The hosting environment where the SSAS 2012 instance is located refuses to open the default port number (2383), and insists on using port 443. Almost all SSAS functions and connections work just fine when running over port 443.
However, the CREATE GLOBAL CUBE command query returns an error.
Either a connection cannot be made to the [SERVER NAME] server, or Analysis Services is not running on the computer specified.
When I switch the SSAS port back to the default 2383, the CREATE GLOBAL CUBE command works perfectly.
Why does this happen, and is there any way to work around this? I suspect it's possibly a limitation in the OLEDB provider, but don't have any proof or definite leads.
I'm happy to use this issue as ammunition to have the host open up port 2383, but this is a battle I've lost multiple times in the name of "security", and time for an end-to-end working solution is running out. (The hosting environment is a department of a corporation, not a 3rd party.)
UPDATE:
This has been confirmed as a bug in the SSAS connection/connection string handling by Microsoft.
The SSAS dev team reports that currently for this command to work, either the SSAS default port must be used, or the SQL Browser default port must be available so that the browser service can direct requests to the non-default port. If neither service's default port is available, it is impossible to run this command from a remote connection.
Microsoft are currently working on a patch.