In general, attribute dimensions and their members are similar to standard dimensions and their members. You can provide aliases and member comments for attributes. Attribute dimensions can include hierarchies, and you can name generations and levels. You can perform the same spreadsheet operations on attribute dimensions and members as on standard dimensions and members; for example, to analyze data from different perspectives, you can retrieve, pivot, and drill down in the spreadsheet.
Table 18 describes major differences between attribute and standard dimensions and their members.
Table 18. Differences Between Attribute and Standard Dimensions
Sparse. An attribute dimension's base dimension also must be sparse | ||
Can be Dynamic Calc only. Therefore, not stored in the database. The outline does not display this property. | Can be Store Data, Dynamic Calc and Store, Dynamic Calc, Never Share, or Label Only | |
Cannot be defined along attribute dimensions, but you can use attributes to define a partition on a base dimension | ||
If a member formula contains a runtime-dependent function associated with an attribute member name, and the member with the formula is tagged as two-pass, calculation skips the member and issues a warning message. Runtime-dependent functions include: @CURRMBR, @PARENT, @PARENTVAL, @SPARENTVAL, @MDPARENTVAL, @ANCEST, @ANCESTVAL, @SANCESTVAL, and @MDANCESTVAL. See Understanding Two-Pass Calculations on Attribute Dimensions. | Calculation is performed on standard members with runtime formulas and tagged two-pass. | |
Order of calculation of members tagged two-pass depends on order in outline. The last dimension is calculated last. | Calculation result is not dependent on outline order for members tagged two-pass in multiple dimensions. | |
Calculation skipped, warning message issued. Therefore, member intersection of two-pass tagged members and upper-level members may return different results from calculation on standard dimensions. See Understanding Two-Pass Calculations on Attribute Dimensions. | ||
Calculations skip dense dimensions if they are on nonexisting stored blocks. For attributes to work on dense members, data blocks for the dense members must exist. When retrieving data on a dense member that has a Dynamic Calc formula and no attributes, Essbase dynamically creates the data block and returns a value. However, if the Dynamic Calc dense member has an attribute, doing a retrieve on the attribute member results in #MISSING, because Essbase skips the dynamic calculation on the dense member and, therefore, the data block is not created. To identify nonexisting stored blocks, export the database or run a query to find out whether the block has data. | ||
For all members, calculated through the Attribute Calculations dimension members: Sum, Count, Min, Max, and Avg. Consolidation operators in the outline are ignored during attribute calculations. | Consolidation operation indicated by assigning the desired consolidation symbol to each member | |
List the base dimension data associated with the selected attribute. For example, drilling down on the attribute Glass displays sales for each product packaged in glass, where Product is the base dimension for the Pkg Type attribute dimension. | List lower or sibling levels of detail in the standard dimensions. For example, drilling down on QTR1 displays a list of products and their sales for that quarter. |