U.S. Office of Personnel Management - Ensuring the Federal Government has an effective civilian workforce

The FedScope Glossary lists and defines key terms that make up the FedScope display.  We have broken out our glossary listing by the three major components of a FedScope cube.

1. Dimension Line (5 key terms)
2. Data Display Area (14 key terms)
3. Toolbar (20 key terms)

FedScope Cube

A multidimensional data source.  It contains measures (data) organized into dimensions to provide faster retrieval and drill down capability.  A FedScope cube brings together key dimensions (data elements) on the Federal workforce and lets you explore any combination of the data: up, down, and across the dimensions.

Dimension

A broad grouping of descriptive data about a major aspect of the Federal workforce, such as agency, occupation, or work schedule.  Each dimension includes different levels of categories in one or more drill down paths and an optional set of special categories.

Dimension Line

The dimension line shows the categories used to filter the data from each dimension in a FedScope cube. The dimension line appears above the display area in your Web browser.  The example below depicts an example of a FedScope dimension line.

Filter

A method to emphasize information important to you by removing unnecessary information from the report.  For example, instead of looking at the total Federal workforce, you can view employment for a specific agency, location, or occupation without deleting data in the report.

Level

An object that contains common or default attributes for all its member categories.  When users drill down on a FedScope dimension, they can drill down on categories from one level to another.

Slice and Dice

Changes and arranges data when you

• choose different categories for your FedScope report
• drill down and drill up
• filter information

Category

The items in the rows or columns of a FedScope report.

Category Label

A name that identifies a category.

Child Category

A category one level below another category along a drill down path.  For example, Alabama is a child category of United States, where United States is the parent category.

See also Parent Category.

Column

A category that shows related information in a vertical list.

Display

A type of table (crosstab) or chart/graph.

You can change the display by clicking on one of the first 8 display buttons on the FedScope toolbar.

Drill

An action that shows different categories.   Drilling down shows child categories.  Drilling up removes child categories from the report.

Drill Down

An action that shows child categories.

Drill Up

An action that removes the child categories, and adds the parent categories.

Measure

A workforce statistic for the who (gender, age, length of service), what (occupation, occupational category, pay plan & grade, salary level, work schedule, type of appointment), and where (agency, location, metropolitan statistical area) dimensions.   FedScope has three available measures:

1. employment count
2. average salary
3. average length of service

Measures are displayed in the cells of a FedScope table.

Nested Category

Categories are arranged in multiple levels along the rows or columns in a crosstab display.  Nested categories form groups of information that add another perspective to a FedScope report.

Nested Crosstabs

A crosstab display contains categories arranged in multiple levels along the rows or columns.

Parent Category

A category one level above another category along a drill up path.  The parent value is usually a consolidation of all its children's values.

For example, United States is the parent category of Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, ..., etc.

Row

A category that shows related information in a horizontal list.

Sort

Arranges FedScope values in numerical order or labels in alphabetical order.   You can sort in ascending or descending order.

Automatic Exceptions

Exceptional values that are automatically highlighted.  A value is considered exceptional if it deviates significantly from the expected value computed from its row and column percentages.

Bookmark

The prepare bookmark icon captures the complete URL for a FedScope report shown in the Location or Address box of your Web browser.  This URL includes information about the categories in the report, data formats, and filtering that is not usually included in the URL.  After you capture the URL, you can bookmark the FeScope report and add its URL to your list of bookmarks or favorites in your Web browser.

Clustered Bar Display

A chart that groups related information, compares summaries, and compares categories.

Columns Box

Used to improve the performance and readability of large reports by limiting the data that appears in crosstab displays.  For example, you can set a row limit of 20 and a column limit of 10.  Values that you set in the Column and Row boxes on the toolbar override the FedScope default row and column limits which are 50 and 20 respectively.

Crosstab Display

The standard crosstab display is the default display type in FedScope, and it shows data in tabular format.  The first two dimensions of a FedScope cube represent the rows and columns respectively.

Drill Through

An action to access information contained in another FedScope report.  You can replace data in a FedScope table with data from a different quarter by drilling through to a different cube.  To drill through to another cube, click on the drill through icon on the FedScope toolbar.

Exception Highlighting

Formatting that is applied when the information in the report meets the conditions set by the automatic exception sensitivity.

Explain Window

A window that shows details about the current information in a FedScope table.

Export Data

Export the data in a FedScope report for use in other applications.  Exported data is saved in a comma separated value (.csv) file format.  You can view this data in any application that supports comma separated value files, such as Microsoft Excel.

Export PDF (Print Reports)

Print FedScope reports using the Adobe Acrobat PDF format to render, paginate, and size the output, producing high-quality reports suitable for distribution.

Indented Crosstab Display

Use this display so that the levels of nested categories are indented and the relationships between the categories are more easily identified.   This display also presents a more compact format that a crosstab, making it better for printing.

Legend

An explanatory list of categories in the report for certain displays.  It shows the category name and color representing the associated data.  The legend doesn't appear in crosstab, simple bar, and three-dimensional bar displays.

Multiline Display

A chart that reveals and compares trends and cycles to show relationships between variables.  It also shows time series analysis and relationships between variables.

Pie Display

A chart that shows the relationship between the whole and the parts.  For example, a pie display can show you the how much of the Federal workforce for the Office of Personnel Management is male vs. female.

Rows Box

Used to improve the performance and readability of large reports by limiting the data that appears in crosstab displays.  For example, you can set a row limit of 20 and a column limit of 10.  Values that you set in the Row and Column boxes on the toolbar override the FedScope default row and column limits which are 50 and 20 respectively.

Simple Bar Display

A chart that shows change over a specific time period, contrasts two or more variables, and reveals trends and irregularities in a bar format.  This type of display is useful for discrete data.

Stacked Bar Display

A chart that shows relative proportions of parts to the whole and the relationship between the parts in a stacked bar format.

Suppression

Used to ignore categories that fall into a low range.

1. Zero Suppression
   • removes rows or columns containing all zeros that can occur when drilling down from governmentwide data to very detailed data.
2. 80/20 Suppression
   • removes rows or columns whose absolute values do not contribute to the top 80% of results.  It then summarizes the removed rows or columns into a single row or column called "Other".

Note:   The Zero and 80/20 suppression button icons remain enabled until you click them again to disable them.

Swap (Rows and Columns)

Exchange the positions of categories in rows and columns.  For example, a FedScope report contains few rows but many columns that exceed the width of the printed page.  You can swap the rows and columns to fit the report on one page.

Three-Dimensional Bar Display

A chart that shows relationships between two or more variables.  Use to analyze large quantities of data that are difficult to interpret otherwise.