SQL Server Management Studio makes it very easy for you to create XMLA-scripts to create or alter cubes, dimensions, etc… But it’s not possible to use Management Studio to create an alter-script that only contains the MDX calculations. Because I needed to resolve a bug in the calculations but the rest of the cube was not ready to be deployed to production yet, I had to create an alter script just for the MDX.

Of course I could have started learning the XMLA-syntax to write a script for this, but I decided to go for the easy way: the BIDSHelper has an option to deploy the MDX to a cube without having to deploy the entire cube.

If you don’t know BIDSHelper, or don’t already have it installed, go to http://www.codeplex.com/bidshelper. This is a must have add-in for all SSAS and SSIS developers!

But as I was allowed to use Management Studio to makes changes to the cubes in the development environment only. So I needed to capture the XMLA script the BIDSHelper executes on the cube, to deploy the same script to the production environment.

That what the profiler is for, not? J

Open the SQL Server Profiler, create a new trace and connect to the analysis services instance. Use a blank template and switch to the tab “Events Selection”. The only event we want to capture here is “Command Begin”.

Click Run.

Now the profiler is ready to capture the XMLA-script, so switch back to Management Studio and use the BIDSHelper to deploy the MDX calculations. When the deploy is finished you can stop the trace.

The profiler should have captured 2 events. The event with subclass “Alter” is the one we need.

Copy the script from the profiler to a new XMLA script in Management Studio.

The last 3 lines (PropertyList) can be deleted.

In the node “ObjectDefinition” you will find your script.

Enjoy!

When they want to add a property of a specific attribute, they just check this item in the field list. By using it this way, you’re kind of building hierarchies between all the selected attributes, therefore all possible relationships must be checked. This of course has a huge performance impact.

There is an easier and better way that also makes loading the data a lot faster: Member Properties. The relationships between Members and their Properties is defined by specifying Attribute Relationships in Analysis Services.

Ever saw that Tooltip in Excel when you’re hovering your mouse over a field in the Pivot Table? This Tooltip shows all available Member Properties.

But you can also display them on columns:

Click right on the field where you would like to display one or more properties for. Under “Show Properties in Report”, select the properties you would like to show.

By using Member Properties the layout will be better and your report will load a lot faster!

Using Attributes:

Using Properties: