Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services OLAP cube

Question

I was trying to find a tool to increase performance in the reports of our application and I heard about OLAP + Reporting Services which is described as an excellent combination to do this work. Anyway I didn't find the way to keep the OLAP cube up-to-date since the data in the original DB can change. (It's a transactional application and one pending record can be mark as paid etc).

Is this the better way to do this, or should I use another technology?

If the suggestion is still to use OLAP + Reporting services how can I have the information up-to-date?

Answer 1

It is usual for a OLAP database to be populated on a regular schedule from your OLTP database using some form of ETL (Extract, Transform, Load).

In the SQL Server world, that is often accomplished using SSIS.

I suggest you read these books:

The Data Warehouse Toolkit

The Data Warehouse ETL Toolkit

Answer 2

I have never used them but I've heard that astrology + fortune telling are extremely cheaper, faster, more efficient, make magics and require to provide even less input than you did in this question.

"Anyway I didn't find the way to keep the OLAP cube up-to-date since the data in the original DB can change."

It is called ROLAP storage mode