To SSAS or not to SSAS, that is the question Ayman Senior PFE - Microsoft

Agenda What is Analysis Services? The many flavors of SSAS Facts, Dimensions, and Cubes Dimensional Modeling Demos

Microsoft’s BI Platform

What is Analysis Services? OLAP – Online Analytical Processing Designed for high speed query processing – Uses data compression and Memory to increase speed – Data is aggregated, which means less data to bring back – Dimensional model further increases speed Not a replacement for OLTP – Designed for reporting over OLTP, DW or DM Data – Can be a Data Mart in itself

The many flavors of SSAS PowerPivot – “Built-in Tabular” for Excel (2GB workbook, 4GB Memory limits) Multi-Dimensional – “Traditional SSAS” Tabular – New for SQL (BI or Enterprise), In-Memory

Facts, Dimensions, and Cubes Fact – Business process or “event” – Example: $29.95 sales price of item Dimension – Attributes that are used to describe Facts – Example: Color of item sold Cubes – “Marriage” or intersection between Facts and Dimensions

Quarters Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 City Philadelphia Chicago NYC Washington D.C. # of Active Food Trucks Type of Food Pizza Burgers Indian Med. Chinese Mexican Dessert **Can have more than three Dimensions

Dimensional Modeling Relational Modeling designed for “saving space” – removing redundant data primary objective Dimensional Modeling designed for faster query speed - less joins, wider tables

Relational Design

Fact Table Dimensional Design – Star Schema

Fact Table Dimensional Design – Snowflake Schema

Demos SSAS Multi-Dimensional PowerPivot and PowerView SSAS Tabular

After Thoughts Watch sessions by Julie Koesmarno – I want it NOW! Data Visualization with PowerView Edwin Sarmiento – SharePoint 2013 as a BI Platform Brian Larson – Tuples, Sets, and Members: Understanding the Basics of MDX James Serra – Building an Effective Data Warehouse Architecture Download and use BIDS Helper

Q&A Ayman Senior PFE - Microsoft