Generic clear utility + Excel cube-view tooling
Quick Facts
- Client: Logitech (consumer electronics)
- Role: EPM Developer
- Impact: A generic clear utility that clears any intersection — including stored/imported data OneStream won't natively clear — plus cube-view connections and submission macros in the Excel surface, and a slow dashboard made responsive by collapsing many spreadsheet components into one.
Overview
An EPM-tooling engagement at Logitech: small, sharp tools that made the OneStream application easier to use and faster to run. The headline was a generic clear utility that goes further than OneStream's native clear; alongside it, cube-view connections and macros made the Excel surface a real working tool, and a targeted dashboard rebuild took a slow page back into responsive territory.
The Generic Clear Utility
OneStream has a real limitation here: natively, it only lets you clear calculated data — data that was imported/stored can't be cleared the same way. That gets in the way whenever finance needs to wipe a slice and reload it.
I built a utility that overrides that limitation. It can clear any intersection, down to any base-level member, regardless of whether the data was calculated or imported/stored. That was the whole point of it — clear data anywhere, not just the calculated slice OneStream lets you touch by default.
Cube-View Connections + Submission Macros
The Excel surface was mostly being used to read numbers. I made it a two-way working tool:
- Cube-view connections bring live cube data into the spreadsheet, so analysts work against current numbers instead of static extracts.
- Submission macros close the loop the other way: the user enters data in their Excel workbook, runs a macro, and the data is automatically pushed back into OneStream — no manual import step.
The Performance Fix
One dashboard was a performance nightmare. It had five or six separate spreadsheet components, each carrying its own cube-view connection, all rendering at once — slow to load and a poor experience.
The fix was structural rather than clever: instead of many spreadsheets and many connections, one spreadsheet workbook with multiple sheets inside it and a single cube-view connection on top. The dashboard now loads one spreadsheet component and runs the whole experience through it. Far less to render — fast, and a much better experience.
Results
| Metric | Before | After | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Clearing data | calculated data only (OneStream native limit) | any intersection / base-level member, incl. stored | clear anywhere |
| Excel surface | read-only number fetcher | live cube views + macro submission back to OneStream | two-way working tool |
| Slow dashboard | 5–6 spreadsheet components, each with its own connection | one workbook, multiple sheets, one connection | fast render |
Learnings
What worked. The clear utility earned its keep by going past a real platform limitation rather than just wrapping the existing one — clearing stored/imported data, not only calculated. And the dashboard fix was a reminder that performance problems are often structural: fewer components and fewer connections beat any micro-optimisation.
Skill developed. Designing for the analyst, not just the developer — live cube data and one-click submission in the surface they already live in (Excel) is what actually changes how finance works day to day.