Script a cube using Windows PowerShell and AMO

This installment of "Windows PowerShell and AMO" covers how to script a cube from a SQL Server Analysis Service instance to XMLA format file.

Part 1 of this series on “Microsoft Windows PowerShell and SQL Server 2008 AMO” illustrated how to install Windows PowerShell and connect to an Analysis Service Servername. Part 2 illustrated how to use Windows PowerShell and AMO to get the various Server properties of SQL Server Analysis Service. Part 3 discussed how to use Windows PowerShell and AMO to get database properties of SQL Server Analysis Service and Part 4 illustrated how to create Analysis Service database using Windows PowerShell and AMO. Part 5 illustrated how to backup an Analysis Service database using Windows PowerShell and SQL Server 2008 AMO. Part 6 of this article series illustrated how to restore an Analysis Service database from a backup file with no password protection. Part 7 discussed how to restore an Analysis Service database from a database backup file with password protection. Part 8 covered how to process a dimension in Analysis Service database and Part 9 illustrated how to process a single cube and also process the entire Analysis service database. Part 10 examined the various types of detach and attach methods to detach and attach an Analysis Service database. Part 11 illustrated how to script dimension from a SQL Server Analysis Service instance to XMLA format file. This installment is going to illustrate how to script a cube from a SQL Server Analysis Service instance to XMLA format file.

Let's begin by connecting to the Analysis Service server “PowerServer\SQL2008” using Windows PowerShell and AMO as shown below. [Refer Figure 1.0] Here you are loading the Analysis Service Manage object DLL and connecting to the Analysis Service server instance “SQL2008” on the “PowerServer3” host.

[System.Reflection.Assembly]::
            LoadWithPartialName("Microsoft.AnalysisServices") >$NULL
$server = New-Object Microsoft.AnalysisServices.Server
$server.connect("PowerServer3\SQL2008")

connecting to the Analysis Service server
Figure 1.0

Now let's list all the databases available on the Analysis server “PowerServer\SQL2008” as shown below. [Refer Figure 1.1]

$database=$server.databases
$database|select-object name

Result

Name
----
Advent2
Adventure Works 2008 DW
Adventure Works 2008 -3
AAA
Adventure Works Test
Adventure Works 2008 -2
MyCube
xyz
Marketing
Finance1
Finance2
Finance3
Marketing1
MyDb123

list all the databases available on the Analysis server
Figure 1.1

Connect to the database “Adventure Works 2008 -2” on the Analysis Service instance “SQL2008” on the host “PowerServer3” as shown below. [Refer Figure 1.2]

$advdb=$database["Adventure Works 2008 -2"]

Connect to the database
Figure 1.2

Now let's assign the cube object “Adventure Works” to the $Adventcube variable as shown below.

$Adventcube = $advdb.Cubes.FindByName("Adventure Works")

Prepare and setup the Scripter Object as shown below.

$stringbuilder = new-Object System.Text.StringBuilder
$stringwriter = new-Object System.IO.StringWriter($stringbuilder)
$xmlOut = New-Object System.Xml.XmlTextWriter($stringwriter)
$xmlOut.Formatting = [System.Xml.Formatting]::Indented
$scriptObject = New-Object Microsoft.AnalysisServices.Scripter

Use the scriptCreate method to generate the script for creating the cube “Adventure Works” as shown below.

$MSASObject=[Microsoft.AnalysisServices.MajorObject[]] @($Adventcube)

$ScriptObject.ScriptCreate($MSASObject,$xmlOut,$false)

Now let's store the generated XML on to a file using the PowerShell cmdlet Out-File as shown below.

$stringbuilder.ToString() |out-file -filepath c:\AdventDb_Adventureworks_cube.xmla

You can open and see the content of the file c:\AdventDb_Adventureworks_cube.xmla as shown below. [Figure 1.3]

<Create xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/analysisservices/2003/engine">
  <ParentObject>
    <DatabaseID>Adventure Works 2008 -2</DatabaseID>
  </ParentObject>
  <ObjectDefinition>
    <Cube xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" 
	xmlns:ddl2="http://schemas.microsoft.com/analysisservices/2003/engine/2" 
	xmlns:ddl2_2="http://schemas.microsoft.com/analysisservices/2003/engine/2/2" 
	xmlns:ddl100_100="http://schemas.microsoft.com/analysisservices/2008/engine/100/100">
      <ID>Adventure Works</ID>
      <Name>Adventure Works</Name>
      <Annotations>
        <Annotation>
          <Name>http://schemas.microsoft.com/DataWarehouse/Designer/1.0:UseDiagramDefaultLayout</Name>
          <Value>true</Value>
        </Annotation>
        <Annotation>
          <Name>http://schemas.microsoft.com/DataWarehouse/Designer/1.0:ShowRelationshipNames</Name>
          <Value>false</Value>
        </Annotation>
        <Annotation> 
...
...
..
..

