MISSING ()

Description:

This function converts a value that is on the LHS of a formula to a type "MISSING". This function is designed specifically to allow you to assign the "MISSING" tag to any value. This tag can be assigned to a value so that in the future one can check for a value to see if it's MISSING, using the ISMISSING function. The function takes no parameters and doesn't return any value either. The function just assigns a MISSING tag to any value / values on the LHS of the formula and then through another function it is possible to check if this value is MISSING or not.

Syntax: MISSING ()

Remarks

• This function takes no parameters.
• It can be used when any value / range of values should be assigned a tag of Missing and categorized as that.
• The function takes one / more values on the LHS and all the values on the LHS can be assigned a tag of Missing.
• Once any value is categorized under "MISSING" then the same can be checked at a later stage for being "MISSING" by using the ISMISSING function.

Example

Let us take the example of a cube in PowerOLAP that requires making a value to type "MISSING". This tag of MISSING can be assigned to any value on the LHS of the formula. This does not produce any visible change in the value, except that it isn't a "blue" value any longer as it is governed by a formula. The value therefore, cannot be changed to something else but what the function does is that it simply assigns a tag to the value that helps it to be identified as missing.  In another cube, or in the same cube, in any member, you can check to see if a value is of type "MISSING" or not by using the ISMISSING function. If the value being checked has been assigned to the type "MISSING" before, then the ISMISSING will return true.



The screen above shows a formula for the MISSING function.

The formula writes a value into the "MetaDataValues" dimension, into the "MISSING" member. In the formula, the MISSING function takes no parameters,as per the design of the function. The function assigns a tag of MISSING to any value that is on the LHS of the formula, and then this value is finally recognized as type MISSING. The function simply tags the value / values on the LHS of the formula as type MISSING. This function does not return a value and it doesn't take a parameter. In the formula above, the LHS of the formula, which are the values for the intersection of the member "MetaDataMeasure" and "Missing", these values are all assigned to being a type MISSING. If any of these values are checked for being of type "Missing" with the help of the function "ISMISSING" then that function will return "TRUE" which means that the tag of MISSING has been correctly assigned to these values.