Cube Build Service

Applies to: Office 2010 | Project 2010 | Project Server 2010 | SharePoint Server 2010

The Microsoft Project Server 2010 Cube Build Service (CBS) manages the OLAP cubes for Project Server reporting. The CBS includes extensive event and trace logging to help find the cause of problems. The CubeAdmin Web service in the Project Server Interface (PSI) enables programmatic management and scheduling of cube building.

The CBS can build multiple databases for OLAP analyses by using Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services. Each database can be limited to a specific date range, with independent sets of projects and resources filtered by one or more departments. In addition, each Analysis Services database includes 14 default cubes for enterprise project management (EPM) reports. Following are the eight primary EPM cubes:

  • Project Non-timephased

  • Task Non-timephased

  • Resource Non-timephased

  • Resource Timephased

  • Assignment Non-timephased

  • Assignment Timephased

  • Timesheet

  • EPM Timesheet

Following are the three default SharePoint Foundation cubes:

  • Risks

  • Issues

  • Deliverables

Following are the three default virtual cubes that combine data from the other cubes:

  • MSP_Project_Timesheet combines the Assignment Timephased, Resource Timephased, and EPM Timesheet cubes.

  • MSP_Project_SharePoint combines Project Non-Timephased, Issues, Risks, and Deliverables cubes.

  • MSP_Portfolio_Analyzer combines the Assignment Timephased and Resource Timephased cubes.

You can add calculated measures to any of the cubes by using an MDX expression. For example, you can add a resource availability calculated measure to the Virtual Portfolio Analyzer cube.

Project Server updates the data in the OLAP cubes based on the scheduled times that are set in the OLAP Database Build Settings page in Project Web App. You can also use the PSI to customize the cubes by adding custom fields. In addition, you can add external data to the cubes by using one of the event handlers (pre-build, post-build, and post-process). For information about adding custom fields as dimensions or measures to the OLAP cubes, see Custom Fields and OLAP Cubes.

After you add your selected data to the cubes, you can use applications such as Microsoft Excel with its PivotTable reports and conditional formatting to build reports. Because your Project Server farm includes Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010, you can publish the Excel workbooks or spreadsheets by using Excel Services for thin rendering on any site in the farm. You can also use tools such as Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services to create reports for your organization.

For information about the OLAP cube schemas, see the OLAPCubeSchemas2010.xlsx file in the Project 2010 SDK download. For descriptions of most of the cube fields, see the OlapView views in the Reporting database schema reference (pj14_ReportingDB.chm). For information about CBS events, see the CubeAdminEventReceiver class.

See Also

Concepts

Project Server 2010 Architecture

Custom Fields and OLAP Cubes

Other Resources

Multidimensional Expressions (MDX) Reference