When do I use IF and FIX in Calculation scripts in ESSBASE

In general you should try and only use

"FIX" statements on Sparse dimensions.

"IF" statements on Dense dimensions.

FIX statement allow you to take slice of the database and only perform an action on that slice.

If you FIX on a sparse dimension, then you are limiting the amount of blocks that you are performing action upon. If you fix on Dense dimension, you are limiting the number of blocks, but rather just a portion within each block.

Using FIX statement on a dense dimension can cause multiple passes through the same block which is very inefficient. On the other hand, the IF statement is well suited to Dense dimensions because it performs IF logic while the block is in memory.

Ex: IF Jan

do.......

ELSE

do......

ENDIF

here the calculations will be done in one pass without the need of multiple passes through the blocks