IGNORECONSTANTS

Controls whether #Missing values, when used as operands in formulas, should remain #Missing after the formula calculation.

Syntax

IGNORECONSTANTS TRUE [BOTTOMUP] | FALSE

TRUE—Default option. #Missing values remain missing regardless of interaction with formula constants.
BOTTOMUP—If used after TRUE, this parameter additionally causes query execution to occur in bottom-up mode, to resolve dependency analysis quickly in cases where the formula cache has a relatively small input data set.
FALSE— #Missing values can be changed by interaction with formula constants.

Description

If a #Missing data value is processed in a formula with a constant or other data-independent construct, the default behavior is that #Missing is not treated like a data value. For example, if A is missing, A+5 returns #Missing.

If you set IGNORECONSTANTS to FALSE, #Missing is treated like a data value. For example, if A is missing, A+5 returns 5.

To optimize cubes in the application for hybrid mode for faster formula execution, you can use this setting configured as follows:

IGNORECONSTANTS TRUE BOTTOMUP

The above usage is recommended for hybrid mode performance tuning if both of these are true:

you experience query performance problems
formulas are complex and contain many cross-dimensional operators or IF/ELSE statements

Complex formulas can cause the formula cache to grow large while also being sparse (having a relatively small input data set). Using IGNORECONSTANTS TRUE BOTTOMUP forces query execution to occur in bottom-up mode, to resolve dependency analysis more efficiently in cases where the formula cache is sparse.

Example

If the configuration is as follows:

IGNORECONSTANTS TRUE

then the result for X in the following formula is #Missing

IF(X)
5;
ELSE
3
ENDIF