ROLAP

Relational Online Analytical Processing(ROLAP) is an alternative to the MOLAP (Multidimensional OLAP) technology. While both ROLAP and MOLAP analytic tools are designed to allow analysis of data through the use of a multidimensional data model, ROLAP differs significantly in that it does not require the pre-computation and storage of information. Instead, ROLAP tools access the data in a relational database and generate SQL queries to calculate information at the appropriate level when an end user requests it.