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  • Understanding the Role of Filters in Sisense

    In the realm of data analysis and visualization, the power of filters cannot be overstated. Filters allow users to refine their data, focus on specific subsets, and extract valuable insights. Sisense, as a leading business intelligence platform, offers a robust set of filtering capabilities that empower users to tailor their analyses to their precise needs. In this guide, we will delve into the world of Sisense filters, exploring their functionality, customization options, and best practices. Additionally, we'll highlight how Paldi filter plugins can enhance the filtering experience within Sisense. Understanding Star Schema and Dimensional Modeling Filters play a pivotal role in Sisense dashboards, serving as indispensable tools for refining and analyzing data with precision and efficiency. By allowing users to focus on specific subsets of data, filters empower them to extract actionable insights and make informed decisions. Within the context of Sisense's architecture, the importance of filters is amplified, especially in conjunction with the star schema data model. In the star schema, dimensions are segregated into their own tables, facilitating optimized data management and query processing. This structural approach streamlines data retrieval and analysis by separating descriptive attributes (dimensions) from measurable quantities (facts), thus enhancing the clarity and efficiency of data modeling. When filters are applied within Sisense dashboards, the system dynamically establishes joins between the fact table and the relevant dimension tables. This process enriches the data with contextual information, enabling users to delve deeper into their analyses while maintaining data integrity. Behind the scenes, Sisense leverages these joins to incorporate a 'where' clause in the SQL queries generated for each widget, ensuring that the data displayed is filtered based on the user's selections. This seamless integration of filters into the querying process not only enhances the relevance and accuracy of insights presented but also optimizes query execution times, bolstering overall dashboard performance. Furthermore, in scenarios where multiple fact tables are present, the star schema proves invaluable. Both fact tables connect to dimension tables, ensuring that when a filter is applied to a dimension, data from all relevant fact tables is filtered accordingly. This capability enables users to conduct comprehensive analyses across disparate data sources, fostering a holistic understanding of their data landscape. Safeguarding Data Privacy in Sisense Dashboards In the dynamic landscape of data security within business intelligence, a critical consideration revolves around presenting aggregated values to viewers while safeguarding granular data from unauthorized access. This balancing act is particularly crucial in scenarios where sensitive information, such as individual employee salaries, must be protected due to privacy and security regulations. For instance, while it's acceptable to display aggregated salary metrics like average departmental salaries or total monthly payroll, revealing individual salary details poses a significant risk. However, the introduction of filters within dashboards can potentially breach this security by allowing viewers to infer granular information. Consider a scenario within the IT department, where most employees are above 30 years old except for one individual aged below 25. If a dashboard features filters based on department and age group, viewers could easily discern details about the younger employee by filtering for "department=IT" and "age group=20-30." This unintended revelation of sensitive data underscores the importance of vigilance when selecting filter fields and crafting dashboards. To address this challenge, organizations must exercise caution when selecting filter fields and constructing dashboards within Sisense. By carefully evaluating the potential implications of filter usage and considering the sensitivity of the underlying data, organizations can mitigate the risk of unintentional data exposure and maintain compliance with regulatory standards. Also there is a powerful plugin available, called Avoid Over Filtering offered by Paldi Solutions, aimed at enhancing data security within Sisense dashboards. Elevating Filter Styling Consistency in filter styling holds significant importance within Sisense as it directly impacts the overall user experience and perception of the dashboard. Filters serve as essential navigational tools, allowing users to interact with and explore data sets effectively. When filters seamlessly integrate with the dashboard's design language, users can navigate through data more intuitively, leading to improved comprehension and analysis. Moreover, visually cohesive filters contribute to a polished and professional dashboard aesthetic, reinforcing the credibility of the data presented and instilling confidence in users. In scenarios such as OEM deployments, where brand consistency is paramount, aligning filter styles with the overall dashboard design becomes even more critical, as it ensures that the user experience remains consistent across various platforms and deployments. In Sisense, achieving consistent filter styling involves leveraging the platform's built-in customization features alongside additional plugins for enhanced flexibility. Sisense provides native options to adjust filter colors, allowing users to match filter aesthetics with other dashboard elements. However, for more advanced customization and styling capabilities, users can opt for plugins such as those offered by Paldi Solutions. Paldi's filter plugins offer extensive customization options, enabling users to tailor filter aesthetics with precision. Enhancing User Experience with Advanced Filter Features User experience with filters is paramount, as it can greatly enhance the efficiency and depth of data analysis. Providing additional features around filters can offer users valuable tools to navigate and analyze data more effectively. Here are some of the features that can be considered while working with filters. 