(Oracle Express) Online analytical processing. OLAP functionality is characterized by dynamic, multidimensional analysis of historical, current, and projected data, which supports activities such as:
calculating across dimensions and through hierarchies
analyzing trends
drilling up and down through hierarchies
rotating to change the dimensional orientation
refining queries
modeling, forecasting, and performing "what-if" analyses
OLAP tools can run against a multidimensional database or interact directly with a relational database.
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