Solution

The correct answer is Fact table.

Key Points

• A Fact table contains the primary information in a data warehouse.
  • The fact table stores quantitative data for analysis and is often denormalized.
  • It usually contains foreign keys to dimension tables which describe the context of the facts.
  • The fact table is central to the star schema and snowflake schema of data warehousing.
  • It typically includes measures (numeric values) and keys to associated dimension tables.
  • Examples of measures in a fact table include sales amount, quantity sold, and transaction count.

Additional Information

• Fact tables are optimized for query performance and are often indexed to speed up data retrieval.
• They are typically large in size and grow quickly as more transactional data is added over time.
• Fact tables can be categorized into different types such as transactional, periodic snapshot, and accumulating snapshot fact tables.
• Unlike dimension tables, which store descriptive attributes, fact tables focus on storing measurable, quantitative data.