1. Reset Filters Resetting filters to their default state after applying multiple selections is a valuable feature that enhances user experience in data analysis. This functionality allows users to easily revert back to the original filter settings, providing a convenient way to start anew with their analysis. Thankfully, Sisense includes a built-in option to reset filters, ensuring users can effortlessly return to the default filter configuration whenever necessary. 2. Filter Bookmark Filter bookmarking, or the ability to save current filter selections for future use, greatly improves user productivity and efficiency in data analysis workflows. With this feature, users can quickly apply previously saved filter configurations, streamlining the analysis process and eliminating the need to manually recreate complex filter setups. Paldi's Filter Bookmark plugin is a valuable addition to Sisense, offering users an intuitive tool for saving and recalling filter settings with ease, thereby enhancing the overall user experience within the platform. 3. Easy Filter Field Discovery Facilitating easy discovery of specific filter fields within a dashboard is essential for improving usability, especially in scenarios where numerous filters are present. Without such functionality, users may struggle to locate specific filters, leading to frustration and inefficiency. While Sisense lacks a built-in option for this feature, external plugins such as Paldi's Filter Catalog can fill this gap. Harnessing the Power of Sisense Filters Sisense caters to diverse data types, seamlessly accommodating various filtering requirements. Text Field Filters For text dimension columns, Sisense offers a diverse range of filtering options, allowing users to include or exclude specific items, filter based on text containment or starting patterns, and more, ensuring granular control over data selection. However, for those seeking heightened customization and flexibility, Paldi's Advanced Filters plugin emerges as a compelling alternative, providing extensive options to tailor the look and feel of filter widgets. Date Field Filters In Sisense, date dimensions empower users to filter data across various granularities, from day to year, facilitating comprehensive temporal analysis. With functionalities like date range selection and predefined presets such as "last 3 years" or "last 12 months," users can efficiently narrow down temporal data to derive meaningful insights. However, for those seeking additional customization and ease of use, Paldi's Date Range filter plugin presents a compelling alternative. Numeric Field Filters Numeric dimensions afford users the flexibility to filter data based on numerical criteria, including greater than, less than, or equal to specific values. This capability, coupled with Paldi plugins, empowers users to refine their analyses with precision. Levels of Filters in Sisense Sisense offers three tiers of filtering granularity: Dashboard Filters: Dashboard filters are applied at the dashboard level in Sisense, impacting all widgets within the dashboard. Users have the flexibility to modify these filters to suit their analytical needs. By adjusting these filters, viewers can refine the data displayed across multiple widgets, enabling comprehensive analysis tailored to specific criteria. Widget Filters: Widget filters are applied within individual widgets, providing targeted data refinement within specific visualizations. When the same field is utilized in both dashboard and widget filters, only the widget filter takes precedence for that widget, overriding the dashboard filter. It's important to note that viewers do not have the ability to modify widget filters; only dashboard designers can make changes to these filters, ensuring consistency and control over data presentation within widgets. Formula Filters: Formula filters are applied within analytical formulas and offer fine-grained control over data manipulation. When the same field is designated as a dashboard filter, widget filter, and formula filter, the formula filter takes precedence. This means that only the criteria specified in the formula filter will be applied, while the dashboard and widget filters will be disregarded. Similar to widget filters, formula filters can only be applied by dashboard designers, ensuring that complex data manipulations are executed with precision and accuracy. Conclusion Effective filtering is integral to extracting actionable insights from data within Sisense. By leveraging a combination of built-in filtering options and Paldi filter plugins, users can streamline analysis workflows, enhance usability, and unlock the full potential of their data. With the right filtering strategies in place, organizations can make informed decisions and drive business success.

