About Dimensions and Dimension Values

How data is organized

Data is organized in Financial Analyzer using three kinds of data structures:

• Dimensions

• Dimension values

• Financial data items

Financial data items are made up of dimensions, which in turn are made up of dimension values.

Definition: Dimensions

Dimensions are database objects that perform the following functions:

• They organize the data contained in financial data items

• They answer the following questions about data: what, when, and where

• They enable you to select and work with specific subsets of data

Definition: Dimension values

Dimension values are the elements that make up a dimension.

Example: Dimensions and dimension values

The report in this example contains the following dimensions and dimension values:

Dimension	Dimension Values
Line	Taxes, Benefits, Office Expenses
Organization	Eastern Region, Central Region, West Region
Time	January 1996

The report displays information for a financial data item called Actuals.

The following illustration shows how the intersection of the Taxes, Eastern Region and January 1996 dimension values points to the financial data item value 5,565,146 in the database.

Who can work with dimensions and dimension values?

Administrators

As an administrator, it is your responsibility to maintain the dimensions and dimension values that your users access in the shared database that you administer. When you create or modify a dimension or dimension value and want other users to be able to access it, you must distribute the dimension or dimension value to the shared database and to other users.

Budget workstation users

As a Budget workstation user, you can create and modify dimensions and dimension values for personal use. You can modify dimensions and dimension values that your administrator has created for you, but you cannot save the modifications unless you assign a new name to the modified dimension or dimension value, so that you retain the original. Also note that you cannot submit data to the shared database if is associated with a dimension or dimension value that you have created in your personal database.