In order to deliver accurate insight in a timely manner, today’s powerful reporting solutions require ‘optimized’ data. However, business applications such as ERP, CRM, Inventory, etc., store their data in a non-optimized transactional format — an ideal format for processing records but less-than-ideal for analyzing them.

Dimension, Fact, and Time modeling is the industry-standard approach to overcoming these challenges. It restructures data to improve reporting performance, accuracy, and usability.

Understanding Dimension, Fact & Time

• Dimension: A constant data element, such as customer name, location, product category, or sales region.
• Fact: A measurable value, such as total revenue, gross profit, or units sold. These values provide insights when analyzed by dimensions.
• Time: The timeframe over which facts are analyzed, revealing trends such as seasonal sales patterns and customer buying behavior.

By applying Dimension, Fact, and Time modeling, businesses can transform raw transactional data into meaningful analytics that are easier to generate, faster to process, and more resilient to data structure changes.

Why Traditional Reporting Falls Short

Using conventional reporting tools to analyze data within an OLTP structure can be time-consuming, complex, and prone to errors as data evolves. Reports often take too long to run, are difficult to build, and can become unreliable as databases change over time.

The DataSelf Advantage: DFT as a Module, Not Just a Model

Traditional analytics solutions rely heavily on manual Dimension, Fact, and Time modeling—requiring extensive schema reviews, data mapping, and installation work that often takes days or weeks to complete.

DataSelf takes a different approach. Rather than requiring complex, manual transformations, DataSelf offers DataSelf DFT™—a Dimension, Fact, and Time modeling module that simplifies and accelerates the process.

With DataSelf DFT, businesses can:

• Deploy BI models up to 80% faster
• Achieve greater consistency and scalability
• Reduce dependency on technical specialists
• Adapt quickly to evolving business needs

Want to see the types of reports and dashboards that can be created with this type of modeling? See them here!