Technical Breakthroughs

Multi-source ROLAP: Enterprise-Wide Data Coverage Across Any and All Sources

MicroStrategy 9 presents the next evolution of MicroStrategy’s unified, multi-dimensional model, enabling companies to quickly and easily deploy BI applications and connect to more databases across the enterprise, with minimal BI costs. A new product in MicroStrategy 9, MicroStrategy MultiSource Option enables this cost-effective flexibility and scalability by creating a unified model of an organization’s data that spans the many, individual data warehouses, marts, and departmental databases within the BI environment. This new multi-source capability, however, is completely transparent to both end users and report designers. In seconds, any user can create and analyze reports and dashboards that contain data from any and all sources in the enterprise. When a report is run, MicroStrategy automatically chooses which data source can have that data at users’ fingertips the quickest. Business users can surf-and-save across multiple databases and seamlessly access data from any source.

MultiSource Option ensures streamlined application development and migration, even in small workgroup environments containing several different types of databases. MicroStrategy can be connected to all of these sources at once, without requiring BI architects to use ETL or physically migrate data from those sources into a single warehouse. This reduces costs, saves time, and offers an evolutionary path that allows companies to migrate departmental BI installations gradually from disparate departmental islands of BI into a fully integrated and unified enterprise BI architecture.

Powerful, Scalable In-memory ROLAP

MicroStrategy 9 introduces world-class In-memory capabilities that leverage 64-bit operating systems to improve the overall performance of a BI system, regardless of the amount of data or number of users involved. MicroStrategy OLAP Services delivers this technology via the enhanced Intelligent Cube™, a dynamic in-memory cache that identifies the most resource and time-consuming queries and consolidates them into In-memory “cubes.” MicroStrategy reports and dashboards, in turn, automatically direct queries to these cubes whenever possible, leading to much faster query performance as compared to database-resident storage. As a result, users benefit from eased peak reporting times, since more users can quickly analyze the full depth and breadth of their data sources at the same time.

In-memory BI is especially ideal for setting up small workgroup BI applications, since it requires very little up-front effort, and no ETL. Populated quickly from any database source, workgroup users can seamlessly use In-memory cubes as a source of reusable definitions and data for many reports, dashboards, and even OLAP investigations. As workgroup-level BI applications mature and grow beyond the size of an In-memory cube, companies can put the data into a proper relational database and use MicroStrategy’s full ROLAP capability to model and access the data.

Faster, Friendlier Web interface

MicroStrategy 9 presents a re-engineered, faster, more intuitive Web interface that blends high-performance with convenient self-service. In MicroStrategy 9, Web-based business users have more control over their reports and dashboards than ever before thanks to a wide range of personalized, self-service features such as prompt and filter creation; a brand new grid and graph designer; ribbon toolbars; one-click drilling across all data; a detailed threshold editor; and the ability to quickly select individual rows and columns to format and analyze data within seconds. MicroStrategy Web empowers every business user to easily build, reformat, and personalize his or her own data-rich report or dashboard, without ever having to rely on any additional support.

Designed to achieve the highest performance regardless of the number of users accessing it across the globe, MicroStrategy Web allows small and enterprise-wide BI groups to deliver more BI with fewer servers and IT personnel. Features such as 64-bit virtual machine support and AJAX-based, client-centric processing translate to a more interactive and responsive interface for the every-day business user.

Easier, More Interactive Dynamic Dashboard Design and Analysis

MicroStrategy’s dynamic dashboards have been significantly enhanced to contain even more information, interactivity, and analytical richness. Within seconds, business users can convert an existing report to a document or use a new out-of-the-box dashboard template to quickly begin building a rich, interactive dashboard. With an expanded library of advanced visualizations along with dynamic selector controls, designers can encapsulate the data from a dozen or more grid or graph reports into one dashboard. Meanwhile, new “multi-layout documents” allow business users to easily combine all of their frequently-used dashboards into a single convenient “dashboard book” that can be run once and quickly referenced throughout the day. Each of these new design features enables users to serve themselves without needing to write any code or request IT support. MicroStrategy 9 also allows analysts to investigate every layer of data directly from their dashboards, as full OLAP drilling capabilities are automatically enabled on dashboards. This further minimizes the need for IT to develop and maintain additional reports over time. Other dashboard enhancements include:

• Any HTML-accessible content can be included directly on the dashboard, such as real-time stock tickers
• Smart placement assistants automatically size and position items on a dashboard
• New visual design cues placed directly on the dashboard template eliminate the need for many pull-down menus
• A library of new autostyles can be applied to format the entire dashboard consistently

Distribution Services: High-Volume Automated Distribution of Reports, Dashboards, and Business Performance Alerts via E-mail, File, and Print

MicroStrategy Distribution Services is a major new component of the MicroStrategy platform, designed for high-volume and high-efficiency distribution of reports and dashboards with the lowest IT administrative overhead. Distribution Services enables business users to quickly set up information flows for themselves and for their co-workers without having to go through a centralized IT administrator, as is common with other BI technologies. Users can easily manage their own report deliveries by choosing delivery formats, end-points, time and event-based triggers, and by setting up personalized alerts for the KPIs that matter most to them. This level of self-service and flexibility allows users to quickly—and independently—satisfy their own business requirements at any time.

Fully integrated within the MicroStrategy Intelligence Server, Distribution Services inherits the Server’s administrative and operational efficiencies, including support for 64-bit operating systems. Distribution Services therefore incurs the lowest administrative overhead by shifting database and BI workload to off-peak hours, delivering more BI with fewer servers, and ensuring that business users always receive optimal performance during even the busiest times of the day.

New Enterprise Reporting Features

MicroStrategy 9 includes a series of new Report Services features that allow business users to develop complex enterprise reporting and customer statements. Extending the already Pixel Perfect™ and flexible nature of Report Services, MicroStrategy 9 provides automatic formatting features such as horizontal repeating sections, dynamically-selected images, vertical text layout, multi-layout reports, automatic table of contents generation, automatic pagination, and watermarks. These features ensure consistent, high-efficiency enterprise BI for business users of all skill levels.

MicroStrategy 9’s powerful enterprise reporting technology is unique because it is entirely metadata-driven and therefore does not require programming, unlike most other BI technologies that address the same requirements. This makes MicroStrategy enterprise reports and customer statement applications fast to develop and easy to change and maintain over time.

Enhanced, High-performance SQL Engine

Already a leader in SQL generation with its patented ROLAP-based SQL generation engine, MicroStrategy introduces a new level of SQL optimization designed to improve performance by optimizing multi-pass SQL generation. As a result, business users can expect to benefit from the fastest report performance at all times, at any scale. Tests with real data warehouses and reports have shown dramatic improvement with the new SQL optimization, with as much as a 55% query time reduction for complex queries.