I work for the University of Michigan and we are just starting to work with OLAP cubes. While talking to the BusObjs reps about our options (which are limited right now because said cubes are on SQL Server Analysis Services 2005) OLAP universes were mentioned as a possibility. However, the reps couldn’t go into detail about how these worked.
It’s my understanding that we really do need the greater functionality of SQL Server 2005 so going to an older version isn’t practical even if we did want to think of going ‘backward’ to get compatibility with BusObjs.
So, I’d like your input on the following - even if the answer to the first question is ‘no’, I’d still be interested in learning about the answers to the other questions:
Is SQL Server 2005 even an option right now for doing this?
How is the connection set up (if 2005 is out, describe the older SQL Server connection)
Is the universe design ‘obvious’ once the connection is established - i.e. do you do anything different, are there any gotchas?
Do you lose some of the OLAP functionality by creating an OLAP universe? What are the tradeoffs vs. using an OLAP-specific tool like OLAP Intelligence?
In general what are the differences between OLAP universes and relational universes? (sort of a restatement of Q3 I know)
thanks for your help!
Mary Wise
University of Michigan
MAIS Data Delivery
Sorry, duh! that was a critical piece of info for me to miss. We are in the process of migrating from Reporter 5.1.5 to WebI XI R2 (not sure of all the patches and CHF’s we have right in now). We do not have the current version of OLAP Intelligence but know that it won’t work w/ SQL Server AS 2005 and the next version isn’t out yet. Our Database access is currently just for an oracle platform, which is where our atomic-level relational DW resides.
Mary,
we are just in a project and building WebI XIR2 reports on MS Analysis Services 2000 cubes. BO is currently preparing an update to correct Performance issues. To your questions:
Analysis Services 2005 cubes are not supported right now
Setting up the connection is straightforward, create a login with read access in SQL Server first
The resulting universe can not be changed a lot, you can not modify objects, only copy. Thus the business logic should be implemented in the cube (calculated members, member properties etc.)
With the new patch CHF16 - mentioned above - you don`t loose OLAP fucntionality. The disadvantage of OLAP Intelligence in our eyes is that member properties can only be displayed for single cells and only temporary but not for a list of dimension items as needed in reports.