  • Unleashing the Power of Advanced Visualizations: A Guide to Elevating Your Dashboards

    Ever wondered why some charts work better than others in showing data? It's crucial to pick the right one, or your dashboard might confuse people instead of helping them. Sisense gives you lots of chart options, but knowing which to use can be tricky. Sometimes the built-in options might not cover all your needs. No worries! That's where this guide comes in. We'll show you some cool charts and explain when to use them. And if you find yourself needing more, we've got your back with our Paldi Solutions plugins. We're excited to introduce Paldi's Advanced Visualization Kit, which contains a variety of interesting and useful visualizations that can elevate your dashboard to another level. Explore these advanced options to add depth and richness to your data representation, ensuring your Sisense dashboards are both visually compelling and highly informative. Ready to dive in and make your data tell a story? Let's get started! Exploring Advanced Visualizations: Innovative Types and Practical Applications This part is all about checking out different ways to show your data. Think of it like finding the perfect picture for your numbers. Each type of chart is like a superhero with its own superpowers. We'll help you understand when to use them and how they make your dashboard more interesting. Whether it's simple pie charts or fancy drill treemaps, we've got all the cool stuff for you. Sankey Diagram The Sankey Diagram is a versatile and impactful data visualization tool designed to illustrate the flow of resources, energy, or information within a system. It uses cool interconnected pathways to draw out the flow and transformation of stuff. Imagine lines of different thickness showing how much of something is going where. It's like magic for understanding complex stuff! People in engineering, environmental science, and process optimization love using it because it helps find problems, and spots where things gather, and makes decisions smarter. It's basically a map that makes tricky things easy to understand! Multi-Node Sankey Diagram A Multi-Node Sankey Diagram is an extension or variation of the traditional Sankey diagram, specifically designed to represent complex systems with multiple nodes or stages. In a standard Sankey diagram, you typically visualize the flow of resources, energy, or information from one source to one destination. However, in a Multi-Node Sankey Diagram, the complexity increases as it accommodates multiple intermediate nodes or stages in the flow. Imagine you're analyzing the user journey on an e-commerce website, and you want to understand the flow of visitors from landing on the homepage to completing a purchase. In this scenario, a Sankey diagram proves to be an invaluable tool. The diagram visually maps out the sequential steps users take, from the homepage through various pages such as product listings, cart, and finally, the checkout page. The width of the arrows in the Sankey diagram represents the volume of users at each stage, allowing you to pinpoint drop-off points and identify areas for optimization. It provides a clear and intuitive visualization of the user flow, making it easier to optimize the website's design and user experience for increased conversion rates. Other Examples of Application Energy Flow Analysis - Visualize the flow of energy within a system. Material or Resource Flow - Visualizes the flow of materials or resources through various stages of production. Project Management - Illustrates the progression of tasks and resources in project management. Financial Budgeting and Expenditure - To represent budget allocations, expenses, and revenue streams. Additionally, for users of Sisense, we at Paldi have an excellent plugin called Advanced Sankey Diagram. This plugin enhances the capabilities of Sisense by supporting multilevel Sankey Diagrams with a multitude of features, providing users with a robust tool for exploring and visualizing dependencies within their data. Chord Dependency Diagram The Chord Dependency Diagram is a visual representation that effectively displays relationships and connections between different entities or elements in a dataset. Its distinctive circular design features "chords" that connect related data points, making it easy to identify dependencies and correlations. This diagram is particularly useful for revealing intricate patterns and dependencies within complex datasets, providing a clear and intuitive way to grasp the interconnections between various components. In the context of international trade between countries, a Chord Dependency Diagram proves to be an invaluable tool for visualizing and understanding the complex network of dependencies. Each node in the diagram represents a specific country, and the chords connecting them illustrate the trade relationships and dependencies between nations. The width of the chords reflects the volume or value of goods and services exchanged. This visualization allows policymakers, economists, and analysts to identify key trading partners, analyze the interdependencies between countries, and assess the potential impact of disruptions on the global supply chain. Other Examples of Application Network Analysis - Visualizing and understanding complex relationships within network structures. Supply Chain Optimization - Visualizes dependencies and connections within a supply chain. Financial Transaction Networks - Represent relationships between different financial entities, such as banks, investment funds, or transactions. Logistics and Transportation - Showcase dependencies between different routes, modes of transportation, and supply chain components. For Sisense users seeking to harness the full potential of this visualization, Paldi Solutions introduces an exceptional plugin: the Advanced Chord Dependency Diagram. This