Multidimensional sources store aggregated data, not the detailed data. Because of their nature, they just contain summary data at certain levels. These levels are specified during creation of the cubes.
Vertical Federation provides the ability to drill through aggregate multidimensional data into detail relational data.
We're going to use a different cube named Market
to demonstrate Vertical Federation. As you've already learned how to import the multidimensional metadata and how to create a business model, these steps will be skipped in our example.
Here's the new source and new Business Model:
The new cube contains Dollars values that are aggregated at these levels:
Area dimension: District level
Time dimension: Year level
Relational source contains Dollars values that are aggregated at these levels:
Area dimension: Sales person level (lower detail level than the District level)
Time dimension: Year level