Basic concepts

There are some fundamental concepts on which the standard OLAP model is based. It is important to understand what should not be changed within a customer implementation:

  • Data storage in data cubes, built-in logic (basic assumption within global sign definition)
    • All values within data cubes are to stored using this logic:
      • Expenses - negative signs
      • Revenues - positive signs
      • Assets, Liabilities, Equities - positive signs
  • This logic is dependent to used weights in BPDACCOUNT:
    • All individual accounts underneath TOTAL_ACCOUNT are to be set up with weight +1.

Following this logic, using negative signs for expenses for data entries and using always weight 1 within BPDACCOUNT, roll up for Profit and Loss statement is handled. Using accounts with weights -1, the configuration cubes will not work as configuration flags are read from consolidated elements as well (-1 + 1 = 0!)

  • BPDACCOUNT dimension, central dimension within BP application for Finance
    • Account structure to be set up individually on customer side underneath existing parent TOTAL_ACCOUNT. The applications expect different parents (Top elements to be defined within Designer settings) for:
      • Profit and Loss Statement
      • Assets
      • Liabilities
      • Balance Sheet (Assets and Liabilities)
        Note: Use always weight 1 for aggregations.
  • Important attribute fields to set:
    • Account type to be set for:
      • Assets - A
      • Liabilities - L
      • Equity - Q
      • Expenses - E
      • Revenues - R
    • Build logic is based on setting account type. For example:
      • Global sign definition
      • Account selections for selections within application such as cash accounts, asset categories, etc.
      • Opening balances logic (only A, L, Q)
    • Detail settings, detail reports for data entries within finance will be offered based on attribute settings:
      • Schedules (A,B,C,D,E)
      • Intercompany (T [True]/[False])
      • Segment 1..3 (T [True]/[False])
      • Line Details (T [True]/[False])
      • Custom Details (1..10, hierarchy information)
    • Method 1 - 4, defined method for currency conversion
  • Writeback of specified values to OLAP as difference
    • As data entries are specified on multiple levels (BPDLEVEL), the specified values are written back as difference values to be able to reproduce specified values. For example:
      • Imported Value: 400 (Level Import)
      • Data Entry: shows 400 => User is changing to: 600 (replaces 400 through 400)
      • 200 is written back as data entry (level INPUT_MAIN)
      • 600 is shown within data entry reports (read from Parent TOTAL_INPUT)
    • Calculation of the difference for writeback is handled mostly within data entry reports.
    • This is not valid for configuration values, only for data entries in real data cubes.
  • The Entity dimension must have only one top level element.