A Flexible Architecture for Accessing OLAP Data

Tim Peterson, the designer of CubeSlice and its predecessor product, the OLAP Client Management System, gave a Spotlight Presentation entitled "A Flexible Architecture for Accessing OLAP Data" at the 2003 PASS Community Summit - Seattle on November 12, 2003.

There are two main questions that need to be addressed when considering how users are going to access OLAP data from the Analysis Server:

• Are the users going to have direct access to the server, access across the internet, or access through local cubes?
  
• What client applications are going to be used for viewing the OLAP data?

This presentation argued for flexibility - providing access to OLAP data in a variety of ways. The goal is to have business intelligence data available in as many ways and as many places as possible.