DBSA allows you to send a value (numeric or string) to an attribute of an element in a dimension.
DBSA Syntax
The syntax for this function is:
DBSA(attribute_value, dimension, element, attribute_name)Where:
- attribute_value: The value that you intend to send.
- dimension: A valid dimension name. It should be prefixed with the appropriate server name and a colon, such as “NebulaFit:Branch” to reference the Branch dimension on the NebulaFit server. If no server name is specified, the DBSA function will attempt to run against the local server.
- element: An element of the dimension to which you want to send the value.
- attribute_name: The attribute to which you wish to send the value. It must be a valid attribute of the dimension specified.
Example of DBSA
We have a dimension, Employee, with the attributes Name, ID-Name, Department and Age. We want to update the Name attribute for employee with the EmployeeID 1111 with the text “Rehmat Walia”.
The DBSA function in Excel as following:
DBSA("Rehmat Walia", "Employee", "1111", "Name")
Here we have posted my name to the Name attribute of the Employee dimension for element with the ID “1111”.
Example of a Numeric value updated into a Numeric Attribute
We also have a numeric attribute, “Age”, on the Employee dimension as well. The same employee needs to have their age entered into the Age attribute. We want to use DBSA to insert the value of 5000 into this attribute for the element “1111”. The formula in Excel to do this would be:
DBSA(50, "Employee", "1111", "Age")Note that there are three types of attributes – String, Numeric and Alias. For a more detailed discussion, please see this post.
Using Cell Reference Rather than Hard Coded Values
Instead of using hard-coded values, a more flexible approach is to reference the values from other cells within Excel. By referring to these cells in your DBSA, the report or form becomes dynamic, allowing for easy modification and updates to the referenced values.
Here is an example of the use of DBSA in Planning Analytics for Excel.
