From Power View to Cube and back again - A Recap Friday

Well what have we here now? Another Friday has settled upon us. Man what busy week this has been, filled with all kinds of great things. I wanted to take the time, and just post a recap of sorts from this & last weeks post. The goal and focus of these past weeks have been around truly using the BI Semantic Model within the context of Dynamics AX 2012 R2.



Without a doubt for each of the topics covered, there is plenty of room for extended reach & depth of knowledge. We can easily spend hours, upon hours within Power View design concepts and more. Further, we could opine and expound on the many depths that exist within the realm of SSAS cubes. Topics as deep as Tuples, and the underlying structures that contain our aggregated measures & dimension attributes. However, while there might be some value for certain people in such a deep journey of understanding for each of the fore mentioned topics, the point would be lost of what the goal really is.



That goal my friends is the enablement of quick consumption of data assets. This is the real goal of any business intelligence story that is to be crafted for a company. Owning the data, and turning that data into a real asset that goes to work for companies. With this goal in mind then, the following is a recap of the recent post, with the goal of quickly getting you up & running with Power View. Further, showing you how *any* cube can be the target for such personal BI artifacts.

• AX 2012 R2 and PowerView - Part I
• AX 2012 R2 and PowerView - Part II Extending
• The Cube behind the Power View - Part I - Perspective
• The Cube behind the Power View - Part II - Create, Deploy & Process

Now having each of these reviewed, you should see how simple it really is to empower yourself and your company or clients to truly start embracing the full BI Semantic Model. When Microsoft Dynamics AX is your system of record, and acting as your main data mart, then you have a great BI offering built right into the product. This is what we refer to as Tier 1 BI for Dynamics AX customers. Meaning that nothing but the stack of Office+SharePoint+SQL Server (OSS) is used to craft a BI story for a company. It's very feasible, and does not take a deep understanding of the empowering underlying technologies to get started.

Well that's all I wanted to gab about today with you. The end result is less focus around what tool really, and more about the data. To much focus at times is placed in the ecosystem currently around specific tools, and myths of 'removing IT' from the equation. The goal is putting your data to work for you, and then the tool comes into focus for the specific BI artifacts that are needed to get the job done.



I would like to add an interesting note here. This is actually my first full blog post, from my new Surface Pro 128 GB version. I'm typing this from the 'real keyboard' cover type as well as having the use of the Surface mouse and stylus for completion of task. I must say I'm very impressed and really looking to push this to the limits. Til Next Time!
Follow Me @:
       

"Visit the Dynamics AX Community Page today!"

The Cube behind the Power View - Part II - Create, Deploy & Process

I hope everyone is having a blessed, Dynamics filled week! Hard to believe that we are well into April of 2013. I do love when the days get longer, the sun is closer, and there is plenty of vitamin D to be absorbed. With this, I wanted to continue the series that was started yesterday, focusing on 'The Cube behind the Power View'. In yesterday's post, Part I - Perspective, we covered the in's and out's of modeling a cube from a perspective.



Having gone through the previous post, you should have a perspective that is ready for targeting a brand new Analysis Services project. After generating the analysis services project in the AOT, we will further create, deploy & process our newly generated cube. Lets get's started then!

A - Create
Our next step is to make use of the 'SQL Server Analysis Services Project Wizard.' This is located within a development work space for AX 2012 R2. You then click on the Tools menu option, Business Intelligence (BI) Tools & finally launch the wizard. Shown in the below image is that exact path.



In launching the Analysis Services Wizard, you should see a screen shot similar to what we see in the below image.



Clicking on the next button will take you to the first prompt where we start to configure this session of the Analysis Services Wizard.



You will notice in the above screen shot, that I have selected the create option. Further I've supplied what the project should be called. The goal is to create a separate SSAS database, and cube within. This leaves in tact the out-of-the-box cube database and cube elements. Further you will notice the name I've given this new project. It has a prefix, which is recommended being this will live in the AOT. Since I work for Sunrise Technologies, I use the prefix of "sun".

Clicking next after filling in the prompt for the create option, will lead us to the below image.



You will notice in the above screen shot, that we have selected the Sales Data perspective. This is listed by label, and what the cube will be named. Moving right along from here, clicking next will bring us to the next image, shown below.



The above shows dimension possibilities from the Shared Dimensions perspective. This is not something we care about in our current targeted cube, and therefore we will leave out for now. Clicking next on this screen, with leaving everything left blank, should take you to the following.



What you see with the above, is the date dimensions in which we can select and work with. These are generated and created within Dynamics AX. We can modify these, and further create different one's, like a fiscal date set. Keep in mind that based on any dimension we selected which has a Date or UtcDateTime data type, will be crossed with these date dimensions. Dynamics AX will automatically generate this for yu via the modeling of the perspective that you created earlier. Selecting date above, and clicking next, should take you to the following screen.



The above image shows the language selection for the cube that is being targeted. Based on the languages you have setup within Dynamics AX, such can be taking advantage of here. Translations exist within cubes as they do within Dynamics AX. For our current target we are selecting just U.S. based English. Doing so, and clicking next will take you to the following.



