The following are elements contained in business/report cubes.
Categories are the main tools for organizing data. They are components which correspond to particular collections of data in the data source. They are grouped in folders that are named to reflect information collections. A category can contain several subcategories.
Organizing data required by a user into multiple categories or multiple levels of categories is meaningful, and makes it easy to use. End users can touch data through elements in a category, instead of having to query a data source directly.
Dimension objects are cube elements that are the basis for analysis in a report. They present the availability and key performance of data, and characteristically return text data or dates, and answer the following question: who, when, what, where and which. A dimension object can be inserted wherever a group field can be inserted, as a column or row in a crosstab, or as a group field in a banded object or table.
Measure objects are numeric cube elements that have been calculated at the data warehouse level. Measures can be used alone or calculated with other fields. A measure object can be inserted wherever summaries can be inserted. For example, measures can be inserted in the group header or footer panel of a table or banded object, or as an aggregate field in a crosstab. JReport calculates values based on the group level at which the measure object was inserted.
Detail information objects provide additional information. It can be bound to a dimension object, measure object or category/subcategory. Detail information objects are used for displaying detailed field values.