I would like to get the expert opinions on this board on the following
statement:

"The differentiators Hyperion claims fame to are their "Calc Scripts"
and their "Financial Intelligence" ...

Based on what we understand Hyperion to be claiming, no other vendor
can do calculations within their OLAP cube engine, at least not to the
extent Essbase can. The ability of Essbase to know the difference
between a debit and a credit within the contxt of an income or expense
account apparently does not exist within any other tool set."

Are the above statements true? Where only Essabse knows the
difference between a debit and a credit? Isn't this just an attribute
of a member in a dimension? Also it their calc scripting language so
powerful. My impression that most modern OLAP tools are capable of
reproducing what Essbase can do and Essbase may be a bit more complex
and demanding to program - but I realize that this is a relative
statement.

Thanks...

Trenton

This can all be catered for within your Analysis Services solution. There
are various areas to cater for this scenario based on Dr's and Cr's. Yes,
the use of a property would help. This issue has been addressed by o2olap
and a US CPA firm we work with. The resolution of this problem also opens up
other potential applications for the technique used.

Howard.Taylor @domain below
www.o2olap.com


"Trenton Lee" <arthurlee389951 (AT) yahoo (DOT) com> wrote

Trenton,

Definatly not a true claim. www.Salient.com's Margin Minder can
handle this type of debits and credits. Actually a basic cube layout
is to have a sales cube, and an adjustments cube. Normal calculated
fields would then include a substraction of one from the other.

Debits and credits are the same internally in Salient's system, it all
matters how you interpret them when they are analyzed by the system.

As you've probably figured, the salesman's job is to get you to stop
looking around and buy in his shop. Take a look around, there's a
lot out there to be impressed with. It's worth the look.

Bill