plugin simplifies the widget creation process, allowing users to seamlessly incorporate this powerful visualization into their Sisense dashboards. Pie Chart A Pie Chart is like a visual pizza, dividing information into slices to show the proportion of different categories in relation to the whole. It's perfect for quickly understanding the distribution of data. Imagine you're managing a marketing campaign with multiple channels contributing to overall success. In this scenario, a pie chart proves invaluable for illustrating the distribution of the campaign's budget across different channels. Each slice of the pie represents a specific channel, displaying the proportion of the total budget allocated to that particular avenue. This visual representation provides an instant and clear understanding of where the majority of resources are directed and allows for quick comparisons between channels. For instance, you can easily discern whether social media, email marketing, or other channels are receiving a larger or smaller share of the budget. Pie-of-Pie Chart The purpose of a Pie-of-Pie chart is to provide a more detailed breakdown of each slice  that might be smaller or less significant in the overall dataset. It allows for a closer examination of particular elements within the larger context, making it easier to emphasize and understand details that might be overshadowed in the main chart. This type of chart is often used when there are one or more smaller data points that warrant attention or when a more granular view is needed for specific categories. Consider a sales analysis scenario where you need to delve into the product categories contributing the most to overall revenue. A pie-of-pie chart becomes a valuable tool in this context. The main pie chart provides a high-level overview of total sales, with each slice representing a product category. However, to add granularity, the pie-of-pie chart is employed. The secondary pie chart breaks down the sales of the categories into subcategories. This visualization allows stakeholders to not only identify the dominant product category but also understand the composition of that category in terms of specific subcategories. Other Examples of Application Market Share - Display the market share of various competitors within an industry. Revenue Distribution - Illustrate the proportion of revenue generated by different business units or product lines. Sales by Region - Break down sales figures for a particular region into smaller pies to identify the most lucrative sub-regions. Product Contribution - Highlight the specific products or services that contribute significantly to the revenue within a broader product category. Paldi's Advanced Pie Chart serves as an excellent choice for Sisense dashboard developers, effortlessly allowing the creation of both standard pie charts and pie-of-pie charts. It offers extensive customization options, providing flexibility in tailoring the visual representation to specific preferences and requirements. Treemaps A Treemap is like a colorful puzzle, showing different categories as rectangles with sizes based on their values. It's great for understanding how things are divided up in a hierarchy. For instance, in a money tracker, it can display how your spending is split between different expense categories. Imagine managing a diverse portfolio of projects within an organization, each with multiple subcategories and associated budgets. In such a scenario, a Treemap becomes a powerful visualization tool. The Treemap allows you to represent the entire project portfolio hierarchically, with each larger rectangle representing a main project and subdivided into smaller rectangles representing subcategories or specific aspects of the project. The size of each rectangle corresponds to the budget allocated to that project or subcategory. This visual representation provides an intuitive and space-efficient way to convey the distribution of resources across the project portfolio. Drill-Down Treemap Now, imagine a Drill-Down Treemap as a cool way to zoom into those rectangles. You can click on them to see more details, like going from continents to countries and then to specific cities in a map. This is super useful for exploring specific parts of the data puzzle, like checking sales performance in different regions or understanding the structure of a company from the big boss down to teams. In the context of analyzing organizational expenses, a Drill-Down Treemap serves as a valuable asset. Imagine having a high-level overview of expenditure categories such as marketing, operations, and research. The Treemap allows you to visualize these categories with each block representing a major expense area. Now, introducing the Drill-Down functionality, you can seamlessly delve deeper into any specific category. For instance, clicking on the marketing block might reveal subcategories like digital advertising, events, and campaigns. Each subcategory is represented proportionally, offering a clear picture of the budget distribution within the broader marketing expense. Other Examples of Application Sales Analysis: Drill down into geographic sales data, starting from continents and moving to countries, regions, and even specific stores or branches. Healthcare Analytics: Navigate through healthcare data, from general health statistics to specific conditions, treatment outcomes, and patient demographics. Product Performance: Examine product sales within broader categories, providing insights into which products are contributing the most to overall revenue. Financial Budgeting: Explore budget allocations by breaking down spending categories into subcategories, offering a detailed view of expenses. The Advanced Drill Treemap plugin, included in Paldi's advanced visualization kit, provides both standard and drill treemaps, presenting a comprehensive array of options for users. Venn