Different way to aggregate Essbase: Cannot aggregate to parent level

Question

Hi,
I used to use the following statement in BR to aggregate dimensions:
FIX("Segment Allocation Base")
FIX(@IDESCENDANTS("YearTotal"))
@IDESCENDANTS("Total Company"); /*Total Company is member of spare dimension: Market Segments */
ENDFIX
ENDFIX
The tree structure is like this:
Market Segments (Never Share)
|__ No Market Segments (Never Share)
|__ Total Company (Never Share)
|__Total Market Segments (Dynamic Calc)
|__SC (Store) -> Level 0
|__SE (Store) -> Level 0
1. However, I found that the parent level cannot be aggregated. After I enter a value for Total Company (I think I am creating a block for Total Company), the above BR works.
2. If I change the BR to the following statement, it works. I don't need to create the block first.
FIX("Segment Allocation Base")
FIX(@IDESCENDANTS("YearTotal"))
AGG("Market Segments");
ENDFIX
ENDFIX
Any gurus knows the difference about the above 2 different ways to aggregate? What's wrong with the first one?
Thank you in advance.
Casper

Answer 1

Unless you wrote the first statement wrong. The reason the first one doesn't calculate is because it does absolutely nothing
@idescendant is a declaration not a calculation
Definition of @idescendant is: Returns the specified member and either (1) all descendants of the specified member or (2) all descendants down to a specified generation or level. You can use this member set function as a parameter of another function, where that parameter is a list of members.
AGG is a calculation.
So unless I'm reading it wrong you declare the children of Total Company and then do absolutely nothing. Therefore it has nothing to do with dense/sparse or blocks existing or not.