Microstrategy Interview Questions

1. What is Microstrategy Desktop?
Microstrategy Desktop™ is a Windows client-server software application that provides integrated monitoring, reporting, and analysis capabilities.

2. What does Microstrategy Desktop allow users to do?
Using Microstrategy Desktop, users can easily access and share critical corporate information they need to make cost-cutting decisions and improve business processes. The information found in databases can also be used to help increase revenue and boost profits. Users can access this database and SAP data without having to learn technical database query (SQL) or multi-dimensional expression (MDX) syntax.

3. What can users do with the information they access using Microstrategy Desktop?
Users can analyze the information using standard aggregations and more sophisticated functions such as average, summation, percentage contribution, standard deviation and net present value. Investigative reporting, using pivoting, sorting, slicing, and drilling to more detail, can be performed with simple mouse clicks. Users can also format reports to their specifications and view the data as intuitive charts and graphs to identify trends and anomalies quickly.

4. What are the benefits of using Microstrategy Desktop?
Users can obtain critical information immediately without waiting for IT departments to create reports. The software is easy to use and provides context sensitive help, thus eliminating the need for extensive support and maintenance staff.

5. Are the reports created using Microstrategy Desktop available to other products such as Microstrategy Web?
Yes. Reports created using Microstrategy Desktop are immediately available to other Microstrategy products because of our centralized metadata architecture.

6. Can Microstrategy Desktop access SAP data?
Yes. With the release of Microstrategy 8, Microstrategy Desktop incorporates a new dynamic data access engine designed to access multi-dimensional databases (MDDBs or OLAP Cube Databases) such as those from SAP Business Information Warehouse (BW) databases.

7. Can Microstrategy Desktop access operational data systems?
Yes. Microstrategy Desktop users can use a new Operational SQL Engine to include data from any operational system using completely free-form SQL, including stored procedures and views.

8. How fast is the performance on Microstrategy Desktop?
Microstrategy Desktop provides instant access and analysis of information. This high performance is enabled through Intelligence Cubes™, caches, incremental fetches and advanced analytic features.

9. How long does it take to learn Microstrategy Desktop?
Microstrategy Desktop preserves the look and feel of popular desktop software such as Microsoft® Windows® Explorer and Microsoft Office. As such, users are immediately comfortable with Microstrategy Desktop. A customized interface using HTML can be created, simplifying navigation and report execution.

10. Can I make my data and graphs look professional?
Yes. Users can format their data into appealing reports using various formatting styles and graphs for maximum visual impact. Users can choose from more than 30 different charting options to present information in the best layout possible.

11. Is it possible to display multiple reports, images and information on the same page?
Yes, users can easily combine tables, images, graphs and other information onto the same page in a document. Visually impressive and compelling documents can be printed out and shared with corporate executives. Business users can now rearrange the organization of any report with simple drag and drop actions or by clicking on the new toolbar icons to get entirely new views of the data, all from the same report and without requiring assistance from IT.

12. What printing capabilities are available in Microstrategy Desktop?
Microstrategy Desktop offers advanced printing capabilities. Features include repeating row/column headers, customizable headers and footers, and a comprehensive page setup menu. Users can preview reports before sending it to the printer.

13. What subtotaling features does Microstrategy Desktop contain?
Microstrategy Desktop has more than 10 different subtotaling functions that aid analysis of the data. Subtotals can be presented at any level in the rows, columns and pages on the report.

14. What are the minimum requirements for Microstrategy Desktop?
Minimum requirements are a computer with at least a 450MHZ Pentium- compatible CPU, 256MB of RAM and 500MB of hard disk.

15. Is Microstrategy Desktop available in other languages?
Microstrategy Desktop is available in English, French, German, Spanish, Korean, Italian, Swedish, Japanese and Portuguese.

16. How long does it take to get Microstrategy Desktop up and running?
Microstrategy Desktop installs in minutes and automatically presents a list of available Microstrategy Intelligence Servers. Within an hour, the installation and setup are completed.

17. How does Microstrategy Desktop integrate with the rest of the Microstrategy platform?
Microstrategy Desktop is the intuitive client-server interface used by business analysts and application developers. Microstrategy Desktop interacts with the Intelligence Server to build metrics, create and format reports, and retrieve timely, accurate information to the desktop to enhance the decision-making process.

18. What security is provided with Microstrategy Desktop?
Microstrategy Desktop provides a host of security options to ensure that data is kept confidential and private. To facilitate easy deployment and minimal maintenance, Microstrategy Desktop integrates with Windows NT and 2000 security and with Novell directory. As a result, users who have logged into these systems will not need to log on again.

19. To what extend can Microstrategy Desktop be personalized?
Each Microstrategy Desktop user has a security profile defined by their administrator. This profile controls access to application functionality, specific reports or particular data for individual users or groups of users. The Desktop interface will adapt and display only what this user is allowed to see.

