Database Reference
In-Depth Information
Essbase server, look at existing applications, create new applications, look at a list of exist-
ing users and create new users, among other operations. Likewise, the
IEssOlapServer
interface includes
connect
,
getApplications
,
createApplication
,
getOlapUsers,
and
create-
OlapUser
methods to perform these operations.
Note:
naming conventions in Java typically use camel casing where the first letter of
the first word in a method name is in lower case, but the first letter of subsequent words
in the method name use an initial capital letter.
much like Essbase itself, the objects in the API have a hierarchy. An Essbase server can
have multiple Essbase applications. In the Java API, you could say that the
IEssOlapServer.
getApplications
method returns the collection of
IEssOlapApplication
objects, or Essbase
applications, on the server. In other words, there is a one-to-many relationship between
the server and the application. Further, you also could say the
IEssOlapServer
is the
parent object of each
IEssOlapApplication
. There are a number of things you can do
with Essbase applications in EAS. Applications can be started, they can be stopped, and
you can look at the existing databases in the application, or even create a new database
within an application. The
IEssOlapApplication interface
, likewise, includes
start
,
stop
,
getCubes,
and
createCube
methods to perform these operations.
he
IEssCube
interface represents an Essbase database or cube. There are many things
you can do with an Essbase cube and, thus, the
IEssCube
interface contains many meth-
ods. The methods of the
IEssCube
interface include methods to load data, calculate
the database, read the dimensions and members of the database, create and open the
database outline for editing, create and manipulate new files, such as Calc Scripts, and
obtain the objects used to define and execute a data query.
he
IEssCubeOutline
interface has methods for querying and manipulating the dimen-
sions and members in the outline, verifying changes to an outline, saving the outline,
and restructuring the cube. There is a one-to-one relationship between the
IEssCube
and the
IEssCubeOutline
objects. An
IEssCubeOutline
instance is obtained using the
IEssCube.openOutline
method.
An Essbase outline must contain two or more dimensions. Likewise, the
IEssCubeOutline
interface contains a
getDimensions
method that returns a collection
of
IEssDimension
objects. he
IEssDimension
interface contains methods to do things
you would typically do with dimensions, including reading and changing the dense/
sparse storage options and reading or modifying level and generation names. It also has
a method,
getDimensionRootMember
, which returns the
IEssMember
object that repre-
sents the dimension member.
Essbase members are represented in the API in the
IEssMember
interface. This inter-
face has methods to get or set the value of every property of a member including its
name, description, formatting string, formula, aliases, attributes, and child members.
The objects discussed so far are very intuitive to people who work with Essbase on a
regular basis. There are a number of other objects that are not so obvious, despite the
fact that Essbase users may have been working with them, albeit indirectly, for years.
The reason that these objects are not well known is that they are used primarily for que-
rying data from the database and as such are not represented in the EAS interface. They
do, however, manifest themselves “under-the-covers” in the classic Essbase Excel
®
add-
in. you can see these objects when you preview data for a database in EAS (Figure 8.2).
he
IEssCubeView
object is a container object for all of the Essbase operations, and
an
IEssCubeView
instance is obtained from the
IEssCube
. If you think about it, it makes
