Defining cubes

To define the general properties of an Alphablox cube:
  1. Log into the Alphablox Admin Pages as the admin user or as a user who is a member of the administrators group.
  2. Click the Administration tab and then click the Cubes link.
  3. Click the Create button. The Cube Administration dialog appears in a new browser window.
  4. In the Alphablox Cube Name field, type a unique name for the Alphablox cube. Allowable characters for Alphablox cube names are A-Z, a-z, 0-9, underscore (_), dash (-), space, percent, at @, single quote, parenthesis ( or ) and period. However, you cannot use a period as the final character in an Alphablox cube name.
  5. Check the Enabled check box to the right of the Alphablox Cube Name field now, or later when you are ready to start this cube. When Enabled is selected, this cube will start automatically whenever the server restarts. If you are working on the cube definition and do not expect it to run properly or you do not want to give others access to it yet, leave the check box cleared and enable the cube later.
  6. From the Relational Data Source menu, select a relational data source previously defined in Creating relational data sources. If the list is empty, no Alphablox relational data sources have been defined.
  7. Optional: If you need to restrict access to your cube, type a predefined role (either defined in your application server or in Alphablox) into the Security Role field and check the Enabled check box.
  8. Optional: If you are using a DB2® data source and have Cubing Services cubes available on your data source, the Enable DB2 Cube Views™ Settings option is available. If you select this option, the available cube definitions in Cubing Services can be used to specify your Alphablox cube. To use this option:
    1. Using the Cube Model menu, select a cube model.
    2. Using the Cube menu, select a cube.
    3. Select either the Use Business Names or Use Object Names radio button to specify the type of names to be used to define objects in your Alphablox cube.

      The Use Business Names option displays alternative descriptive names for objects that are more meaningful way to users, while the Use Object Names option displays the labels assigned to the physical objects.

    4. Click the Import Cube Definition button to import a cube definition and pre-populate measures and dimensions in your Alphablox cube. Depending on the cube definition imported, Alphablox Cube Server attempts to specify an Alphablox cube that closely matches the one in Cubing Services. Click the Show Import Log button to see a log specifying information and debugging messages related to the import operation.
    5. At this point, you can edit the imported cube measures and dimensions (as described below) to customize your cube, or you can optionally check the Import cube definition (on start, rebuild, and edit) option. When selected, the Alphablox cube loads the latest Cubing Services cube definition every time the cube is started, rebuilt, or opened for edit.
  9. Click the OK button to save the Alphablox cube.
Parent topic: Creating and modifying cubes