Diagram A Venn Diagram is a visual representation that illustrates the relationships between different sets of data. It consists of overlapping circles, where each circle represents a set, and the overlapping areas show the elements that are common to those sets. Venn Diagrams are widely used to showcase the similarities and differences between various groups or categories. They help visualize the intersection and distinct elements within datasets, making it easy to understand the relationships between different components. For example, in a business context, a Venn Diagram could be used to display the overlap between customers who purchased product A and those who purchased product B, revealing the shared customer base. In the realm of market segmentation, a Venn Diagram proves to be an insightful tool for visualizing the overlap and distinctions between different target audience segments. Consider a scenario where a company offers a range of products appealing to various customer demographics. The Venn Diagram allows marketers to represent these demographic segments as circles, each circle indicating a unique customer group based on factors like age, preferences, or geographic location. The overlapping areas in the diagram highlight segments that share common characteristics, providing a visual representation of potential cross-selling opportunities or shared marketing strategies. Other Examples of Application Comparing Social Media Audiences: Visualize the overlap of audience interests between different social media platforms for targeted marketing. Examining Technology Features: Compare the features of different technological devices, such as smartphones, laptops, and tablets. Customer Behavior in Retail: Categorize customer behaviors in a retail setting, such as shopping online, in-store, or both. Analyzing Project Team Skills: Identify the skills common among team members in a project, helping in resource allocation and task assignment. Paldi's Adaptive Venn Diagram stands out as an excellent choice for Sisense developers, enabling the creation of visually striking and insightful Venn diagrams with ease. Radial Histogram A radial histogram, sometimes referred to as a polar histogram, is a type of histogram that displays the distribution of data in a circular arrangement. Unlike traditional histograms that use bars along a single axis, a radial histogram places bins or sectors around a central point, creating a circular or radial pattern. In addition to the circular representation of data distribution, some advanced radial histograms go a step further by supporting more than one dimension to represent categories and their subcategories. This means that additional layers or rings can be used to convey additional dimensions of the data. This enhanced feature allows for a richer and more detailed representation of complex datasets, enabling the visualization of multiple aspects within each radial segment. Imagine analyzing the distribution of sales performance across different regions throughout the year in a business report. A Radial Bar Histogram serves as a powerful visualization tool in this scenario. Each bar in the histogram represents a specific region, and the radial arrangement allows for an intuitive comparison of sales figures. The length of each bar corresponds to the sales volume, and the circular layout allows stakeholders to quickly identify regions with the highest and lowest sales. The radial aspect facilitates a visual exploration of regional trends and disparities, offering a unique perspective on the overall sales landscape. This type of visualization proves especially effective when you want to showcase variations in sales performance across multiple regions in a dynamic and visually engaging manner. Other Examples of Application Performance Comparison: Compare the performance of multiple entities across different categories, with each radial bar representing a performance metric. Product Feature Comparison: Compare features or attributes of different products in a circular layout, making it easy to identify strengths and weaknesses. Skill Proficiency: Illustrate the proficiency levels of individuals or teams across various skills in a radial arrangement. Temperature Variation: Showcase temperature variations throughout a day or year, with each bar representing a specific time or month. Paldi's Adaptive Radial Infographics is a preferred option for Sisense developers aiming to design impressive and advanced radial charts. This tool supports two dimensions and offers a variety of features, including built-in advanced tooltips, enhancing the charting capabilities for a visually compelling experience. Combined Visualizations Combining diverse chart types is a powerful strategy in data visualization, enhancing the ability to derive meaningful insights. The fusion of charts, such as Line Charts, Area Charts, Column Charts, and Bar Charts, provides a holistic view of data trends. Sisense facilitates this approach, offering built-in features that seamlessly combine two chart types. The interactive nature of these combined charts elevates the user experience, enabling dynamic exploration and analysis of complex datasets. In the context of sales performance analysis, a Combined Chart Type proves highly effective for presenting both actual sales figures and target benchmarks. Imagine a scenario where a company sets quarterly sales targets for its sales teams. By combining a Line Chart to illustrate the actual sales performance over time with a Line or Bar representing the target values, stakeholders can easily compare achieved results against set goals. The Line Chart showcases the fluctuation in sales, while the Target Line or Bar provides a clear reference point for expected performance. This combination allows sales managers to assess team performance in relation to targets, identify trends, and make informed