Databases Reference
In-Depth Information
Relational databases
We have saved the best for last! Without the time or expense of writing complicated
interfacing programs, Essbase allows you to create a data load rule that automatically
connects directly to an external relational database such as, Teradata or SQL Server,
just to name a few. Using a load rule with connection information specified, you
actually write an SQL query using the source database's own
Structured Query
Language (SQL)
commands. You can use this data source to build the outline itself
or to load the data values.
By now, you should be telling yourself just how cool you think
Essbase is and what did you ever do before you learned about it.
Data load methods
We have discussed the types of data you can load into your Essbase database.
We have also discussed how these types of data can be loaded as just the data
values themselves, or that they can be used to build your Essbase database outline
by dynamically adding dimension members and then loading the data values.
Here, we will discuss some of the various methods you can use to load data into
your Essbase database.
Data file freeform (no load rule)
This method is quite possibly the most worry free and easy way to load data into an
Essbase database. When you have a properly formatted (Essbase-friendly) data file,
all you need to do is drag-and-drop the file onto the EssCmd/MaxL executable files
or their desktop shortcuts. Essbase will automatically determine what delimiter you
are using and correctly load the data.
Here are just a few words of caution on using this data load method. The reason it is
so easy at the load step is because the harder work has already been done at the front
of this process to create an Essbase-friendly data source. If you were to create such a
program, it would need to construct your data source file in such a way as to match
the structure of the database outline. Each field, in every row of data in the file,
would need to contain a representative member from every dimension in the Essbase
database outline. The data in the file would also need to be ordered in the same order
as the members in the outline from top to bottom.
