Building Basic Dimensions and Cubes - Expert Cube Development with SSAS Multidimensional Models - page 35

Even when installing Analysis Services, you need to be aware that there are two
types of models: an instance of Analysis Services can run either in Multidimensional
mode or Tabular mode, and you can't change from one to the other after installation.
What's more, you should have a thorough understanding of the strengths and
weaknesses of both types of models before you start your project and choose
carefully between them. There is no easy way to convert a solution developed for
Analysis Services Multidimensional to Tabular, or vice versa. A blog post that
provides a good overview of the two different models and when you should use
which is available at http://tinyurl.com/ TabularMulti .
Choosing an edition of Analysis Services
Before we start developing with Analysis Services, we need a clear idea of which
edition of Analysis Services we're going to be developing for. There are three choices:
Standard Edition, which is the cheapest but is missing some features; and BI Edition
and Enterprise Edition, which are more expensive, but feature-complete. The only
difference between BI Edition and Enterprise Edition, as far as Analysis Services
Multidimensional goes, is that BI Edition is licensed on a server and Client Access
License ( CAL ) model, whereas Enterprise Edition is licensed on a per-core model.
The licensing cost is likely to be the major factor in the decision about which edition to
choose. If money is no object, then you should use Enterprise Edition or BI Edition.
If money is an issue, then you'll just have to live with the limitations of Standard
Edition. Of course, if we install Analysis Services on a server that already has SQL
Server installed, then there are no extra license costs involved, but as we'll see
in Chapter 11 , Monitoring Cube Performance and Usage , we have to be careful they
don't compete for resources. The SQL Server 2012 Licensing Guide gives a detailed
breakdown of which features are available in each edition, and can be downloaded
from http://tinyurl.com/sql2012licensing .
Don't worry about having to use the Standard Edition though. Some of the features
it lacks can be recreated with a little bit of extra work. The key features in Enterprise
Edition and BI Edition are in the area of performance for very large or complex
cubes, and you can go a long way with Standard Edition before you really need
to use these features. The Deployment Server Edition project property, which is
described next, will help you make sure you only use the features available in the
edition of your choice.