A standard for representing multidimensional properties: The Common Warehouse Metamodel (CWM)

Abstract

Data warehouses, multidimensional databases, and OLAP tools are based on the multidimensional (MD) modeling. Lately, several approaches have been proposed to easily capture main MD properties at the conceptual level. These conceptual MD models, together with a precise management of metadata, are the core of any related tool implementation. However, the broad diversity of MD models and management of metadata justifies the necessity of a universally understood standard definition for metadata, thereby allowing different tools to share information in an easy form. In this paper, we make use of the Common Warehouse Metamodel (CWM) to represent the main MD properties at the conceptual level in terms of CWM metadata. Then, CWM-compliant tools could interoperate by exchanging their CWM-based metadata in a commonly understood format and benefit of the expressiveness of the MD model at the conceptual level. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2002.