MSAS - Building a Virtual Cube Page - 2

Customization of data from a cube for presentation

The reason why we need to customize data for presentation is that there may be certain data which should not be accessible to certain users. We need to restrict their access to such data. There may yet other users who will need to access all data. We may need to give them access to the data. The virtual cube enables us to create a cube out of existing cubes and enables us to include or exclude dimensions and measures for the virtual cube. By excluding dimensions we can restrict users from accessing data in those dimensions, yet give him access to data he can view by including those specific dimensions.

In Analysis Manager Tree pane right click the cubes folder and click New Virtual cube.

Click Next on the Virtual Cube Editor Welcome screen.

The Wizard displays the cubes existing in the database.

Select the cubes to be included in the database. Let’s say we want to click on Sales Cube. Click on Sales cube and click next.

The measures for the cube are displayed. Double click unit_sales and sales_cost. Click on the measure names selected and rename them. A unique name is required for measures in a virtual cube. We could name our measures Sales_per_Unit and Cost_per_store.

The Dimensions box is displayed. All the dimensions of the cube are displayed. Double click Time, State..

Double-click Time, Product and Customers and then click Next

Type Basic sales as the name of the Virtual cube. Let the Process now option remain selected, click finish and close the process log window once the processing is complete.

The virtual cube Wizard leaves us back at the Virtual cube Editor. This is a modified version of the Cube Editor. It does not contain the schema tab only the data screen.

To make structural changes to the virtual cube the user must click Edit structure Wizard toolbar button to redisplay the virtual cube wizard.

The Analysis server has to process the virtual cube. Processing creates files to identify the cube and indicate how to relate the virtual cube to the original cube.