decisions on strategies for meeting or exceeding future sales goals. Other Examples of Application Financial Analysis: Integrate Area Charts to represent overall revenue trends with Column Charts for expense breakdowns, offering a consolidated financial overview. Sales and Revenue Analysis: Display multiple sales indicators alongside line charts depicting revenue trends. Employee Performance: Present employee performance metrics, integrating line charts to illustrate individual or team achievements over time. Paldi introduces a game-changing visualization tool, the Indicator Card, which takes combined visualizations to the next level. This advanced plugin not only accommodates multiple indicators in a single widget but also seamlessly integrates line, bar, column, or area charts. Its high interactivity, coupled with features like drill-down capabilities and built-in additional tooltip information, enhances the richness of data representation. Consider a scenario in project management where you need to present both key performance indicators (KPIs) and the corresponding project progress in a clear and concise manner. The Combined Chart Type, incorporating both an Indicator and Bar Chart, proves to be a powerful solution. The Indicator can represent critical metrics such as completion percentages, while the Bar Chart visualizes the actual progress in various project tasks or phases. This combination allows project managers and stakeholders to quickly assess not only the overall project health through KPIs but also the detailed progress in individual components. Creating Powerful Dashboards In today's data-driven world, businesses rely heavily on dashboards to monitor key metrics, track performance, and make informed decisions. However, not all dashboards are created equal. To truly harness the power of data visualization, it's essential to design dashboards with complementary visualizations that provide comprehensive insights at a glance. Industry Dashboards: Blending Widgets for Optimal Insights Let's delve into an example of an industry dashboard for a retail chain. Imagine a dashboard that tracks sales performance across different regions, product categories, and customer segments. To effectively convey this information, a combination of widgets works best: Single Value Indicator: At the helm of our dashboard sits a single value indicator, proudly displaying the total sales revenue for the selected period. This simple yet impactful widget acts as the North Star, guiding users' attention to the primary metric driving business success. Column Chart: A column chart displays sales figures for each product category, offering a quick comparison of performance. This visual is ideal for identifying top-selling categories and trends over time. Line Chart: Pairing the column chart with a line chart showcasing sales trends over time adds depth to the analysis. It allows users to spot seasonal patterns, identify sales spikes, and evaluate overall growth trajectories. Pie of Pie Chart: In a retail context, understanding the distribution of sales across different regions is crucial. A pie of pie chart provides a concise overview of sales distribution by region, with the main pie chart showing total sales by region and the secondary pie chart breaking down again by category. Drill-Down Treemap: To dive deeper into sales performance within specific regions or product categories, a drill-down treemap offers an interactive solution. Users can navigate through hierarchical data structures, revealing insights at various levels of granularity. Advanced Sankey Diagram: For analyzing the flow of sales from one stage to another, an advanced Sankey diagram is invaluable. It visualizes the path of sales conversion, highlighting bottlenecks, and opportunities for optimization within the sales funnel. Radial Histogram: To explore the distribution of sales across different price ranges or customer demographics, a radial histogram offers a unique perspective. Its circular layout provides a visually engaging way to compare frequency distributions. Enhancing Adoption with Advanced Visualizations While traditional charts and graphs serve their purpose, incorporating advanced visualizations elevates the dashboard experience and drives higher adoption rates. Here's how: Enhanced Interactivity: Advanced visualizations, such as Sankey diagrams and drill-down treemaps, offer interactive features that empower users to explore data dynamically. This hands-on approach fosters engagement and encourages users to delve deeper into the insights presented. Storytelling Capabilities: Complex data relationships and trends are often easier to grasp with advanced visualizations like chord dependency diagrams. By telling a visual story, these diagrams simplify complex concepts, making them more accessible to a broader audience. Visual Impact: Advanced visualizations add a visual flair to dashboards, capturing users' attention and making data more memorable. Whether it's the elegant flow of a Sankey diagram or the intricate connections depicted in a chord diagram, these visuals leave a lasting impression. Comprehensive Insights: By combining multiple advanced visualizations within a single dashboard, users gain a holistic view of the data. Each visualization offers a unique perspective, contributing to a more comprehensive understanding of the underlying trends and patterns. In conclusion, creating powerful dashboards requires careful consideration of complementary visualizations that cater to users' analytical needs. By blending traditional charts with advanced visualizations, such as Sankey diagrams and chord dependency diagrams, businesses can unlock actionable insights and drive informed decision-making. With enhanced interactivity, storytelling capabilities, and visual impact, advanced visualizations pave the way for a more engaging and impactful dashboard experience.

