Object Caches

When you or any users browse an object definition (attribute, metric, and so on), you create what is called an object cache. An object cache is a recently used object definition stored in memory on Developer and Intelligence Server. You browse an object definition when you open the editor for that object. You can create object caches for applications.

For example, when a user opens the Report Editor for a report, the collection of attributes, metrics, and other user objects displayed in the Report Editor compose the report's definition. If no object cache for the report exists in memory on Developer or Intelligence Server, the object request is sent to the metadata for processing.

The report object definition retrieved from the metadata and displayed to the user in the Report Editor is deposited into an object cache in memory on Intelligence Server and also on the Developer of the user who submitted the request. As with element caching, any time the object definition can be returned from memory in either the Developer or Intelligence Server machine, it is faster than retrieving it from the metadata database.

So when a Developer user triggers an object request, the cache within the Developer machine's memory is checked first. If it is not there, the Intelligence Server memory is checked. If the cache is not even there, the results are retrieved from the metadata database. Each option is successively slower than the previous. If a MicroStrategy Web product user triggers an object request, only the Intelligence Server cache is checked before getting the results from the metadata database.

This section discusses the following topics concerning object caching: