Online Analytical Processing

OLAP is one of the most popular analytical methods. The reason is that multivariate representation of data is very simple. All the manipulations are performed with dimensions and facts in a very flexible way because they can be arranged arbitrarily. Another factor that explains the popularity of this approach is that all the operations can be performed on-the-fly; everything is fast and intuitive.

Loginom has everything necessary for full-fledged OLAP analysis. It contains the mechanisms for multivariate storage (Loginom Warehouse) and data visualization (OLAP cube). These are integral parts of the analytical platform and they are integrated with other Loginom modules:

• Data storage. Loginom Warehouse uses the most powerful and productive method of multivariate data storage — the "star" and the "snowflake" schemas. It has a rich semantic layer and built-in performance optimization mechanisms. Loginom Warehouse is a perfect data source for decision-making support systems.
• Visualization. A built-in visualizer — OLAP cube — supports all multivariate operations: arbitrary placement of dimensions and facts, filtering, sorting, grouping, and different aggregation and refinement methods. The data are represented as pivot tables and pivot diagrams - all the operations are performed on-the-fly, and the data processing methods are intuitive.
• Researching the data. OLAP cube is a powerful research tool that a allows the user to perform exploratory and comparative data analysis, discover tendencies, find seasonality and trends, identify the best and the worst selling goods and calculate their share in the sales volume.
• High performance. The special storage and calculation mechanisms ensure fast processing and rational use of the computer’s RAM. All the data handling operations are performed within a few seconds.
• Integration. The data from any source can be viewed as a cube at any processing stage. The resulting cube can be imported to office applications or into an HTML file.

OLAP analysis mechanisms are most commonly used in analytical reporting systems because they enable the analyst to easily obtain the desired information without the help of IT experts. They do not require any special knowledge and are not bound to the rigid structure of reports. Instead of hundreds of large and complicated reports, the user can have just an adjusted data warehouse and a visualization tool. This is enough to quickly receive virtually any necessary information sliced by the desired parameter.