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DIMENSIONS Rowset

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The DIMENSIONS rowset contains information about the dimensions in a given cube. It has one row for each dimension.

Note

Because OLE DB for OLAP treats measures as just another dimension, a row is returned in the DIMENSIONS rowset for the Measures dimension.

The default sort order is CATALOG_NAME, SCHEMA_NAME, CUBE_NAME, and DIMENSION_NAME.

The rowset has the structure described in the following table.

Column name

Type indicator

Description

CATALOG_NAME

DBTYPE_WSTR

Optional. The name of the catalog to which this dimension belongs. NULL if the provider does not support catalogs.

SCHEMA_NAME

DBTYPE_WSTR

Optional. The name of the schema to which this dimension belongs. NULL if the provider does not support schemas.

CUBE_NAME

DBTYPE_WSTR

Required. Name of the cube to which this dimension belongs. NULL if this dimension does not belong to any cube, which is possible in multicube architectures. For more information, see Hypercubes and Multicubes.

DIMENSION_NAME

DBTYPE_WSTR

Required. Name of the dimension. If a dimension is part of more than one cube, there is one row for each cube/dimension combination. The field rgpwszDimensionNames, in the MDAXISINFO structure, corresponds to this element. For more information, see Hypercubes and Multicubes.

DIMENSION_UNIQUE_NAME

DBTYPE_WSTR

Required. Unique name of the dimension. For providers that generate unique names by qualification, each component of this name is delimited.

DIMENSION_GUID

DBTYPE_GUID

Optional. The GUID of the dimension. NULL if no GUID exists.

DIMENSION_CAPTION

DBTYPE_WSTR

Required. A label or a caption associated with the dimension. Used primarily for display purposes. If a caption does not exist, DIMENSION_NAME is returned.

DIMENSION_ORDINAL

DBTYPE_UI4

Required. Ordinal number of the dimension, among the group of dimensions that form the cube.

DIMENSION_TYPE

DBTYPE_I2

Required. The dimension type. Can be one of the following values:

  • MD_DIMTYPE_TIME, which indicates a Time dimension.

  • MD_DIMTYPE_MEASURE, which indicates a Measures dimension.

  • MD_DIMTYPE_OTHER, which indicates the dimension is neither a Time dimension nor a Measures dimension.

  • MD_DIMTYPE_UNKNOWN, which indicates that the provider is unable to classify the dimension.

DIMENSION_CARDINALITY

DBTYPE_UI4

Required. The number of members in the dimension. This value can be an approximation of the real cardinality. Consumers should not rely on this to be accurate.

DEFAULT_HIERARCHY

DBTYPE_WSTR

Required. Indicates the default hierarchy for this dimension. This is a unique name. Each dimension must have a default hierarchy.

DESCRIPTION

DBTYPE_WSTR

Optional. A human-readable description of the dimension. NULL if no description exists.

ANNOTATIONS

DBTYPE_WSTR

Optional. A string containing annotations added by analysts through their client applications. For more information about this feature, see The ANNOTATIONS Column.