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Identifiers (MDX)

This section discusses identifiers in InterSystems MDX.

MDX Identifiers and Allowed Variations

Every cube, subject area, relationship, dimension, hierarchy, level, member, property, and measure has an identifier.

Each MDX identifier has one of the following forms:

  • A regular identifier:

    name
    

    You can use this form if name follows these rules:

    • The first character must be either an alphabetic character (Latin-1) or the underscore character (_).

      In InterSystems MDX, the first character can be numeric if the rest of the characters are also numeric. This InterSystems extension to MDX means that you can conveniently refer to members that have all-numeric names (such as postal codes).

    • The other characters must be either alphabetic characters, the underscore character, or numeric characters.

    • The name must not be an MDX reserved keyword. Reserved keywords are not case-sensitive in MDX.

  • A delimited identifier:

    [name]
    

    You must use this form if name does not follow the preceding rules. If name includes a right square bracket (]), you must escape that by using two right square brackets together (]])

  • (Only for members) A member key:

    &[key value]
    

    For information on key values, see Key Values.

Note:

name is not case-sensitive, but key value is.

Important:

Note that name and key value are not expressions. That is, you cannot replace them with string-valued expressions.

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