Apparatus and method for allowing complex aggregates in analytical views in a distributed database

1. A system, comprising:

a plurality of worker machines connected by a network, each worker machine storing at least one partition of a distributed database and a partial function module to initialize a database dimension, increment an aggregate of the database dimension in response to a data change and to serialize a last aggregate of the database dimension in response to a refresh operation to form partial results of an analytical view; and

an analytical view machine connected to the network to respond to a query without accessing a partition of the distributed database, the analytical view machine merging partial results from the plurality of worker machines to produce a final result to the query.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the aggregate of the database dimension is a decomposable measure.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein the aggregate of the database dimension is not a decomposable measure.

4. The system of claim 3 wherein the aggregate of the database dimension that is not a decomposable measure is an estimate supplied by a database management system associated with the distributed database.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein the analytical view machine merges partial results from the plurality of worker machines to aggregate data along a hierarchical dimension and thereby define an analytical view that is maintained as a data unit separate from the distributed database prior to the receipt of a query applied to the analytical view.

6. The system of claim 1 further comprising a client machine connected to the network to secure the final result from the analytical view machine.