Time dimension

You will probably always want to have a Time dimension in your Data Warehouse, so let’s build one.

Using the InMemory Query Tool, we can see that the central table, the Sales Invoice Line table, already contains a number of columns with date information. One of them is the Posting Date column:

The Posting Date column could act as a dimension in itself, but typically you would like to have even more categorization options when it comes to Time than just the dates.

For instance, you would like to be able to group your data by:

• Dates
• Weeks
• Months
• Quarters
• Years
• Etc.

Also, it makes sense to create one central, shared Time dimension table that can be referenced by all potential date columns in all potential Fact tables.