Perspectives

A perspective is a subset of a cube that presents a specific view of the cube's data to business users. Perspectives simplify cube analysis by providing users with focused, task-oriented views that are easier to navigate and understand than the entire cube. They can hide unnecessary objects (tables, columns, measures, hierarchies) and expose only those relevant to a particular business process or user role.

Benefits of Using Perspectives

Simplification: Reduces complexity for end-users by showing only relevant data.
Security: Can be combined with roles to provide granular data access control.
Performance: While not directly improving query performance, a simplified view can lead to more targeted queries.
Usability: Improves user experience and adoption of BI solutions.

Creating and Managing Perspectives

Perspectives are created and managed using SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT) or SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS). You define which objects (tables, columns, measures, hierarchies, attributes) are visible within each perspective.

Key Objects in a Perspective

Visible Tables: A subset of tables from the data source view.
Visible Cubes: A subset of cubes within the Analysis Services database.
Visible Measures: Specific measures or measure groups that are exposed.
Visible Hierarchies/Attributes: Specific dimensions or hierarchies within dimensions that are made available.

Example Scenario

Consider a large retail cube with data for sales, inventory, and marketing. Users in the sales department may only need access to sales figures and product dimensions, while marketing users might focus on campaign performance and customer demographics. Perspectives allow you to create a "Sales View" and a "Marketing View" of the same underlying cube.

Creating a Sales Perspective (Conceptual Steps):

Open your Analysis Services project in SSDT.
Navigate to the Perspectives folder in Solution Explorer.
Create a new perspective, for example, "Sales Perspective".
In the perspective designer, select the cube(s) to include.
For each selected cube, choose which dimensions, hierarchies, and measures to make visible. You might hide the inventory measures and dimensions irrelevant to sales.
Save and deploy the changes.

Technical Considerations

When designing perspectives, consider the following:

The naming convention for perspectives should be clear and intuitive.
Document the purpose and contents of each perspective.
Test perspectives thoroughly with representatives of the target user groups.

Note: Perspectives do not physically divide the data; they provide logical views. All data remains available in the underlying cube, but only the objects marked as visible in a perspective are exposed to the user querying that perspective.

Tip: For complex cubes, consider creating multiple perspectives, each tailored to a specific business function or user role, to significantly improve usability and reduce training overhead.

By effectively leveraging perspectives, you can transform complex multidimensional models into user-friendly interfaces, empowering business users to derive insights more efficiently.