Relative date analysis and data navigation

The modeling tools allow for relative time analysis and data navigation, although each tool accomplishes these functions in a different way.

Framework Manager supports dimensionally modeled relational (DMR) modeling, which is similar to ROLAP. This type of modeling allows Cognos® Analytics to build a cube cache of the data to perform traditional, OLAP-style queries by using the multidimensial expression (MDX) query language, which is used to query dimensional sources. With DMR models, authors can use powerful dimensional functions for data analysis, comparison, and manipulation.

By using DMR, you can easily perform relative time analysis by dragging the members that you want to compare into the query, or use dimensional functions to retrieve the members for comparison. DMR also allows you to navigate up and down through the hierarchies of the dimensions, which is called drilling up and down. This makes for quick and powerful analysis of the data with the ability to drill down into the details.

For more information, see Defining the Dimensional Representation of the Model.

In data modules, relative date analysis is accomplished in a purely relational fashion by constructing relative date filters and relative date measures. The following screen capture shows the relative date filters for the Open Date column in a sample data module:

And the following screen capture shows the relative date measures for the Service Requests measure in the same sample data module:

For more information, see Relative date analysis.

Data modules also allow you to navigate defined levels in your data using the navigation path feature. You can define logically related levels, such as Year, Month, Date, or non-related levels, such as Product, State, Customer, and so on. When navigation paths are enabled, users can drill up and down through the data in dashboards or explorations.

For more information, see Creating navigation paths.