You will see in the above image we are now generating our project. This basically ends the create portion of this post, as the Analysis Service project is now generated and living within the AOT.

B - Deploy
Now that we have created our analysis service project, we will continue using the wizard to finish things out. With that, we should see a screen shot similar to the below.



Clicking on next from the progress update, should take us to the following screen.



You will notice I'm saving the actual project to the AOT, under the name sunSalesAnalysis. This allows for again a separate project not related to the out-of-the-box cubes. Clicking next, after filling this prompt out as shown above, will take me to the following.



Here is where we actually select which cube databases we want to deploy. Since the concept of partitions came into being with R2, cubes take this into consideration. With the demo data set we have two partitions which are initial and ps. Since we only care about the inital partition and the legal entities contained therein, that is the target for deployment.

C - Process
I eject the process here, as it's an option we have selected int he above screen shot. Doing this means once the cube database is deployed it will process as well. Allowing us to remain within Dynamics AX the entire time, without having to jump into anything else to achieve this. Having made our above selections and clicking next, will take us through a series of progress updates.



Having reached the end of the deployment and processing, we should see an image similar to the one below.



In clicking next, that is it! We have created, deployed & finally processed our new cube. If there where multiple cubes targeted for this specific database, then those would have processed as well. Just to show that this processing took place, I quickly consumed the Sales Data cube from within SQL Server Data Tools. You can see this data, processed in the cube in the image below.



Now obvious there are plenty of things that can be done from this point. More advanced topics that could and should be covered. However there is only so much one should write at a given time, specifically for the type of medium you find yourself reading right now. I hope this helps you out, and further helps show how easy it is to create a cube. Finally, keep in mind the focus of extending power view within Dynamics AX. The combined knowledge should give you exactly what you need to really start taking advantage of the bull BI Semantic Model. Make sure to check back soon & often! Til Next Time!

Follow Me @:
       

"Visit the Dynamics AX Community Page today!"

The Cube behind the Power View - Part I - Perspective

Recently I started a series on making the most use of Power View for Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2. This is a great new tool that helps further complete the personal BI story for Dynamics AX customers. It's enabled within a framework delivered as part of the current version from Microsoft, and part of that framework is the consumption of SQL Server Analysis Services Cubes.



Before we get into the 'cube behind the Power View', lets recap with the following resources in how we arrived here. The following is the list of post that should be read, before reading this post.

• AX 2012 R2 and PowerView - Part I (Understanding)
• AX 2012 R2 and PowerView - Part II Extending

With the above list, and what was covered in mind, now we can look into the cube that powered this concept. The whole point that I was trying to get across with the above to post is that it's easy to extend the Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2 Power View Framework. Further to this point, not only can you extend from the base cubes that exists within Dynamics AX, but also any cube database you create and cube contained within.



The above image is the final representation of a cube created from a perspective with the AOT. Unlike perspectives within cubes themselves, these are elements within the AOT that allow the modeling of a SQL Server Analysis Services Cube. We can see in the following image, that is the starting point for our custom cube.



Perspectives are made up of Table & View elements from within the AOT as well. You must think in terms of facts that you want to measure, and dimensions to slice said measures via. This is the point of tables, and views to provide such facts and dimensions & attributes. We can see in the following image, the tables & views that make up our targeted perspective. It happens to be the InventTable, as well as, the SalesLineCube & CustTableCube view elements.



After having set our perspective targets from the tables & views we can make use of, our next focus is around the properties of each. What we see in the following series of images, is the properties of the InventTable, SalesLineCube & CustTableCube as they sit within the perspective. What we make a choice for each, is how we are modeling our to-be cube outcome.


InventTable Element Properties.




SalesLineCube Element Properties.




CustTableCube Element Properties.

You will note that the SalesLineCube provides both measures as well as dimensions. Further it is the targeted transaction table, in which the cube will build measures from. This is why we have this property marked as such. Further you will note that the other two elements are left as auto and only have dimension label established for them. This then allows Dynamics AX to understand we want each of these elements to be dimension elements against our "fact table" represented in the SalesLineCube element.

Moving along from this point, our next focus is to pick which elements we want to become measures, and then finally what we want as dimension attributes. Keep in mind, that we will make use of the SalesLineCube view as both a fact table containing measures as well as dimension attribute values to slice via. Lets start with the measures on the SalesLineCube. I'm going to show the following image, that is an example of each what this should look like. Then have a list of each measure we care about to finalize our needs.



