Book Image

Expert Cube Development with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services

Book Image

Expert Cube Development with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services

Overview of this book

Microsoft's SQL Server Analysis Services 2008 is an OLAP server that allows users to analyze business data quickly and easily. However, designing cubes in Analysis Services can be a complex task: it's all too easy to make mistakes early on in development that lead to serious problems when the cube is in production. Learning the best practices for cube design before you start your project will help you avoid these problems and ensure that your project is a success. This book offers practical advice on how to go about designing and building fast, scalable, and maintainable cubes that will meet your users' requirements and help make your Business Intelligence project a success. This book gives readers insight into the best practices for designing and building Microsoft Analysis Services 2008 cubes. It also provides details about server architecture, performance tuning, security, and administration of an Analysis Services solution. In this book, you will learn how to design and implement Analysis Services cubes. Starting from designing a data mart for Analysis Services, through the creation of dimensions and measure groups, to putting the cube into production, we'll explore the whole of the development lifecycle. This book is an invaluable guide for anyone who is planning to use Microsoft Analysis Services 2008 in a Business Intelligence project.
Table of Contents (17 chapters)
Expert Cube Development with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services
Credits
About the Authors
About the Reviewers
Preface
Index

Analysis Services data directory maintenance


By default, all of the files used by Analysis Services to store MOLAP data are stored in the Analysis Services data directory. The location of this directory is set during installation, and can be changed by changing the value of the DataDir server property.

As with any other type of file handled by Windows, the files in the Analysis Services data directory are prone to fragmentation. During processing a lot of files are created, written, and deleted, and if the disk is very fragmented these files may be split across different portions of the disk, slowing down access to them.

A regular defragmentation of the drive on which the data directory exists will improve the overall speed of the disk subsystem, which will of course have benefits for Analysis Services query and processing performance. As a result we suggest regular disk defragmentation of the Analysis Services data directory's drive as part of the server's maintenance plan, making sure of...