20. Is the Microstrategy MDX engine certified by SAP?
Yes. This new Dynamic MDX Engine generates optimized MDX syntax that is fully certified with SAP BW using SAP's high performance BAPI interfaces.

21. Can users join data across SAP BW Info Cubes and Query Cubes?
Yes. Users can use Microstrategy Desktop to create reports that access SAP data and join data across SAP BW Info Cubes and Query Cubes as well as access multiple instances of SAP BW at once.

22. Can Microstrategy Desktop join data across heterogeneous data sources?
Yes. Microstrategy 8 extends the Microstrategy data modeling flexibility to include integrated views of data across heterogeneous data stores. By mapping conforming dimensions from different sources, Microstrategy Desktop can automatically join data from multiple different sources in the same report document. Data can come from any source accessible by Microstrategy 8, including the data warehouse, data marts, SAP BW, and any number of operational system databases

23. Does Microstrategy provide predictive modeling capabilities commonly available in data mining tools?
Yes. Microstrategy 8 can calculate four of the primary data mining functions including neural network algorithms, clustering algorithms, regression algorithms, and tree algorithms.

24. Can Microstrategy incorporate best-of-breed data mining insight into mainstream business reports and analysis?
Yes. Microstrategy 8 has extended its analytic engine with "Data Mining Services" capability that allows reports and analyses to include predictive capabilities in every Microstrategy report or analysis. Microstrategy 8 includes the new ability to import data mining models directly from best-of-breed data mining products from vendors like IBM, Teradata, SAS, and SPSS using the new PMML or predictive modeling mark-up language standard.

25. Can Microstrategy Desktop export data to other software applications?
You can export information from Microstrategy Desktop to text files, Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Access and HTML files. The formatting of the tables and data are preserved when you export to these file formats.

26. What data sources does Microstrategy Desktop support?
You can access data in all the major databases including Oracle, IBM DB2, Informix, NCR Teradata, Microsoft Access, Microsoft SQL Server, Red Brick, Sybase and Non-Stop SQL.

27. To save time, can many reports be run at the same time?
Microstrategy Desktop can execute multiple reports simultaneously. Report results are saved in a personal History folder when ready.

28. Can reports be executed in off-peak periods?
Reports can be attached to time-based or event-based schedules that are defined by the administrator. These schedules automatically trigger the report execution and place a notification message in the History folder on completion.

29. What is Microstrategy OLAP Services?
Microstrategy OLAP Services is an extension to Microstrategy Intelligence Server that allows Microstrategy Web and Desktop users to manipulate Intelligent Cubes™. With OLAP Services end users can add or remove report objects, add derived metrics and modify the filter -- all with speed-of-thought response time against Intelligent Cubes. OLAP Services enables full multi-dimensional OLAP analysis within Intelligent Cubes, while retaining users' ability to seamlessly drill through to the full breadth and depth of the data warehouse.

30. What are the Intelligent Cubes used by OLAP Services?
Intelligent Cubes are user or administrator created multi-dimensional cubes that operate within Microstrategy Intelligence Server™. On Microstrategy's BI platform, creating an Intelligent Cube is as easy as creating a report. Intelligent Cubes enable Microstrategy to combine the speed and interactivity of multi-dimensional OLAP analysis and the analytical power and depth of relational OLAP.

31. What specific features and functionality do I get with OLAP Services?
With OLAP Services Microstrategy Web, Desktop and Office users can:

· Create unique report views based off an Intelligent Cube.
With OLAP Services, users can create unique report views by adding or removing attributes and metrics contained within the Intelligent Cube. This allows speed-of-thought report creation and modification with no need to extract data from the data warehouse.

· Create new on-the-fly metric calculations from existing metrics in an Intelligent Cube.
The new calculation is performed without submitting a new request to the data warehouse.

· Filter their view of the data within an Intelligent Cube.
The filtering will be performed on Microstrategy Intelligence Server within the Intelligent Cube.

32. How are Intelligent Cubes different from ordinary cubes?
Intelligent Cubes are created automatically when a new report is run against the data warehouse. Subsequent requests by other users can seamlessly hit this new Intelligent Cube. The logic to match user requests with the appropriate Intelligent Cube is automatically handled within the Microstrategy platform. Users don't have to specify the cube to which they want to connect.

Benefits of Intelligent Cubes include:

· Greater Efficiency - Intelligent Cubes are automatically generated and shared among all users whenever a report is executed by a user or pre-cached by the administrator or a user.

· Easy to Use - Intelligent Cubes can be designed by mainstream BI users, using the same interface and the same operations as are used with basic OLAP analysis.

· More Scalable Cubes - Intelligent Cubes do not need massive pre-calculations or pre-aggregations. The mid-tier Intelligence Server can do these calculations on-the-fly as the cubes are being used.

