Online analytical processing
OLAP performs multidimensional analysis
of business data and provides the capability for complex calculations, trend analysis,
and sophisticated data modelling. OLAP (or Online
Analytical Processing) has been growing in popularity due to the increase in
data volumes and the recognition of the business value of analytics.
OLAP allows business users to slice and dice data
at will. Normally data in an organization is distributed in multiple data
sources and are incompatible with each other.
OLAP consists of three basic analytical
operations:
- · Consolidation(roll-up)
- · Drill-Down
- · Slicing and Dicing
Multi-dimensional databases generally have
hierarchies or formula-based relationships of data within each dimension. Consolidation involves computing all of
these data relationships for one or more dimensions, for example, adding up all
Departments to get Total Division data. While such relationships are normally
summations, any type of computational relationship or formula might be defined.
Drilling
down
or up is a specific analytical technique whereby the user navigates among
levels of data ranging from the most summarized (up) to the most detailed
(down). The drilling paths may be defined by the hierarchies within dimensions
or other relationships that may be dynamic within or between dimensions. For
example, when viewing sales data for South India, a drill-down operation in the
Region dimension would then display Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala etc.
Slice
is a subset of a multi-dimensional array corresponding to a single value for
one or more members of the dimensions not in the subset. The dice operation is a slice on more than
two dimensions of a data cube (or more than two consecutive slices).
By,
Dhiraj Kumar Doley
Team E
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