Business Intelligence and Big Data with the Microsoft Stack, For Database Administrators

SQTH13 Avoid Slow SSAS Queries: MDX Query Troubleshooting

12/13/2012

1:30PM - 2:45PM

Level: Advanced

Craig Utley

Craig Utley

Mentor

SolidQ

Do you have SSAS queries that you feel should be faster? Multidimensional Expressions, or MDX, is the language used to work with Analysis Services. Similar to SQL for the relational engine, MDX is a language for queries and DDL statements on multidimensional cubes in Analysis Services. Troubleshooting slow MDX queries is often challenging because the level of support provided by the tools and the Analysis Services engine is not as mature as that found in the relational engine. This session covers the methods for examining slow queries using the SQL Profiler and Performance Monitor to determine the need for aggregations, caching problems, memory constraints, and so forth. Best practices for optimizing MDX will be examined, and various server properties will be discussed as necessary to help correct query issues. Attendees will leave armed with a practical approach to locating bottlenecks and strategies for speeding up queries.

You will learn:

  • Techniques for analyzing slow MDX queries
  • How to analyze and fix slow MDX queries
  • The internals of MDX queries against Analysis Services