Tag Archives: Dimensions

some more MDX

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Some fairly basic MDX stuff:

WITH
SET [a] AS [Geography].[City].[City] * [Product].[Category].Levels(1).Members 
SET [b] AS [Date].[Calendar].Levels(1).Members * [Sales Territory].[Sales Territory].[Country]
SELECT
     Order([a], [b].Item(0), BDESC ) ON ROWS
     ,[b]  ON COLUMNS
FROM [Adventure Works];

Use the * (asterisk) to separate multiple columns and rows. It’s a bit like a similar use in R when plotting against two things, I think the library(doBy) uses the same .

…with selection and NON EMPTY:

WITH
SET [a] AS	[Geography].[Country].&[Germany]
			*[Product].[Category].Levels(1).Members 
SET [b] AS	[Date].[Calendar].Levels(1).Members
			* [Sales Territory].[Sales Territory].[Country]
SELECT
     Order([a], [b].Item(0), BDESC ) ON ROWS
     ,non empty{[b]}  ON COLUMNS--[Geography].[City].&[Abingdon]&[ENG]
FROM [Adventure Works];

Dimensions and Measures with BIDS, MDX etc.

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So how do you tell what dimension is associated with a measure?

Open up BIDS (SQL Server Business Intelligence Development Studio)
From the file menu select: Open > Analysis Service Database
and choose your databsae and server etc.
Let the old girl sort itself out and then in the Solution Explorer select your cube of interest.

You’ll get something like this interlinked view:

Just switch to the Dimension Usage tab:

and you can see that Department is NOT linked to most measures.

Simple MDX again

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WITH
SET [a] AS [Product].[Category].Levels(1).Members
SET [b] AS [Date].[Calendar].Levels(1).Members
SELECT
     Order([a], [b].Item(0), BDESC ) ON ROWS
     ,[b]  ON COLUMNS
FROM [Adventure Works];

The “Category” above is not an MDX keyword, but a part of the hierarchy under the “product” dimension.



What happens if you change the dimension to one in which the measure does not spread over?


WITH
SET [a] AS [Product].[Category].Levels(1).Members
SET [b] AS [Date].[Calendar].Levels(1).Members
SELECT
     Order([a], [b].Item(0), BDESC ) ON ROWS
     ,[b]  ON COLUMNS
FROM [Adventure Works];


Which gives:




 




CY 2001
CY 2002
CY 2003
CY 2004
CY 2006




Bikes
$7,395,348.63
$19,956,014.67
$25,551,775.07
$13,399,243.18
(null)




Components
$615,474.98
$3,610,092.47
$5,482,497.29
$2,091,011.92
(null)




Clothing
$34,376.34
$485,587.15
$871,864.19
$386,013.16
(null)




Accessories
$20,235.36
$92,735.35
$296,532.88
$161,794.33
(null)






Now what do we get if we only look at the top level of the row dimenion?


WITH
SET [a] AS [Product].[Category].Levels(0).Members
SET [b] AS [Date].[Calendar].Levels(1).Members
SELECT
     Order([a], [b].Item(0), BDESC ) ON ROWS
     ,[b]  ON COLUMNS
FROM [Adventure Works];




 




CY 2001
CY 2002
CY 2003
CY 2004
CY 2006




All Products
$8,065,435.31
$24,144,429.65
$32,202,669.43
$16,038,062.60
(null)






Which is just the total “whatever measure this is” for the column dimension.

Now let’s throw in a dimension which doesn’t split the measure.


WITH
SET [a] AS [Department].Levels(1).Members
SET [b] AS [Date].[Calendar].Levels(1).Members
SELECT
     Order([a], [b].Item(0), BDESC ) ON ROWS
     ,[b]  ON COLUMNS
FROM [Adventure Works];


you get this:




 




CY 2001
CY 2002
CY 2003
CY 2004
CY 2006




Executive General and Administration
$8,065,435.31
$24,144,429.65
$32,202,669.43
$16,038,062.60
(null)




Inventory Management
$8,065,435.31
$24,144,429.65
$32,202,669.43
$16,038,062.60
(null)




Manufacturing
$8,065,435.31
$24,144,429.65
$32,202,669.43
$16,038,062.60
(null)




Quality Assurance
$8,065,435.31
$24,144,429.65
$32,202,669.43
$16,038,062.60
(null)




Research and Development
$8,065,435.31
$24,144,429.65
$32,202,669.43
$16,038,062.60
(null)




Sales and Marketing
$8,065,435.31
$24,144,429.65
$32,202,669.43
$16,038,062.60
(null)






Which looks like a cartesian join enacted on a crosstab. So each example of the row dimention gets an instance of the column dimensions (which the measure is applicable to)

How do I find out how my measures and dimensions are related?

…for that you need BIDS.