SQL Server Analysis Services 2005/2008 articles,blogs,scripts,FAQs,tools,books

Q: Can you  specify bucket start/end values for groupping attributes using DiscretizationMethod ?

A: No, and start/end values can change after reprocessing dimensions. If you want to have control on groupping attributes values, best option is to create attribute group by yourself either in the dimension table or in data source view using name calculations.

Example:

1. Need to make customer groupping based on first letter of last name:

SELECT CustomerName, LEFT(CustomerName, 1)  AS CustomerNameGroup
  FROM dbo.Customer

2. Need to group sales price:

 SELECT SalesPrice
   , CASE WHEN SalesPrice <= 10 THEN '<=10'
         WHEN SalesPrice <= 50 THEN '<= 50'
          WHEN SalesPrice <= 100 THEN '<= 100'
          ELSE '>100'
    END SalesPriceGroup
  , CASE WHEN SalesPrice <= 10 THEN 1 WHEN SalesPrice <= 50 THEN 2 WHEN SalesPrice <= 100 THEN 3 ELSE 4 END AS SalesPriceGroupKey
FROM dbo.Sales

Note: Use SalesPriceGroupKey to Order by key, so you will see values in proper order.

More information about this property you can read here.