Professional Microsoft® SQL Server® Analysis Services 2008 with MDX

6.3. Cube Dimensions

The Cube Wizard helps you create your cube object from the DSV by creating appropriate dimension objects. The wizard detects the relationships between dimension tables and fact tables in the DSV, creates appropriate dimensions if needed, and establishes appropriate relationships between the dimensions and measure groups within the cube. As mentioned in the previous section, a cube contains an instance of the database dimension referred to as cube dimension. There can be multiple instances of a database dimension within a cube. There exists a relationship between the cube dimension and the measure groups within the cube. In this section you learn about various types of relationships between the cube dimensions and the measure groups within, as well as refine the Adventure Works DW cube created by Cube Wizard by adding a new dimension.

The Cube Wizard establishes relationships between the measure groups and cube dimensions based on its analysis of relationships in the DSV. You might have to refine these relationships based on your business needs. You can change these relationships in the Dimension Usage tab of the cube editor. If you switch to the Dimension Usage tab you will see the dimensions, measure groups of the cube, and the relationships between them, as shown in Figure 6-10.

The cube dimensions and measure groups are represented in a matrix format as rows and columns, respectively, where the relationship between them corresponds to the intersection cell. ...