· Increased Manageability and Reliability - Intelligent Cubes can be configured to expire or refresh automatically whenever underlying data or definitions change.

· Increased Power for End-Users - Users can seamlessly drill through to the full depth of the data warehouse, or slice and dice with speed-of-thought response time within the Intelligent Cube.

33. What end user products leverage OLAP Services?
Microstrategy Web (Analyst and Professional versions), Microstrategy Desktop (Analyst and Designer versions) and Microstrategy Office all leverage the functionality enabled by OLAP Services.

34. What does an end-user need to do to take advantage of this?
The usage of OLAP Services is transparent to end-users. Users do not need to know the name and location of an Intelligent Cube, or even if it exists. OLAP Services works with Microstrategy Intelligence Server to automatically use the appropriate Intelligent Cube or create a new one to satisfy the end user request.

35. How is security handled?
Intelligent Cubes used by OLAP Services automatically inherit all of the security provisions of every report object used within the Intelligent Cube, and those provisions are dynamically applied to each user's security profile when the cube is accessed. If a user only has privileges to use four of the five metrics contained in an Intelligent Cube, that restriction will automatically and seamlessly apply when the user accesses the Intelligent Cube. The user will still have access to the Intelligent Cube for the four metrics he or she has privileges to use.

36. Can I access Intelligent Cubes without OLAP Services?
Yes, with the appropriate version of Microstrategy Web or Desktop, certain functions leverage the Intelligent Cubes. These functions include: report formatting down to cell level, column aliasing, drilling, pivoting, page-by, adding metric thresholds, adding subtotals, ranking and sorting. Please see the Web and Desktop version comparisons to determine exactly which Web or Desktop version includes the desired functionality.

37. Is OLAP Services sold as a separate product?
Yes, OLAP Services is sold as a separate product that is installed with Microstrategy Intelligence Server. It is licensed either on a per-user or per-CPU basis.

38. What is Microstrategy Narrowcast Server?
Microstrategy Narrowcast Server is a software product that monitors and delivers individualized information to users via email, web portals, and wireless devices such as PDAs, pagers, and phones. Through a easy-to-use web page, users specify what information they want, when and how they want to receive it.

39. What are the business benefits of Microstrategy Narrowcast Server?
Microstrategy Narrowcast Server provides an easy and inexpensive way to send corporate information to untrained employees, partners, and customers. As a result, decision-makers have the information they need to maximize revenue generation and streamline business processes that cut operating costs.

40. What kinds of applications can Microstrategy Narrowcast Server support?
Microstrategy Narrowcast Server supports: enterprise reporting applications, executive information portals, corporate information dissemination, sale force automation, working capital management, supply chain management, extranet portals, secure business to business portals, customer service applications, and intelligent alerting applications.

41. Why do businesses need to send information out to users proactively?
People do not have time to search through information to identify information that requires immediate action. An intelligent alerting system understands and constantly monitors the information users need, and delivers information only when users need it. Users save time and take action when required.

42. How do current Microstrategy Narrowcast Server customers use Intelligent Alerting?
Customers use Microstrategy Narrowcast Server to deliver inventory alerts, business performance alerts, supply chain alerts, customer activity alerts, stock and personal finance alerts, last minute travel alerts, data load alerts, customer account activity alerts, and fraud alerts. New uses are constantly being developed for intelligent alerting.

43. How do users receive only information that they want?
Through an easy-to-use subscription web page, users specify what information they want. Some personalization options include the language choices and specific information criteria such as certain products. Using this user profile, Microstrategy Narrowcast Server sends only the information that the user has requested.

44. Can users turn off the information delivery?
Yes, users can switch on and off their own information delivery. Administrators can also set up some ‘non-optional’ information delivery so that everyone receives the information. As a result, users can obtain information without having to wait for IT to develop the reports.

45. What kinds of information can users receive?
Users can receive both tables and charts from the Microstrategy platform, and content from current information sources such as transaction processing systems, Enterprise Resource Planning systems, databases, XML files, and web servers.

46. What formatting can be applied to the information that is sent out by Microstrategy Narrowcast Server?
Information can be formatted into HTML, plain text, Microsoft® Excel, or PDF files. The size and display of these files are adjusted to suit the email type or the wireless device for different users.

47. To which devices can Microstrategy Narrowcast Server deliver information?
Narrowcast Server can deliver information to email, mobile phones, pagers, faxes, PDAs, intranet and extranet web portals. Businesses can also build and plug in their own Information Transmission Module to support their own devices.

48. How does the Microstrategy Narrowcast Server support enterprise wide mission critical applications?
Microstrategy Narrowcast Server's world-class clustering and fail-over ensures support for mission-critical 24x7 systems. Rigorous in-house testing has proven that Narrowcast Server can personalize and deliver millions of messages a day. The system tracks fail-over down to each message.