SSAS Interview Questions with Answers - Mindmajix

If you're looking for SSAS Interview Questions for Experienced or Freshers, you are at right place. There are lot of opportunities from many reputed companies in the world. According to research SSAS has a market share of about 26.35%. So, You still have opportunity to move ahead in your career in SSAS certification guide. Mindmajix offers Advanced SSAS Interview Questions 2018 that helps you in cracking your interview & acquire dream career as SSAS Developer.

Q1) Explain about Data Mining Archtecture & Techniques?

Data Mining Architecture & Techniques
	Resources	Explanation
Architecture	Data sources	WWW or Internet is big source of Data
	Database	Database contains data which is ready to be processed
	Data mining engine	It contains modules used to perform data mining tasks
	Pattern evaluation module	It mentions the measure of the differnitaions of patterns
	GUI	It is the communication between user and data mining system
	Knowledge Base	It is a guide for result patterns, based on models it interacts
Types Of Mining Architecture	No-coupling Data Mining	It retrives data from a particular data sources
	Loose Coupling Data Mining	It retrives data from a particular database
	Semi-Tight Coupling Data Mining	In this it uses few features of data warehouse sys
	Tight Coupling Data mining	Data layer, Data mining application layer, Front-end layer
Data Mining Techniques	Decision Trees	Common technique used for mining, The root acts as condition
	Sequential patterns	It is used to identifiy events, similar patterns of transaction data
	Clustering	By automatic method similar characterstics clusters have to form
	Prediction	It defines the relationship of dependent & independent instances
	Association	It is a relation technique, used to recognize the pattern
	Classification	It depends on ML, Used to classifiy item of particular set to predinned groups
Technological Drivers	Database size	For mainatining & Processing data we need powerful sys
	Query complexity	It is used to analyze complex queris in large number.

Q. What is SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS)? List out the features?
Microsoft SQL Server 2014 Analysis Services (SSAS) delivers online analytical processing (OLAP) and data mining functionality for business intelligence applications. Analysis Services supports OLAP by letting us design, create, and manage multidimensional structures that contain data aggregated from other data sources, such as relational databases. For data mining applications, Analysis Services lets we design, create, and visualize data mining models that are constructed from other data sources by using a wide variety of industry-standard data mining algorithms.
Analysis Services is a middle tier server for analytical processing, OLAP, and Data mining. It manages multidimensional cubes of data and provides access to heaps of information including aggregation of data. One can create data mining models from data sources and use it for Business Intelligence also including reporting features.
Analysis service provides a combined view of the data used in OLAP or Data mining. Services here refer to OLAP, Data mining. Analysis services assists in creating, designing and managing multidimensional structures containing data from varied sources. It provides a wide array of data mining algorithms for specific trends and needs.
Some of the key features are:
1.Ease of use with a lot of wizards and designers.
2.Flexible data model creation and management
3.Scalable architecture to handle OLAP
4.Provides integration of administration tools, data sources, security, caching, and reporting etc.
5.Provides extensive support for custom applications

Q. What is the difference between SSAS 2005 and SSAS2008?
1.In 2005 its not possible to create an empty cube but in 2008 we can create an empty cube.
2.A new feature in Analysis Services 2008 is the Attribute Relationships tab in the Dimension Designer.to implement attribute relationship is complex in ssas 2005
3.we can create ONLY 2000 partitions per Measure Group in ssas 2005 and the same limit of partitions is removed in ssas 2008.

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Q. What is OLAP? How is it different from OLTP?
1.OLAP stands for On-Line Analytical Processing. It is a capability or a set of tools which enables the end users to easily and effectively access the data warehouse data using a wide range of tools like MICROSOFT EXCEL, REPORTING SERVICES, and many other 3rd party BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE TOOLS.
2.OLAP is used for analysis purposes to support day-to-day business decisions and is characterized by less frequent data updates and contains historical data. Whereas, OLTP (On-Line Transactional Processing) is used to support day-to-day business operations and is characterized by frequent data updates and contains the most recent data along with limited historical data based on the retention policy driven by business needs.

Q. What is a Data Source? What are the different data sources supported by SSAS?
A DATA SOURCE contains the connection information used by SSAS to connect to the underlying database to load the data into SSAS during processing. A Data Source primarily contains the following information (apart from various other properties like Query timeout, Isolation etc.):
1.Provider
2.Server Name
3.Database Name
4.Impersonation Information
SSAS Supports both .Net and OLE DB Providers. Following are some of the major sources supported by SSAS: SQL Server, MS Access, Oracle, Teradata, IBM DB2, and other relational databases with the appropriate OLE DB provider.

Q. What is Impersonation? What are the different impersonation options available in SSAS?
Impersonation allows SSAS to assume the identity/security context of the client application which is used by SSAS to perform the server side data operations like data access, PROCESSING etc. As part of impersonation, the following options are available in SSAS:
1.Use a specific Windows user name and password: This option lets you to specify Windows account credentials which will be used by SSAS to perform operations like source data access, processing etc.
2.Use the service account: When this option is selected, SSAS uses the credentials of the service account under which the Analysis Services service is configured/running for source data access, processing etc.
3.Use the credentials of the current user: When this option is set, SSAS uses the credentials of the current user for performing operations like DMX Open Queries, Local cubes etc. This option cannot be used for performing server side operations like source data access, processing etc.
4.Inherit: This option let’s the SSAS server decide which impersonation mode is suitable for each type of operation. When this option is set, by default SSAS will use the service account for operations like processing and the credentials of the current user for operations like Local cubes, querying the data mining models, etc…

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