Troubleshooting Cognos validation problems

If you encounter validation problems while you install HCL Cognos® Business Intelligence or use the Metrics application, verify that the details of the Cognos administrator and server are correct. If you supply incorrect values during installation, the validation might fail; however, you can continue with the installation and correct the information afterward.

Potential validation problems

Table 1 lists validation problems that can occur with the Metrics application and Cognos.

Table 1. Potential validation problems with Metrics and Cognos
Column 1 describes validation problems and column 2 suggests how you can resolve them.
Problem	Solution
Validation fails in Cognos panel during installation even when the correct values were selected for the Cognos server host, port, and context root.	Ensure that the Cognos BI Server is started and the network connection between the Deployment Manager and the Cognos node is accessible.
When you run the cognos-configure.bat\|sh script during installation, the following exception occurs and the installation fails: Err,com.cognos.crconfig.data.DataManagerException: Unable to save the configuration file. The parameter named 'External dispatcher URI' located in 'Environment' is currently invalid. You can also view the error message in the in cognos-configure.log file.	Check the cognos.contextroot value in the cognos-setup.properties file. If the value includes a forward slash (/), choose another context root without a slash (/) because Cognos does not support a context root that includes (/). Replace the cognos.contextroot value in the cognos-setup.properties file with `cognos` or another single word. Update the context root in WebSphere® Application Server with the new value for the Cognos application. Restart the Cognos server. Rerun the cognos-configure.bat\|sh file.
Communities metrics cannot be updated.	You might have provided the wrong LDAP account for the Cognos administrator during installation. Update the Cognos administrator credentials that are stored in Connections by completing the following steps: Log in to the Integrated Solutions Console on the Deployment Manager. Click Global security > JAAS - J2C authentication data. Select cognosAdmin. Update the Cognos administrator user name and password. Click OK. Save your changes to the master configuration by clicking Save in the Messages box.
The Communities metrics update process ends prematurely and no more than one report can be updated.	The report update needs more time to complete because the Cognos server is running slowly. Change the value of the cognos.secsPerRequest parameter in the metrics-config.xml file to match the capacity of the server. Begin by changing this value to a high value such as 3600. When the Communities metrics update is working correctly, assign a lower value that is based on the actual time it takes to generate a set of reports for a community. For detailed information about changing this value, see the Modifying configuration properties and Metrics configuration properties topics in the Administering Metrics section.
Metrics features are not working. The Metrics UI indicates that the Cognos server is not available.	You might have provided the wrong host name, port, or context root during installation. You can change these host settings by following the instructions in the Updating web addresses in HCL HTTP Server topic. Update the Cognos entry, which is indicated by `serviceName="cognos"`.
When you run the cognos-configure-update.bat\|sh file during installation or an update, the following error is returned in the cognos-configure.log file: CM-REQ-4159 Content Manager returned an error in the response header. The error "cmAuthenticateFailed CM-CAM-4005 Unable to authenticate. Check your security directory server connection and confirm the credentials entered at login." can be found in the response SOAP header.	If you disabled anonymous access to the Cognos server, you must enable it now because the script that updates the configuration requires that anonymous access be enabled. You can enable anonymous access in two ways: Run the Cognos Configuration tool. If your Cognos server runs on AIX® or Linux™ and does not provide a graphical user interface, enable anonymous access manually.