1862925 - Session handling and tuning

Symptom

• In certain scenarios it is observed that Sessions are not being released when users close the browsers.

Environment

• SAP Business Intelligence 4.0 / 4.1
• Central Management Console
• BI Launchpad

Reproducing the Issue

1. Here is just one example workflow, but there are various methods of where a session get created within Business Intelligence 4.0 (BI4.0)
2. Logon to the Central Management Console (CMC) or BI Launchpad
3. Close browser
4. Observe your session count on same or other machine in the CMC the behavior of your sessions.

Cause

• Due to the single BOE.war deployment now in BI4.0, the Session behavior has somewhat altered when comparing to the older versions (Example of older version BusinessObjects Enterprise XI3.1).
• One shared browser session behavior is currently being looked at by SAP development to see if this can be altered or improved. The following Problem Report has been created for this:  ADAPT01685736

Resolution

Here are various scenarios and workflows related to session count.

• Logon as a user in BI Launchpad or CMC in a browser and use log off button. This will clear one session count.
• Logon as a user in BI Launchpad or CMC in a browser and close browser. The default 20 minutes timeout setting will catch and clean session.
• Logon as a user in BI Launchpad and/or CMC in same browser but 2 different tabs and log out of one of them on same machine. This will clear one session and one will remain. (go from 2 down to 1 sessions).
• Logon as a user in BI Launchpad and/or CMC in two browser windows and log out of one of them and close browser on same machine. This will clear one session and one will remain. (go from 2 down to 1 sessions).
• Logon as a user in BI Launchpad and/or CMC in two different kind of browsers (IE, Firefox, Chrome etc) and log out of one of them and close browser on same machine. This will clear one session and one will remain. (go from 2 down to 1 sessions).
• Logon as a user in BI Launchpad and/or CMC in two different kind of browsers (IE, Firefox, Chrome etc) and close one of them on the same machine. This will clear one session after default 20 minutes timeout. (go from 2 down to 1 sessions after 20 minutes).
• Logon as a user in BI Launchpad and/or CMC in two browser windows on 2 different machines and log out of one of them and close browser on one of the machines. This will clear one session and one will remain. (go from 2 down to 1 sessions). Also note that this is the same for no matter what kind of browser is used (IE, Firefox and Chrome).
• Logon as a user in BI Launchpad and/or CMC in two browser windows on two different machines and simply close one of the browsers on one of the machines. This will clear one session after default 20 minutes timeout. (go from 2 down to 1 sessions after 20 minutes). Also note that this is the same for no matter what kind of browser is used (IE, Firefox and Chrome).
• Logon as a user in BI Launchpad and/or CMC in two browser windows and simply close one of the browsers on same machine. Two sessions will remain even after default 20 minutes timeout. Timeout and session cleanup will only occur after "ALL"browser windows are closed on same machine.
• Logon as a user in BI Launchpad and/or CMC in two tabs in same browser window and simply close one of the tabs on same machine. Two sessions will remain even after default 20 minutes timeout. Timeout and session cleanup will only occur after "ALL"browser windows are closed on same machine.

NOTE: Do keep in mind that the above scenarios are given as example when a user or users log on one or two times, but the same applies to no matter the amount of user logons.

The last two given scenarios above are currently being looked at by the aforementioned ADAPT (see the "Cause" section) and see if it can be improved. The difference for these two scenarios in BI4.0 vs XI3.1 is that in BI4.0 the Web application deployment is done under one single BOE.war deployment that houses the CMC and BI Launchpad. In XI3.1 and previous versions the Infoview and CMC was split in different deployments and session handling was addressed separately. 

What can you do to tweak your session handling in BI4.0.

• Currently there is only one setting that can be altered to affect session handling in BI4.0.
• The one setting available is the setting that alters the default 20 minutes timeout.

1. look up your deployed Web.xml file on your Web application server.
2. Open this xml and scroll to the bottom of this file and you will see:

<session-config>
        <session-timeout>20</session-timeout>
</session-config>

    3.   You can alter this to any amount of minutes.

Keywords

ADAPT01685737, TE: 5050114680, BOE, CMC, login, session, close, hung, stuck