What are they talking about when we refer to the shape of an Essbase outline? How can an Essbase database outline have a shape? Well conceptually every Essbase database outline has a shape. What you want to be concerned with is what shape your outline has.
Believe it or not, the shape of your outline is one of the most important considerations for overall database performance, but it is still a guideline. There will be times when this guideline simply will not work for you.
Everyone knows what an hourglass looks like, right? An hourglass is wide at the ends and narrow in the middle. Well in most cases, you want your Essbase database outline to have the shape of an hourglass, really.