IBM Cognos Analytics allows enterprises to use their data to its full extent. With features that enable businesses to visualize patterns and understand trends, it is an invaluable data visualization and pixel perfect reporting tool. Over the years, IBM Cognos Analytics has kept up with ever-increasing demands of the market. Each update brings exciting new features. Release 12.1.0. represents a major milestone with the launch of a new product – Cognos Analytics Certified Containers. Keep reading to learn more about the new evolution in developing IBM Cognos Analytics applications.
Reduced costs with seamless scaling
Each individual Cognos Analytics application is now independently scalable. This significantly reduces infrastructure costs. IBM uses traditional t-shirt sizing, as it is a good starting point for organizations to figure out their needs. Depending on your capacity and changes in the active user base, it is always possible to scale up or down. Furthermore, you can now maximize hardware utilization and run multiple Cognos containers on one server. In the Kubernetes environment, resources can be shared and prioritized based on your specific parameters. Your Cognos environment can evolve and grow with your organization or shrink as needed. Instead of paying for what you don’t need, you can effectively optimize resource usage. All of this allows you to focus on what matters most – how to understand and visualize your data better.
Improved security and recovery
Security improvements are another key benefit of Kubernetes deployment. With security and authentication services fully containerized, your environment is more robust and resistant to attacks. The risk and impact of deploying a security flaw is reduced significantly. Furthermore, the impact of downtime is brought to a minimum. Containerized applications simplify disaster recovery via self-healing, auto scaling and fast re-deployment. The ability to swiftly redeploy an application after a failure is an immense upgrade over traditional methods. While zero downtime upgrades are not yet available, this feature is being worked on intensely. Soon, you will be able to migrate to a new version of Cognos Analytics hassle free. Other tools which are available to further better management are container layering and optimized log gathering for your environment.
Cognos Analytics and OpenShift
Cognos Analytics Certified Containers is now available for a number of Kubernetes platforms including Red Hat OpenShift. As an officially validated product, it meets all Red Hat certification standards:
- Fully containerized
- Enterprise-grade
- Follows best practices defined by Red Hat
- Undergoes continuous vulnerability scans
- Validated and tested by Red Hat Partners
OpenShift makes it possible to deploy IBM Cognos Analytics as close to your data as possible, requiring a minimal amount of resources. By choosing OpenShift Container Platform, you get access to documentation and fast-track security updates based on Red Hat guidelines. According to IBM documentation, IBM containers are built to deploy best on OpenShift as the combination provides the most optimal way to manage the complete lifecycle of containers and a helm chart.
The setup is simple –point the Kubernetes CA containers to your existing authentication provider, content store and deploy. This makes moving from traditional IBM Cognos Analytics installation easy and fast. There is no downtime or interruptions for end users.
Cognos Analytics Certified Containers architecture
Existing Cognos architecture consists of a gateway tier, application tier, and content management tier. The gateway tier has been replaced by a scalable Cognos Analytics Ingress written in Go. The middle tier has been separated into services: REST, Smarts, UI, Reporting, DSS, Content Manager, CA Proxy and Artifact. These microservices are fully configurable and scalable. Currently, this version of the architecture deploys in just 200 seconds. Multi day updates, migrations, maintenances and deployments are now a thing of the past.

Over the years, CROZ has intensely worked with IBM Cognos Analytics and OpenShift. Both platforms are used internally, and on a number of external projects. This new partnership allows us to collaborate and combine our knowledge and skills in devops and data respectively. Cognos Analytics Certified Containers on OpenShift is an exciting opportunity for our teams to work together on new solutions.