     </Action>
      </Actions>
      <ProactiveCaching>
        <SilenceInterval>-PT1S</SilenceInterval>
        <Latency>-PT1S</Latency>
        <SilenceOverrideInterval>-PT1S</SilenceOverrideInterval>
        <ForceRebuildInterval>-PT1S</ForceRebuildInterval>
        <Source xsi:type="ProactiveCachingInheritedBinding" />
      </ProactiveCaching>
    </Cube>
  </ObjectDefinition>
</Create>

$see the content of the file c:\AdventDb_Adventureworks_cube.xmla$
Figure 1.3

Create the PowerShell script C:\AMOScripts\Generate_Dim_Script.ps1 that generates a script for any cubes in any database. Copy and paste the below given code to C:\AMOScripts\Generate_Cube_Script.ps1 as shown below. [Refer Figure 1.4]

param
(
[string] $servername,
[string] $databasename,
[string] $cubename,
[string] $location
)

[string] $mydate=date
$mydate=$mydate.replace(":"," ")
$mydate=$mydate.replace("/"," ")
$mydate="_" +$mydate.replace(" ","_")

[System.Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName("Microsoft.AnalysisServices") >$NULL
$server = New-Object Microsoft.AnalysisServices.Server
$server.connect($ServerName)

$database=$server.databases


$advdb=$database["$databasename"]

$AdventCube = $advdb.cubes.FindByName("$cubename")



$stringbuilder = new-Object System.Text.StringBuilder
$stringwriter = new-Object System.IO.StringWriter($stringbuilder)
$xmlOut = New-Object System.Xml.XmlTextWriter($stringwriter)
$xmlOut.Formatting = [System.Xml.Formatting]::Indented
$scriptObject = New-Object Microsoft.AnalysisServices.Scripter


$MSASObject=[Microsoft.AnalysisServices.MajorObject[]] @($AdventCube)

$ScriptObject.ScriptCreate($MSASObject,$xmlOut,$false)
$filename=$location+$cubename+"_"+$mydate+"_cube.xmla"
$stringbuilder.ToString() |out-file -filepath $filename

Create the PowerShell script
Figure 1.4

Let's get to the C:\AMOScripts location using set-location cmdlet as shown below.

Set-Location C:\AmoScripts

Execute the C:\AMOScripts\Generate_Dim_Script.ps1 with Servername “PowerServer3\SQL2008”, database name “Adventure Works 2008 -2”, cube name “Adventure Works” and with the location name “C:\Data\” as shown below. [Refer Figure 1.5]

.\Generate_Cube_Script.ps1 "PowerServer3\SQL2008" "Adventure Works 2008 -2" "Adventure Works" "C:\Data\"

execute the script
Figure 1.5

When the script is executed, you see that the XMLA format file for the cube “Adventure Works” is generated under C:\Data folder as shown below. [Refer Fig 1.6]

When the script is executed, you see that the XMLA format file for the cube
Figure 1.6

You can open and see the content of the file c:\data\ Adventure Works__04_08_2009_20_44_42_cube.xmla as shown below. [Figure 1.7]

<Create xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/analysisservices/2003/engine">
  <ParentObject>
    <DatabaseID>Adventure Works 2008 -2</DatabaseID>
  </ParentObject>
  <ObjectDefinition>
    <Cube xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" 
	xmlns:ddl2="http://schemas.microsoft.com/analysisservices/2003/engine/2" 
	xmlns:ddl2_2="http://schemas.microsoft.com/analysisservices/2003/engine/2/2" 
	xmlns:ddl100_100="http://schemas.microsoft.com/analysisservices/2008/engine/100/100">
      <ID>Adventure Works</ID>
      <Name>Adventure Works</Name>
      <Annotations>
        <Annotation>
          <Name>http://schemas.microsoft.com/DataWarehouse/Designer/1.0:UseDiagramDefaultLayout</Name>
          <Value>true</Value>
        </Annotation>
        <Annotation>
          <Name>http://schemas.microsoft.com/DataWarehouse/Designer/1.0:ShowRelationshipNames</Name>
          <Value>false</Value>
        </Annotation>
...
...
...
...
...
        </Action>
      </Actions>
      <ProactiveCaching>
        <SilenceInterval>-PT1S</SilenceInterval>
        <Latency>-PT1S</Latency>
        <SilenceOverrideInterval>-PT1S</SilenceOverrideInterval>
        <ForceRebuildInterval>-PT1S</ForceRebuildInterval>
        <Source xsi:type="ProactiveCachingInheritedBinding" />
      </ProactiveCaching>
    </Cube>
  </ObjectDefinition>
</Create>

open and see the content of the file
Figure 1.7

You can also see that the file name is generated on the fly with the cube name and time stamp.

Conclusion

This installment illustrated how to generate a script for a given cube of the Analysis Service database.

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