Getting Started with OLAP Cubes

This section discusses OLAP cubes, which are one of the optional modules that can be added to Argos. To check if your institution is licensed for the OLAP module, a MAPS administrator can go to the License screen in the MAPS Configuration and select Argos. If you are not licensed for the OLAP module, Report Writers will see a message to this effect when attempting to add an OLAP cube to a dashboard.

OLAP stands for OnLine Analytical Processing. An OLAP cube is a type of object that can be included on a dashboard which makes it very easy for users to change how the data is presented on the screen. The DataBlock designer defines certain dimensions, e.g., attributes that the data can be sorted on, and what the measures are (the counts, amounts, or other numbers that are being measured). The report viewer can then pick and choose at run time which dimensions they want to use, and how the data should be broken down.

For example, suppose there is a company that sells IT equipment. They have 12 salespeople, each of whom works in a particular region of the country. It would be nice to know things such as:

Who sells the most in each region?
Which regions are the most and least profitable?
Which salesperson makes the most sales? The fewest? Who sells the highest and lowest amounts?
Does a particular product sell better in the Midwest vs. the South?
Which products sell best? Worst?
Are there products that sell better at certain times of year?
For each salesperson, have sales increased or decreased from time last year?

Determining all of this information would most likely require a large number of spreadsheets showing various data depending on the question you are trying to answer. OLAP cubes allow you to drag and drop dimensions, then filter, group, and sort the data to get the information you need quickly and easily. They have sometimes been called "a million spreadsheets in a box" because of how easily they can be rearranged to convey completely different information.

This section contains the following topics:

In addition to the information provided in the Help pages, you can find step-by-step instructions for building an OLAP cube in the Argos DataBlock Designer Guide. Examples of how a Report Viewer would work with the cube to create views of the data are contained in the Argos Report Viewer Guide.

The following videos demonstrate how to create an OLAP cube and then work with measures and dimensions to obtain desired views.

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