Blending Data that You Added

You might have a project where you added two subject areas. You can blend data from one subject area with the other.

For example, Subject Area B might contain new dimensions that extend the attributes of Subject Area A. Or Subject Area B might contain new facts that you can use alongside the measures that already exist in Subject Area A.

When you add more than one subject area to a project, the system tries to find matches for the data that is added. It automatically matches external dimensions where they share a common name and have a compatible data type with attributes in the existing subject area .

To blend data that you added:
  1. Add data as described in Adding Data from External Sources.
  2. In the Data Sources pane, click Source Diagram.
  3. Click the number along the line that connects the external source to the subject area to display the Connect Sources dialog.
  4. In the Connect Sources dialog, make changes as necessary.
    1. To change the match for a column, click the name of each column to select a different column from the external data source from the subject area.

      Note:

      If columns have the same name and same data type, then they are recognized as a possible match. You can customize this and specify that one column matches another by explicitly selecting it even its name is not the same. You can select only those columns with a matching data type.
    2. Click Add Another Match, and then select a column from the external source and from the subject area to match.
    3. For a measure that you are uploading for the first time, specify the aggregation type such as Sum or Average.
      See Specifying Aggregation for Measures in Fact Tables for descriptions of aggregation types.
    4. Click the X to delete a match.
  5. Click OK to save the matches from the external source to the data model on the server.