SAP Analytics Cloud Roambi Reviews

by Boulder Jack

I was immediately enthralled with Roambi Analytics...cool looking graphs that are easy to create...except that after spending 4 hours trying to learn the program I was more confused than when i started. I must have gotten lucky with some early attempts to build simple graphs.
But I sallied forth and decided to buy two licenses for $528. Big mistake.
I paid one of my people to spend 40 hours learning the program and he was only moderately successful. And 3 weeks after committing to buy the program, they still haven't given me a login or password...something about "provisioning" taking time...seems ridiculous...and my impression that since SAP bought Roambi it has become part of the problem not the solution. Short answer: sexy idea but ease of use is an unfulfilled promise. And support at all levels is, while very nice, surprisingly unhelpful.
Recommendation: Don't waste your time.

by Hungerrgamez

This application has a very insidious draconian user agreement which you should definitely not Accept. It is a way of spreading and protecting their ideas and blocking other people who may have similar ideas from pursuing a similar line of development - and all of this, at a very early stage of iPhone and SmartPhone development. Very Harvard-esque and in some ways, fundamentally against the grain of the creative spirit that is being launched in our nation, at a time when we need all the inspiration we can get.

You can get a clear idea of what they are working from the website, don't bother downloading SAPAnalyticsCloudRoambi which requires you to Accept a very unreasonable Agreement.

by Vantage352

SAPAnalyticsCloudRoambi looked so promising. But, the publisher is difficult to use and the support for auto-refresh, both for the $100/yr Pro version and the $40,000 enterprise version are just not sufficient whatsoever. The auto-refresh works with Excel files, but they MUST be hosted on Googledocs? What a ridiculous requirement! This one requirement has halted our company from being able to completely automate the process of refreshing the Roambi. And the enterprise version (not an option for small businesses at a STAGGERING $40k) is no better, as there is only one difference between Pro and Enterprise: Oracle support.

However, I am still holding out hope that they will change, what with a recent injection of $30 million in venture capital.

by Aztai

Basically, you upload your data document to the Roambi server, which formats it according to one of its templates, and then sends it to your iPhone all nice and pretty. There are some small things that need working on, though. Large Excel spread sheets upload fine, but there is no quick find feature, meaning you have to scroll like crazy to get to the end. If you use the Go To feature, it does not go directly to your goal, bur rather scrolls automatically, taking just as much time as you would have to do it yourself. So for large data files, it's impractical. I would love to use it for an important spreadsheet I have with 1000+ entries and multiple columns. The columns work out fine, but the inability to go quickly to the end, and then back, makes it hard to use. (Also, if you have confidential data, you have to trust their privacy policy since you're basically running your data through their server.)

by OmgSeriously

Very excited at the stunning visualizations and the idea of seeing my own data appear I downloaded SAPAnalyticsCloudRoambi. After playing around with the sample data I tried going to their website on my iPad only to discover that it's in Flash. Flash isn't supported on the iPad or iPhone so that was a bit disappointing. Undaunted, I went to the site on my laptop and created a free account.

I think this is an example of a really great and potentially powerful idea that didn't follow through well on execution. The flashed site elements are kind of pretty, but they aren't functionally done well.

Button hotspots don't line up with the actual buttons, so you sit there and move the mouse around until you get a cursor - then you click. And, even though I downloaded their template for the pie charts and replaced the data in the worksheet with some dummy data, the web interface wouldn't display the data as a report.

Whoever recommended that they use Flash for this though - that person really torpedoed RoamBI and clearly did not understand the impact of the decision - it renders the product pretty useless to iPad/iPhone users. This product has a lot of potential, we'd love to use it - but it needs some serious repairs first.

by Nicki2002

If you bother to go through enough reading, you can eventually figure out how to select data correctly. But the developers didn't make it at all easy which is why I'm giving it 3 stars. what they should do is take 2 or 3 examples from the beginning and show you step by step how the resultant Roambi graph was built. When I finally figured it out, I was really happy but it was laborious getting there and they could have made it simpler with detailed step by step "do this, do that" to "get this, get that" result.

by Ophichius

The concept of SAPAnalyticsCloudRoambi is great. I was going to purchase the pro version. But SAPAnalyticsCloudRoambi is not there yet. Spent lots of time trying to figure out how to display simple data via an Excel sheet and I could not. I end up converting the file in csv format. The charts are okay could be much better. Another thing, you can not display your Roambi on a VGA screen.
For now until someone comes up with a better visualization app, I think Numbers is doing a pretty good job right now.

by Urbanslaughter

I thought this would be a perfect app for my business, but I simply couldn't get it to work. The website is HORRIBLE! Even the videos don't explain clearly what you're supposed to do. I tried to download a small to average sized excel file, but I was never able to get it to work in the tab visualizer and I couldn't even figure out how to try doing it in any of the other visualizers. I've contacted "support". I'll update when/if they respond.

So I got fantastic personal help from RoamBi and now it's working just great (it did not work with the beta version of the latest Safari). I'm really happy with this product and it really makes working with my excel files much easier (I think Microsoft could learn a thing or two from them). Great product and great support.

by Fazirof

Roambi gets mobility. The user experience is driven by the various visualizations, and the choice of a "view" or report is determined by the use case. For example, there are views that allow me to drill down levels of a path so I can see how my products are performing then drill to the sales regions within those products. For me, I found it's better to start by looking at the various "views"and figuring out what I want on the iPad instead of trying to figure out how to replicate current reports - it's just so different!

by MelissaMarieB

So impressed with SAPAnalyticsCloudRoambi. Very easy to take the templates and model my excel spreadsheet with my data and upload to Roambi website. Demo right away, tweaking is very easy, and the ability to manipulate data exceeds expensive software that we've been using for some time. Incredibly impressed. Sharing this with everyone and using it with work data and home data. Thank you Roambi!

by LeslieCabernet

I have been a business owner for 25+ years and always dreamed for a way to access my data without having to ask an army of people to get me the numbers... A friend mentioned Roambi... I have to say, I'm very satisfied. It's practical and helpful, it's really good for my business and my investors. It also helps me in my sales efforts and on gaining credibility with providers, investors and customers.

by Howardd21

From a business perspective of the iPad, Roambi could be a killer app. I found it easy to create an Excel spreadsheet with my data and publish it on their site, and then by virtue of my account being subscribed, it showed up in full glory on my iPad. My business executive clients can benefit from such an application. I saw no bugs and it was easy to use sample roams they had published.

by Kathleenn

Fabuous interface, amazing data displays, great pre-built data sets (baseball stats, world population). Very easy to create your own data sets via excel and the Roambi website. Excellent education tool! I put student grades on it in the cardex view....Easily flip to any student while protecting confidentiality. Would be a great tool for high school math science to address data visualization concepts/skills. Highly recommend.

by Sardjono

I was looking for such a solution for PC to perform data analysis. Instead I stumbled upon this great app. Works great and exceeds my expectation.

New feature requests:
1. Flash based uploader is graphically stunning, but slow. Prefer to have an option to use a simpler (eg. HTML based) uploader
2. Would be nice if Roambi has option to send a hi-res output for export to PC (eg. for Powerpoint presentation) instead of the iPhone screenshot.

by Minister Jose Juarez III

The new UI isn't just chrome, instead, Roambi seems to have taken the opportunity to look at the user experience of their entire app and thoroughly redefined how people should be interacting with their data on their iPhone.

This is a way to consume data that is easy to use and deadly to your foes when in your hands.