There are industry standards, and then there are Microsoft Corp standards, the latter often becoming de facto simply by dint of the size of the company. On its quest ever upwards into the enterprise systems space, Microsoft Corp has heralded its entry into datawarehousing with the launch of a new set of application programming interfaces, APIs, to enable access to online analytical processing data. Microsoft has just released the beta version of the APIs called OLE DB for OLAP, which are designed to link multi-dimensional data providers with those wishing to access the data. Of course, these fly pretty much in the face of the OLAP Council, which is working on an industry-wide standard API for online analytical processing. Needless to say, some 18 vendors, including OLAP Council members, have already announced their support for OLE DB for OLAP, including Gentia Software Ltd, Andyne Computing Ltd, Brio Technology Inc, Cognos Inc, Business Objects SA, NCR Corp, Seagate Software Inc, and Panorama Software Systems Ltd. Panorama is the Israeli company from whom Microsoft last year bought a multi-dimensional database engine, which it is working on to make its own (CI No 3,099). Gentia Software, the application development tools company, is one of those involved in the OLAP Council, who has also announced support for Microsoft’s APIs. Its eponymous Gentia tools are used to build business intelligence applications, and while it implemented the OLAP Council API support in March, it will also support OLE DB for OLAP, which it expects to deliver in the first half of next year, subject of course to Microsoft delivering on time.
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