(EN) A method, a computer system and a computer programme product for a computer system for transforming general On-line Analytical Processing (OLAP) hierarchies into summarisable hierarchies whereby pre-aggregation is disclosed, by which fast query response times for aggregation queries without excessive storage use is made possible even when the hierarchies originally are irregular. Pre-aggregation is essential for ensuring adequate response time during data analysis. Most OLAP systems adopt the practical pre-aggregation approach, as opposed to full pre-aggregation, of materialising only select combinations of aggregates and then re-use these for efficiently computing other aggregates. However, this re-use of aggregates is contingent on the dimension hierarchies and the relationships between facts and dimensions satisfying stringent constraints. The present invention significantly extends the scope of practical pre-aggregation by transforming irregulare dimension hierarchies and fact-dimension relationships into well-behaved structures that enable practical pre-aggregation.
