Getting Started with Tabular July 11, 2015

Phillip Labry  Sr. BI Engineer  IT development for over 25 years  Developer, DBA, Business Intelligence  Experience with Manufacturing, Telecom, Banking, Retail, Government, Insurance, Healthcare, Consulting, Energy Blog: Blog:

BASIC TERMS MeasureNumeric value that can be aggregated (Sales Amount) FactCollection of fields mainly consisting of Measures DimensionTable of values that describes a fact (people, places, things) Star SchemaDimension tables radiating out from a related fact table Snowflake SchemaDimensions related to other dimensions AggregateA mathematical summarization of measures AttributeAnother name for Column(used in Dimensions)

Analysis Services  Released in Version 7 as OLAP Services  Row based storage  Implements Multi Dimensional Expressions(MDX)  Similar enough to SQL to be Very Confusing  Performance gains through preprocessing of aggregations  Data Mining added in 2005

Analysis Services Tabular  Released in 2012  Column based storage(Xvelocity Engine)  Performance via in memory storage and compression  Implements Data Analysis Expressions(DAX)  Not like SQL at all  Consumes data from many sources

DATA SOURCES SQL ServerSQL AzureAPS(PDW)MS Access ExcelAnalysis ServicesSSRS reports Azure Data Marketplace

DATA SOURCES SQL ServerSQL AzureAPS(PDW)MS Access ExcelAnalysis ServicesSSRS reportsText files OracleTeradataSybaseDB2 InformixAzure Data Marketplace OLEDB/ODBCOdata feeds

BI SEMANTIC MODEL: VISION Third-party applications Reporting Services Excel PowerPivot DatabasesLOB ApplicationsFilesOData FeedsCloud Services SharePoint Insights Power View

FOR DEVELOPMENT  Install From SQL 2014 Developer Edition  Must Choose Tabular Server  Only Tabular Or OLAP Per Instance  Use local machine for workspace if you can  DO NOT CHOOSE PRODUCTION SERVER FOR WORKSPACE

UPDATES DON’T FORGET TO APPLY SERVICE PACK 2 FOR SQL SERVER 2012

DIMENSIONS  Wide and shallow  Describe facts  Can contain hierarchies  Can contain calculated columns

HIERARCHIES  Predefine common hierarchies for the users  Hierarchies are defined from largest group to smallest  Year  Quarter  Month  Hide columns used for hierarchies where appropriate

FACT TABLES  Deep and narrow  Mostly measures(Numbers)  Keys to dimensions(Ints)  Natural repository for calculated measures

CALCULATED COLUMNS AND MEASURES Created in the model only Calculated measures execute when called based on filter context Calculated columns are created on data load and persist in memory

DEMO

TIPS FOR DEVELOPMENT  Clean table names on first import  Settle on column names before creating any calculated columns or measures  Flatten out snowflakes where possible  Avoid creating calculated columns for intermediate measures  Use views for source data  Use meaningful and verbose names  Use attribute properties and formatting

CURRENT TABULAR CHALLENGES  Many to many relationships  True role playing dimensions  Multiple language support  Complex or ragged hierarchies  Measure security  Cell level security

THANK