Hyperion Essbase FAQS - 41 - 60

41. What is Dense restructure and why does this happen?
Ans: whenever we add/remove a dense dimension member from the outline, the outline has to restructure itself so as to accommodate the changes happened to the outline. This is called as dense restructure.

42. What are shared members and why do we use them?
Ans: If there are same named members in the outline we can tag one of the members as the shared member such that the data won’t be saved for this but it will point the original member instead when queried.

43. What files are created when you load a cube with data? How is their structure?
Ans: Index file (.ind file), page file (.pag file), configuration file (.cfg file)

44. Which files have .otn extension and why are they used? (Hint: It is not .otl)
Ans .otn is a temporary Hyperion essbase outline file,
45. What is expense reporting and why do you use it?
Ans: Expense reporting is tagged to the accounts dimension such that variance, profit etc. member will not show the negative value when we calculate it.

46. What is Time Balancing and why is it used?
Ans: When we set time balance property to a member in accounts dimension, it affects how Essbase affects the calculation of that parent member in the time dimension. We need to tag the accounts dimension as expenses and should have time dimension, we can calculate ending inventory and opening inventory using this.

47. What is consolidation and why is it done?
Ans: Consolidation, the data of all the children/descendants will be added and that will be rolled up to the parent member…

48. What is MASK and why is it used?
Ans: Mask is Essbase command. It is used if Essbase data is imported into a program that requires delimiters. Use INCMASK to re-enable the display. Use SUPMASK to disable the display.

49. Differentiate between default calc and intelligent calc?
Ans: Default calc is used to calculate the whole cube and intelligent calc is used to calculate the updated values only or the dirty cells.

50. Can you override default column grouping?
Yes.
1. Use the "SYM" command when the selection of column members meets the requirements of the rule for asymmetry, but you want to produce a symmetric report. The "SYM" command always produces a symmetric report, creating all combinations of each column dimension.
2. Turn off the symmetric format and restore the rules for asymmetric reports with the "ASYM" command.

51. What is the difference from symmetric and asymmetric reports?
Essbase reports can contain symmetric or asymmetric column groups
A symmetric report, shown below, is characterized by repeating, identical groups of members.
An asymmetric report, shown below, is characterized by groups of nested members that differ by at least one member in the nested group. There can be a difference in the number of members or the names of members.
By default, Essbase creates a symmetric report unless you select the same number of members for all column dimensions.

52. What is the maximum number of parallel threads used to calculate?
Ans: Four threads.

53. How does Report Extractor Retrieves Data?
The Report Extractor processes the report script and retrieves data in the following Order:
Composes the member list, based on all possible member combinations.
For example, the following command retrieves member East and all of its Descendants:
1. IDESCENDANTS East
2. Applies member restrictions. For example, the following command refines the member selection: LINK
3. Orders the member output. For example, the following command determines the order in which members are sorted: SORT
4. Extracts data from the following areas:
● Local regions
● Partitioned regions
● Dynamically calculated data
5. Restricts data. For example, the following command suppresses the display of all rows that contain only missing values: {SUPMISSINGROWS}
6. Sorts data. For example, the following command returns rows with the highest Values of a specified data column: TOP
7. Formats output. For example, the following command skips one or more lines in the final output report: {SKIP}
The order in which the Report Extractor retrieves data is important when using complex extraction and formatting commands. For example, because the Extractor restricts data (step 5) before sorting data (step 6), if you place conditional retrieval Commands in the wrong order, the report output results could be unexpected. Be aware of the data retrieval process when designing your report scripts.

54. What is a batch POV (Point of View)?
Ans: The batch POV is a collection of all dimensions on the user POV of every report And book in the batch. While scheduling the batch the members selected on the batch POV’s may be set.

55. Point of View (POV)?
Ans: A Unique set of dimension members that define specific intersection of data.

56. Extensible Markup Language (XML)?
Ans: A Language comprised of set of tags used to assign attributes to data that can be interpreted between the applications based on the schema used.

57. What is a Grid POV?
Ans: The Grid POV enables designers to specify the members for a dimension on a grid with out placing the dimension on the row, column or page intersection. The report designer can set the POV Values at the grid level, preventing the user POV from affecting the particular grid. If a dimension has only one value for the entire grid, the dimensions should be put in to the grid POV instead of the row, column or page.

58. Why do you need a batch POV?
Ans: It allows anyone scheduling the batch to use the same default values for all the grids in all reports in the batch simultaneously when the batch is run. It is specific to a data source for a single batch, but not specific to any report or grid to a report in a batch. Since the batch POV values are only saved when the batch is scheduled, you can set different values for the same batch. Changes to the batch POV do not effect the designers POV the changes to the designers POV do not effect the users POV.

59. What are Report member selections?
Ans: The Report member selections define the values for the values for any dimensions not in the grid’s row, column, or page axis or set in the grid POV for all reports in a specific report in the book.

60. Why do you need a book POV?
Ans: It allows anyone running the batch to use the same default values for all the grids in all reports in the book simultaneously each time the book is run. It is specific to a data source for a single book, but not specific to any report or grid object in a report in that book. As the book POV values are saved with the book itself, changes to the book POV does not affect the designers POV.

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