What we see in the above image is the targeted SalesQty field, from the SalesLineCube view element in the perspective. We see the properties for said field, in how we label it, type of being a measure, and further the default total type of sum. Having this, now we can use the following list to create our final measures.:

• SalesQty - 'Sales Qty' - Measure - Sum
• SalesPrice - 'Sales Price' - Measure - Sum
• SalesStatus - 'Order Status' -Attribute - (blank)
• ShippingDateConfirmed - 'Ship Date' - Attribute - (blank)
• CreatedDateTime1 - 'Created Date' - Attribute - (blank)

Having the above established for the SalesLineCube element in the perspective, next we can do similar setup for both the InventTable, as well as the CustTableCube. Keep in mind, that the InventTable, when modeled as a cube will be 'Product Information'. Further CustTableCube, will show up as 'Customer Information.'
InventTable

• ItemId - 'Item Id' - Attribute
• ABCRevenue - 'ABC Rev' - Attribute

Moving forward still we will need to complete our dimensions from the CustTableCube view element. Doing this is very similar to what we just did, selecting fields that are meaningful in which our dimension attributes should target. These will be used, to slice & dice our measures with. The following is the list for the 'Customer Information' dimension set.
CustTableCube

• AccountNum - 'Account Id' - Attribute
• GroupName - 'Group' - Attribute
• Name - 'Customer Name' - Attribute
• CountryRegionId - 'Country' - Attribute

Now having the above set for the perspective, we have now modeled what we want our new 'Sales Data' cube to be made of. Having these specific measures, as well as dimension attributes specified will allow Dynamics AX 2012 R2 to build out our cube as desired. That is where this part I of 'The Cube behind the Power View' ends. We will pick this back up in my next post, for proceeding with creating a new Analysis Service project, deploying, processing and finally consuming. Til Next Time!

Follow Me @:
       

"Visit the Dynamics AX Community Page today!"

AX 2012 R2 and PowerView - Part II Extending

What a great day to be alive! I know for a lot of people, including myself, today has special meaning. It's about faith, and remembering that we are finite and need our Creators grace & mercy. So I must first hope that everyone has a blessed good Friday, and you find yourselves doing well. Further, today I wanted to continue the series I started yesterday around Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R2 & PowerView.

For those that are just reading this post, you can go to Part I of this series located here.: AX 2012 R2 and PowerView - Part I. Having the knowledge gained from that post, we can now continue with extending PowerView for AX 2012 R2 with our own custom cube!.



We start this journey by focusing on where the PowerView data connections and artifacts are stored within Enterprise Portal. You can see this location in the above screen shot from the demo image I'm using as my target. This is located in.: 'http://[site]/sites/DynamicsAX/Power View Reports/'.



Having the location open, we can then target creating a new data source that we will want PowerView to consume. As we can see in the above image, we target a new data source by simply adding one to the document library. Further what's important to not, as seen in the below image, is the connection type and the connection string.



You will not that we have a connection type that is very specific to enabling PowerView artifact creation. This type is called.: Microsoft BI Semantic Model for Power View. Further the connection string is very important as well. This happens to be pointing to a custom SSAS Cube Database and further a custom SSAS cube.



These where both created from the BI Project wizard within Dynamics AX 2012 R2, from a perspective representing the Measures & Dimensions desired. The following is an example connection string that is valid, that you can easily adjust for your own needs.

Provider=MSOLAP.5;Integrated Security=SSPI;Persist Security Info=True;Data Source=localhost;Initial Catalog=sunSalesAnalysis initial;Cube=Sales Analysis

Now having this in place, we can test our connection and save the new data source for PowerView usage. This is the default library where the PowerView managed code looks for data sources to make use of. Going back to the information in the first post on this topic, that means that when an action menu item passing in a data source name as the parameter, it is in reference to the data sources living in this specific document library on Enterprise Portal.



Having done a successful save of the data source, you should see something very similar to the above screen shot. This means that we are ready to move back into Dynamics AX 2012 R2 for completing our extending of PowerView. Like all things in Dynamics AX, this extension should remain within an AOT project.



What we see in the above screen shot is that project, including having highlighted the custom action menu item that will launch our PowerView design process. You will notice that I'm targeting the name given to the data source that lives in the document library on EP. That is the parameter value that will launch PowerView to target the specific custom cube.



Having created the menu item, and launching it, we see in the above image a field list from the custom cube I created from the above mentioned perspective.



This literally took under two hours to complete, from cube to launching into the design space. To further bring home the point that this is a separate cube database, and cube, please reference the below image.



You can see that I have a new cube catalog, or database as well as a custom cube called Sales Analysis. Further you can see in the above image the dimension structure in which we can slice our measure via. Again, this was 100% generated from a perspective within the AOT. Having completed this, we can now create compelling visualizations with PowerView based on the custom cube.



Further having completing such visualizations, saving these to the 'Power View Reports' document library we can surface these and execute them as web parts, or full screen mode.



The above knowledge, mixed with the first post of this series, should enable you to start easily taking full advantage of Power View, well beyond the out-of-the-box cubes. Having these powerful visualizations that allow power users to help complete a BI story for a customer is the icing on-top of the BI cake represented by the Microsoft Stack. This will truly help you to engage your user base and help you down the continue journey of Creating a System of Engagement!

That's all I have for this post. Feel free to comment or leave me any questions you might have. Further, I will back into the cube creation process behind this in a new post, so that there is a complete story from end-to-end for you. Keep in mind, this would work for *any* cube. This does not have to be just the Dynamics AX cubes. Further you can start to see how this can be placed throughout the Dynamics AX forms and user experience. Til Next Time!
Follow Me @:
       

"Visit the Dynamics AX Community Page today!"