Analysis services processing task in ssis

Question

I am trying to set up a daily schedul to process cube.. so it refles the new /update/delete data from data source..
shoud I process both cube and  dimensions/partitions ? or cube only.. if i select cube only , is it going to process all dimensions/partitons in that cube as well?

i am little bit consufused what objects should i add to accomplish this?

what is a typical daily  processing scenario?

i.e dimensions -> partitions?

Answer 1

Here's a great whitepaper describing processing:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms345142(SQL.90).aspx

I've also described a pretty typical evolution for processing cubes. There's a continuum between simplicity and efficiency:
http://www.artisconsulting.com/blogs/greggalloway/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=7

To answer your question, processing the cube won't process the dimensions if they're already processed. So either ProcessFull the whole database, or process the dimensions then the cube/partitions. More detail can be found in the links above.

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http://artisconsulting.com/Blog/GregGalloway

Answer 2

The processing scenario varies from project to project, and also depends on your data refresh logic. Simple rule of thumb, process all the objects (dimensions/Facts) that get updated by your ETL process run. So, if there are only 5 dimensions being refreshed out of 50 by your ETL, you can select only those 5 dimensions to be processed in your Analysis Services Processing task. Coming to Facts, as fact tables are bound to be written to by the ETL, it makes sense to process all the facts that are updated. You can chooose between a FULL processing and processing only the updates. All these options are available in the Analysis Services processing task. 

Hope this helps.

Cheers!!

M.