The specific class of application that Alphablox supports is online analytical processing (OLAP). In contrast to online transactional processing (OLTP) applications that generate and access data in transactional data sources, OLAP applications access data in data sources. These data sources usually contain data consolidated from transactional detail and stored in a multidimensional architecture.
Part of the application design process is identifying required data, as well as any security issues surrounding access to that data. Answering the following questions can help define application data requirements.
Answering this question as precisely as possible is the first step toward locating the information and defining efficient queries against it. It is important to determine if users already have access to the required information, if there are security issues involved in enabling access, and so forth. For example, regional sales managers may be able to view data for all regions, while regional sales representatives may be able to view data for only their region.
Alphablox applications can access data from a wide variety of multidimensional and relational databases. Before beginning to develop applications, make sure you consider which data sources you will need to access and verify that Alphablox supports your requirements. (For details on support for specific data sources, see the Installation Guide) Many analytic applications rely on multidimensional data sources that organize information into a hierarchy of dimensions and members. Blox are specifically designed to exploit this data hierarchy; their user interfaces enable drilling up and down through the hierarchy, filtering data based on dimensions and members, moving one or more dimensions to a different axis, and so forth.
Alphablox also supports relational data sources that organize information into a row-and-column format. One use for relational data is “drill to detail,” enabling users to move from a multidimensional data source of consolidated information into its underlying detail in a relational data source.
The Alphablox Cube Server component of Alphablox enables administrators to create multidimensional data cubes from information residing in relational data sources. The Alphablox Cube Server is useful for applications that do not require the scalability and overhead of full-featured OLAP data sources. The Alphablox Cube Server contains dimensional metadata so that users can perform such operations as drilling, pivoting, and filtering. For information on how to transform relational data into multidimensional data, see Administering Alphablox Cubes.
Note that when data appears in an Alphablox application, the underlying data format is not apparent to the user. However, user actions that require multidimensional format (such as drilling) are disabled if the data is in relational format.
Beginning with Alphablox, you can use ReportBlox to develop interactive reports from relational data sources, allowing your users to add break groups, reorder columns, sort data, rename columns, and edit cell and header styles through the built-in Report Editor user interface. For information on ReportBlox and its support Blox, see Developing Reporting Applications with ReportBlox.