SQL Server 2000
SQL Server 2000 is a major leap forward. It comes with more than the usual RDBMS and includes components that probably would have been separate products in the past.
Along with a robust relational database management system, you will find several different services and utilities such as the SQL Server Agent, the Distributed Transaction Coordinator, the SQL profiler, and the Enterprise Manager. The product also comes with ‘English Query (EQ)’ which allows you to develop applications for non-technical users. EQ simplifies the query process by allowing the user to use plain English in querying the database.
Another outstanding product that comes with the database is ‘Analysis Services’. This is the OLAP (On Line Analytical Processing), data warehousing, and data mining tools. Replication capability is also included.
Data Transformation Services (DTS) has expanded enormously in SQL Server 2000. The product has different functionality in transforming data, either within a database or transferring information in or out. Customized tasks can also be handled. DTS reduces the need for companies to use programmatic approach to transform data.
SQL Server 2000 is a robust system and offers an excellent price/value relationship.
Analysis Services
‘Analysis Services’ brings the
OLAP form of analysis and reporting to the developer and the user. The approach provides a method to work with ‘dimensions’ in converting the online Transaction Processing (OLTP) to multidimensional reporting. OLAP systems are commonly used for decision support systems (DSS) and executive information systems (EIS). A common term used with OLAP is the ‘Data Cube’. In the Data Cube, data is summarized at the various dimensional levels such as: time, product, location, customer, sales, etc.
Modeling data multi-dimensionally facilitates online business analysis and query performance. The Analysis Manager allows you to turn data stored in relational databases into meaningful, easy-to-navigate business information by creating these data cubes. The most common way of managing relational data for multidimensional use is with a star schema. A star schema consists of a single fact table and multiple dimension tables linked to the fact table.
DynaSight is able to connection to the data cube and Analysis Services interface is shown in the picture to the right. The left side of the database window shows the available data source cubes. An Analysis cube consists of the dimensions as descriptive categories and of the values as quantitative elements. All dimensions are equivalent. The value dimension is shown separately in inSight.
Each dimension consists of one or more hierarchies, which again consist of individual named levels. For performance reason you can define a dimension to contain calculated members.
A dimension may also have defined attributes that associate each element with a value (e.g., color or size). The attributes can be queried like key figures of dimension elements (as column titles).
The elements of the key figure dimension of the Analysis Services data source are also listed separately in the inSight database window as "values". This is a helpful function during application development that permits a convenient and quick access to individual values.
With Analysis Services, you can design storage options for the data and aggregations in your cube. You can choose from three storage modes: multidimensional OLAP (MOLAP), relational OLAP (
ROLAP), and hybrid OLAP (HOLAP).
The Analysis Services allows you to set up aggregations, which are pre-calculated summaries of data that greatly improve the efficiency and response time of queries.
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