Introduction

The concept of OLAP was introduced in Chapter 16, "Multidimensional Reporting Against OLAP Data." With OLAP it is relatively easy to create professionally formatted Crystal Reports based on multidimensional data sources. These types of formatted reports are targeted for end users who require only one specific viewpoint into the OLAP data. OLAP Intelligence provides a more interactive end-user environment with the reports so that speed-of-thought interactive viewing is available to end users. This chapter introduces OLAP Intelligence and the richness of interactivity it can add to your reporting environment.

One of the key challenges facing organizations today is providing actionable information to business managers, enabling them to make decisions in a timely manner based on concrete data. This chapter shows how OLAP Intelligence can be used to deliver compelling analytical reports to end users.

This chapter covers the following information:

• Introduction to OLAP Intelligence

• Data connectivity options for OLAP Intelligence

• Introduction to the powerful Worksheet object

• Introduction to the Charting object