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Drilling Through on Dates Between PowerCubes and
Relational Packages
The usual method of drilling through from OLAP to relational packages requires
that the target report parameter is set using the business key in the relational data,
which does not work well for dates.
OLAP data sources typically view dates as members, such as Quarter 1 2006, while
relational data sources view dates as ranges, such as 1/Jan/2006 to
31/March/2006.
A special feature exists for drilling through between PowerCubes and relational
packages. Ensure that the target report parameter is set up using in_range. Note
that the parameter must be of type date-time, and not integer.
An example follows:
[gosales_goretailers].[Orders].[Order date] in_range
?Date?
Also ensure that the drill-through definition maps the parameter at the dimension
level and that the PowerCube date level is not set to suppress blank categories.
Enabling the option to suppress blank categories in the Transformer model before
you build the cube may cause the drill-through on dates to be unsuccessful. This
happens because there are missing values in the range.
Set Up Drill-through Access in Packages
A drill-through definition specifies a target for drill-through access, the conditions
under which the target is available (such as the scope), and how to run or open,
and filter the target.
In IBM Cognos Connection, a drill-through definition is associated with a source
package. The drill-through path defined in the drill-through definition is available
to any report based on the source package it is associated with. The target can be
based on any target package in IBM Cognos Connection and can be stored
anywhere. For example, all reports authored in the GO Data Warehouse (analysis)
sample package or in a folder linked to this package can access any drill-through
definition created in this package.
Note: For reports created in Report Studio, you can define drill-through access in
specific reports by setting up the drill-through definition in the report instead of in
the package, or restrict drill-through access by changing report settings so that the
report is unavailable as a drill-through target. For more information, see the IBM
Cognos Report Studio User Guide. Reports created in IBM Cognos Business Insight
Advanced are not supported as drill-through targets.
You can define drill-through definitions between reports created in the different
IBM Cognos Business Intelligence studios, and reports based on different packages
and data sources.
The target report must exist before you start creating the drill-through definition in
IBM Cognos Connection. Drill-through targets can be reports, analyses, report
views, PowerCube packages and queries.
Chapter 8. Drill-through Access
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