There are many options to build and maintain the structure of each business segment. One or multiple can be used depending on the use case and access to source systems:
Manual definition (staging cube): mainly recommended for smaller dimensions and when the structure cannot be loaded from a source system.
ODBC: Frequently used when the dimension can be loaded from an ERP system or data warehouse.
CSV: Dto. but when an ODBC connection is not available but instead a file export can be provided in a suitable format
Dimension: When the business segment can be derived from another TM1 dimension in the system
Attribute: An attribute of the dimension can be used to determine the structure
Process: A custom Turbo Integrator process can also be used to build the structure.
For a full documentation please refer to the Apliqode Framework documentation. The following paragraphs will focus on the manual definition and the general concepts that are valid for any of the load types.
It can also be a viable option to create new business segment elements as part of the data load, please refer to this paragraph.