Summary

The capabilities of Excel Services give your users the opportunity to create powerful BI dashboards and share workbooks directly within the browser. This chapter outlined the built-in capabilities and hopefully started to get your thoughts moving toward the robust solutions that can easily be created. In conclusion:

• Excel Services will provide an easy way for you and your users to share and manage information in Excel workbooks.

• The new features included in Excel 2007 are worth the upgrade even if you aren’t planning on using Excel Services. They increase not only functionality but also make it easier to complete common tasks.

• The configuration settings for Excel Services are set in the SSP. In addition to configuring Excel Services in the SSP, the enterprise features on the site collection and site must be activated for the functionality of Excel Services to be used.

• When publishing a workbook through Excel 2007, the user can determine what items to publish as well as whether to allow the modification of parameters.

• To display workbooks in the browser, the Excel Web Access Web Part is provided. This Web Part has additional functionality for determining how to display the workbook and what viewers can access.

• The Report Center Site template includes functionality for creating a central hub for BI. This functionality includes reports, dashboards, filter Web Parts, and KPIs.