I've recently heard of OLAP. I'm not familiar with it, could someone
explain the concept to a newbie? What are the benefits of OLAP?

Dear Mike -

Mike> I've recently heard of OLAP. I'm not familiar with it,
Mike> could someone explain the concept to a newbie? What are the
Mike> benefits of OLAP?

Gosh. Let's start at 10,000".

OLAP is a way of accessing and viewing information. It is a
replacement for a subset of traditional business reports.

The key difference between OLAP and traditional reporting is that it's
dynamic. You "open" a report at a highly summarized level and then
you can "drill" into the summary numbers to get an understanding of
their composition when broken down by other "dimensions".

OLAP is something that really must be seen to be appreciated. I was
once explaining the advantages of OLAP to the controller of a firm
and, she said to me "I don't get it. Everything you've told me about
I can do today with my current Excel spreadsheets." I thought for a
moment and suggested "Imagine that it's ten years ago and I'm trying
to explain why you want Excel and your response is 'I don't get it.
Everything you've told me about I can do today with my calculator.'"

Try and find an opportunity to see one of the leading tools
demonstrated. I suggest you check out: Cognos, MicroStrategy,
Hyperion, Brio and/or Business Objects (personally I'm a MicroStrategy
fan). Others hear will undoubtably be able to provide an exhaustive
(at least exhausting) list of OLAP tools.

In lieu of that you can visually imagine looking at a spreadsheet of
costs by department and account. You notice that although most
departments operate with travel costs about $500/yr./headcount the
auditing department spends triple that. You can "right-click" on that
number and a menu pops up that offers you the chance to "drill" into
that number by month, authorizing manager or a dozen other
"dimensions". You then break it down by authorizing manager and notice
that now the numbers are all normal except for the "Travel Auditor".
Hmmm.

The major advantages (as I see it) are three-fold, first it's simply
easier and quicker to find the numbers you're looking for then
flipping through the pages of a collection of reports or, heaven
forbid, requesting a new report be developed with *just* the numbers
you need. Second, it *can* be setup such that the answers are more
current then they could ever reasonably be on a printout. Third, (and
to my mind most important) it incites you to view the data in a more
exploratory manner thereby facilitating both creativity and access to
information (not to be confused with data).

When properly implemented an OLAP infrastructure is an essential
component of corporate performance management and a significant
contributor to a firm's ability to surgically adapt it's policies
and processes to acheive strategic objectives.

Bottom line, it's good stuff.

Yours - Billy

================================================== ==========
William Goedicke goedicke (AT) goedsole (DOT) com
Cell 617-510-7244 http://www.goedsole.com:8080
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Lest we forget:

You can "see" the clams.

- Pauline Goedicke (aka Nana)