SSAS Cube Action: Cells Target type, URL Action type Example
Originally, we were charged with figuring out how to display SSAS cube measure descriptions via ToolTip in Excel 2007. If that's your plan, forget it - after some reading up on the interwebs, it appears that Excel doesn't even request the Description property. Additionally, if you want to add a description to Calculated Members, you have to hack it in (yuck).
So we went with a simple, albeit relatively crude (but effective), alternative - implementing a URL action for Cells so users can easily link out to a definition of the measure they're looking at.
Create a new action in your cube (Open up the cube definition, Actions tab) and configure similar to this:
Name: View Member Definition
Action Target
Target Type: Cells
Target object: All cells
Action Content
Type: URL
Action expression: "http://i.domain.com/doc/Defs.aspx#"
+ [Measures].CurrentMember.Name
Additional Properties
Invocation: Interactive
Description: View Member Definition
"View Definition Of " + [Measures].CurrentMember.Name + "..."
Caption is MDX: TrueWhen you're finished, it should look something like this:
For a possible way to implement the aforementioned Definitions.aspx, check out http://timlaqua.com/2009/03/scrolling-to-and-highlighting-anchor-target-via-javascript/ - which describes an early endpoint we used for this project.
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March 13th, 2009 - 10:07
Tim, that is very frustrating. The best workaround I’ve found is to use the Search feature of OLAP PivotTable Extensions which will show the descriptions:
http://olappivottableextend.codeplex.com
March 13th, 2009 - 14:25
Yeah, I evaluated that option as well. The only issue there is that you’re still just working with the Description property of real (not calculated) measures. If you use the method I outlined, you can describe measures in as much detail as you like, with formatting, etc.
This also allows you to remove the BI Developer(s) from the definition maintenance process because the definitions are stored outside of the Cube.
March 25th, 2009 - 13:51
Very good approach and well done.
April 30th, 2009 - 18:11
I am trying to make your solution work for dimension attributes and must have the syntax wrong – this is what I have that isn’t working:
“View Definition Of ” + [Dimensions].CurrentMember.Name + “…”
May 2nd, 2009 - 06:35
There is no [Dimensions] dimension, you have to specify an actual dimension (so you would have to have a unique action for each dimension). Do you want users to be able to fire the action by right-clicking Hierarchy/Attribute headings?