OLAP Cube

An OLAP cube (Online Analytical Processing cube) is a multidimensional structure (think revenue by product, region, and month all at once) that pre-aggregates data so a user can slice and dice it instantly. It is the engine under most classic EPM tools, and it is genuinely fast at what it does.

The speed comes from pre-computing and storing summarized numbers ahead of time, which means the cube itself doesn’t keep a live link back to the individual ledger entries that produced them. That’s fine for a human analyst who trusts the model that built the cube. It is a problem for an AI asked to cite where a number came from. See why the OLAP cube is the wrong foundation for finance AI.