your computer has a large enough monitor, you should be able to view the tutorial and Discoverer at the same time. Minimize both the Web browser window and the Discoverer window so that you can easily switch back and forth between the two. If your computer has a small monitor, consider printing out each lesson and having only the Discoverer window visible on your monitor. However, if you print out the lessons, you will not be able to use some of the tutorial's interactive features, such as Hints, Definitions, and Questions, which are described below.

Hints. Each lesson assumes you have successfully completed the previous lessons. However, if you need help, click a hypertext link whenever you see the word "Hint". The link takes you to the previous lesson that describes the procedure you may have forgotten. The hints appear in a separate Web browser window. After you finish reading the hint, close the browser window and continue the lesson.
Definitions. New terminology is defined the first time it is used. After their first occurrence, these new terms are underlined. If you click the underlined term, its definition pops up in a separate Web browser window. After you read the definition, close the browser window and continue the lesson. If you are working from a printed page, the definitions are listed at the very bottom of each lesson.
Questions. As you follow the tutorial's instructions, you will occasionally see questions that ask you to think about what you are learning. To read the answer to each question, click a hypertext link whenever your see the word "Answer". The answers appear in a separate Web browser window. After you read the answer, close the browser window and continue the lesson. If you are working from a printed page, the answers are listed at the very bottom of each lesson.

Start Each Lesson

Click a link below to start each lesson.

Lesson 1: Getting Started with Discoverer
Lesson 2: Getting the Data You Want
Lesson 3: Analyzing Your Data
Lesson 4: Sharing Your Results with Others
Lesson 5: Putting It All Together