Installing OLAP Services

Microsoft® SQL Server™ OLAP Services is a new middle-tier server for online analytical processing (OLAP). OLAP Services includes a powerful server that constructs multidimensional cubes of data for analysis and provides rapid client access to cube information. PivotTable® Service, the included OLE DB 2.0 compliant client, is used by Microsoft Excel and applications from other vendors to retrieve multidimensional data from the server and present it to the user.

OLAP Services organizes data from a data warehouse into multidimensional cubes with precalculated summary information to provide rapid answers to complex analytical queries.

Some key features of OLAP Services include:

• Unparalleled ease of use provided by the user interface and wizards
• A flexible, robust data model for cube definition and storage
• Automated solution to the data explosion syndrome that plagues traditional OLAP technologies
• Scalable architecture capable of supporting multiple OLAP and data warehouse servers
• Intelligent client-server cooperative caching for rapid query response and reduction of network traffic
• Widely supported, documented APIs and open architecture to support custom applications

When you install OLAP Services, a Start menu item named OLAP Services is created in the Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 program group. It contains these shortcuts:

• MDX Sample Application
• OLAP Manager
• Product Documentation
• Readme

To install OLAP Services