Element attributes

In addition, to define an element's type (numeric, consolidation, or string), elements can have attributes defined for them. If elements identify data in a cube, then think of the element attributes describing the elements themselves.

For example, let us say that some of your users would like to display an account using the account name followed by the account number. Other users would like to display only the account name. You can define an alias attribute for each of these requirements. In fact, you can define as many alias attributes as you need.

I can have an account number of "01-0000-00001" and define multiple aliases so that the user can view the element as any of the following:

Some interesting uses for attributes include:

An alias attribute may also be used to present data in different languages!

You can select elements by attribute value in the Subset Editor. You can also display element names in TM1 windows using their aliases.

To create attributes and assign attribute values, you use the Attributes Editor.

When adding attributes using the Attributes Editor, you will notice that it "defaults" to an attribute type of string, so be careful to select the desired type before proceeding. In most cases, TurboIntegrator processes will be the tool used to add, update, and delete your dimension attributes. You use the following programming functions:

A key point to know is that, if you try to view or update dimensions attributes and there are a large number of elements in the dimension when you open the Attributes Editor, you will receive a message as shown in the following screenshot:

The alternative is to access the attributes of this dimension through the attributes cube instead, as it is much faster:

This is another important point. The }ElementAttributes cubes are known as Cognos TM1 control cubes. These cubes are automatically generated by TM1. As an application developer you can either create a new (lookup) cube or use a control cube to look up data, depending upon your needs. Lookup and control cubes are discussed later in this chapter.

Some key attribute terminology and concepts you should be able to recognize are descriptive attributes, alias attributes, and when to use an attribute versus an additional element. Let us briefly touch on these.