Analysis Services in Business Intelligence Development Studio

  • Article

Business Intelligence Development Studio is the environment that you will use to develop Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) cubes and data mining models in SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services (SSAS). Business Intelligence Development Studio is the Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 environment with enhancements that are specific to business intelligence solutions. Business Intelligence Development Studio opens after you create a new Analysis Services project by using the New Project dialog box in Visual Studio 2005. For more information about the general features of Business Intelligence Development Studio, see Introducing Business Intelligence Development Studio.

Business Intelligence Development Studio provides several unique features that let you work with Analysis Services projects and integrate Analysis Services projects with Reporting Services and Integration Services. These features are described in this topic.

Note

BI Development Studio, the 32-bit development environment for Analysis Services projects, is not designed to run on the IA64 64-bit architecture and is not installed on IA64 servers.

The design surface in Business Intelligence Development Studio is specialized for each object that you work with in Analysis Services. For example, there is a designer for working with data mining models, called Data Mining Designer, and another designer for working with cubes, called Cube Designer. Solution Explorer, located to the right of the design surface, provides a mechanism for navigating between design surfaces and managing the items within a project. Business Intelligence Development Studio also contains a deployment window that displays the progress of a deployment, and a Properties window, allowing you to change the properties of selected objects. For an in-depth look at how to work in these design spaces, see the following tutorials: Data Mining Tutorial, SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services Tutorial

Important

Many new and useful actions are available from the shortcut menus that you see when you right-click labels and objects in the user interface. As you explore Business Intelligence Development Studio and the Analysis Services features discussed in this topic, make sure that you right-click various items to learn about these options.

The following sections describe the components of Business Intelligence Development Studio that are unique to Analysis Services.

  • Solution Explorer
  • Designers
  • Menus
  • Tools/Options

Analysis Services Solution Explorer

You can use the Solution Explorer to move through the different components of your projects. Double-click an item in a folder to open the associated designer, and right-click a folder to add a new item to the folder.

The Solution Explorer contains the following project items when you open a new Analysis Services project.

  • Data Sources folder. A data source represents a connection that can be shared among OLAP cubes and data mining models in a project. For more information, see Defining a Data Source Using the Data Source Wizard.
  • Data Source Views folder. A data source view represents a subset of the data in a data source, and can also contain named queries and named calculations. Data source views can also be shared among multiple OLAP cubes and data mining models in a project. You can designate tables, views, or named queries from a data source view as the source of data for an OLAP cube or data mining model. For more information, see Defining a Data Source View Using the Data Source View Wizard.
  • Cubes. A cube represents a set of measures that are grouped into measure groups and hierarchically organized by dimensions. Cubes are typically constructed from data retrieved from relational data sources, such as an OLTP database, a data warehouse, or a data mart. For more information, see Defining and Configuring Cubes and Cube Properties.
  • Dimensions. Dimensions are used in Analysis Services to organize data within cubes. Dimensions use a combination of hierarchies and attributes to represent levels of categorization within a cube. For more information, see Defining and Configuring Dimensions, Attributes, and Hierarchies.
  • Mining Structures. A mining structure defines the data domain from which mining models are built. A single mining structure can contain multiple mining models that share the same domain. For more information, see Working with Data Mining
  • Roles. Roles are used in Analysis Services to manage security for OLAP and data mining objects and data. For more information, see Roles (Analysis Services).
  • Assemblies. Analysis Services gives you the ability to add assemblies to an Analysis Services instance or database. Assemblies let you create external, user-defined functions using any common language runtime (CLR) language or any Component Object Model (COM) automation language. For more information, see Assemblies (Analysis Services).
  • Miscellaneous folder. If you add files of other types, such as documents or images, to your Analysis Services project, these files are grouped in the Miscellaneous folder.

Analysis Services Designers

You can use the following designers in an Analysis Services project in Business Intelligence Development Studio. To use a designer, open its associated project item in Solution Explorer.

  • Data Source View Designer. The Data Source View Designer provides an environment that you can use to add and remove objects, designate logical primary columns, define relationships between tables, replace tables with other tables or with named queries, and add named calculations to existing tables in the data source view. For more information, see .Adding or Removing Tables or Views in a Data Source View, Viewing or Changing Data Source View, DataTable and DataColumn Properties in a Data Source View, and Lesson 3: Modifying Measures, Attributes and Hierarchies
  • Cube Designer. The Cube Designer provides an environment to configure the cube and the objects in the cube. For international applications, you can add translations for Analysis Services objects. For processed cubes, you can browse the cube structure and view data. For more information, see Cube Designer (SSAS)
  • Dimension Designer. The Dimensions Designer provides an environment to configure the dimension and the objects in the dimension. For international applications, you can add translations for the dimension metadata. For processed dimensions, you can browse the dimension structure and view data. For more information, see Dimension Designer (SSAS)
  • Data Mining Designer. The Data Mining Designer provides an environment that you can use to create, explore, and work with data mining models. For more information, see Data Mining Designer.

Analysis Services Menus

Business Intelligence Development Studio contains the following custom menu items that you can use with an Analysis Services project.

  • Database. Use the Database menu options to make changes to the Analysis Services database associated with the current Analysis Services project. For more information, see Working with Analysis Services Databases
  • Cube. Use the Cube menu options to navigate through the Cube Designer, or to perform operations specific to the cube selected in Solution Explorer. For more information, see Defining and Configuring Cubes and Cube Properties
  • Dimensions. Use the Dimensions menu options to navigate through the Dimension Designer, or to process the dimension selected in Solution Explorer. For more information, see Defining and Configuring Dimensions, Attributes, and Hierarchies
  • Mining Model. Use the Mining Model menu options to navigate through the Data Mining Designer, or to perform tasks specific to the tab and options selected in the designer. For more information, see Working with Data Mining

Note

The full functionality of the menu item is not available unless the associated project item is selected in Solution Explorer.

Analysis Services Tools/Options

You can set the following options, which are specific to Analysis Services, in the Options dialog box. To access the Options dialog box, select Options from the Tools menu.

  • Connection and query timeouts. Use to set the default time-out for connecting to an instance of Analysis Services, and the default timeout for querying against an instance of Analysis Services. The timeouts are measured in seconds.
  • Default Deployment Server Edition. Use to set the edition of the server that the project will be deployed to, and to adjust the defaults for new projects that you create. This property serves as the basis for designer validations, which are specific to the edition. You can select one of the following options:
    • Developer
    • Enterprise
    • Evaluation
    • Standard
  • Default Target Server. Specifies the default server for new projects.
  • Data Mining Viewers. Use to adjust the default colors used in the data mining viewers.

See Also

Concepts

Introducing Business Intelligence Development Studio
Introduction to Solutions, Projects, and Items

Other Resources

Introducing SQL Server Management Studio

Help and Information

Getting SQL Server 2005 Assistance