  • Add Clickable elements To Dashboard Headers

    How to add a button to the dashboard toolbar: Follow the steps below to incorporate a button into the toolbar of a Sisense dashboard. Open the dashboard to which you want to add a button to the toolbar. Access the dashboard menu by clicking on the three dots located at the top-right corner of the dashboard and choose 'Edit Script.' This action will open the script editor for the dashboard in a new tab. Copy and paste the script provided below into the script editor window of the dashboard. Feel free to customize the button's style, text, and add the desired action to be performed upon clicking. dashboard.on('initialized', (sender, args) => { const btnsHolder = $('.prism-toolbar__section--right .prism-toolbar__cell.btns-holder'); const newButton = document.createElement('button'); newButton.className = 'btn custom-btn'; newButton.style.backgroundColor = '#9b9ae6'; //background color newButton.style.color = '#000000'; //font color const buttonText = document.createElement('span'); buttonText.className = 'btn__text btn-text-sp2'; buttonText.textContent = 'New Button'; //Text to be displayed on button newButton.append(buttonText); $(newButton).on({ click: ({target}) => { //Add action to be performed on button click console.log('Button Clicked'); }, mouseenter: (event) => { $(event.currentTarget).css('background-color', '#aeaddb'); //Background color on hover over }, mouseleave: (event) => { $(event.currentTarget).css('background-color', '#9b9ae6'); //Background color } }); btnsHolder.prepend(newButton); }) Save the script, and refresh the dashboard to observe the newly added button in action.

  • Understanding Sisense Events

    Leveraging Sisense Events Sisense events are notifications that are generated when certain actions occur in Sisense, such as when a dashboard is loaded, a widget is refreshed, or a filter is changed. Events can be used to trigger custom JavaScript code, which can be used to perform a variety of tasks, such as updating other widgets, sending email notifications, or integrating with external systems. There are three main types of Sisense events: Widget events: These events are generated by individual widgets, and they are generally related to the state of the widget, such as when it is refreshed, builds the query, or rendered. Some common examples of widget events include: initialized: Fired after the dashboard is initialized. buildquery: Fired when executing the widget's native build query and allows customization of the JAQL query object before execution. processresult: Fired when executing the widget's native result processing, and allows customization of the query result before being rendered. render: Fired when the widget is rendered. ready: Fired when the widget's rendering is over and the widget is ready. beforedatapointtooltip: Fired for all widgets that render a tooltip. Dashboard events Dashboard events are triggered when certain actions occur on the dashboard level, such as when it is loaded, refreshed, or filter is changed. Some common examples of dashboard events include: initialized: Fired after the dashboard is initialized. refreshstart: Fired after one or more widgets have started the refresh process. widgetrefreshed: Fired when a widget refresh has ended. filterschanged: Fired when the dashboard filter changes. widgetprocessresult: Fired after executing the widget’s native result processing, and allows customization of the query result before being rendered. Global Events Sisense global events are a special type of event that can be triggered from anywhere in the Sisense web client. They are useful for performing tasks that need to be done regardless of which dashboard or widget is currently active. Some common examples of global events include: apploaded: Fired when the whole Sisense web application is loaded. beforemenu: Fired before every menu is opened and allows the removal of existing menu items and the addition of custom menu items. beforewidgetmenu: Fired when clicking the widget menu while in Edit Widget mode. homeloaded: Fired when the home page in the Sisense Web Application is loaded. dashboardloaded: Fired when a dashboard model is loaded into the environment. How to use Sisense events To listen for events, you can use the dashboard.on() , widget.on(), prism.on() methods. These methods take the event name as a parameter and a callback function that will be executed when the event is generated. For example, the following code will listen for the dashboard.initialized event and log a message to the console when the dashboard is loaded: dashboard.on('initialized', function() { console.log('Dashboard is loaded'); }); The following code will listen for the widget.render event and log a message to the console when the widget is rendered: widget.on(render, function() { console.log(Widget  is rendered); }); The following code snippet shows how to register a custom script to be triggered when a menu it opened: prism.on(beforemenu, function() { // Perform some action when a menu is opened. }); Where to Write Code To write JavaScript script code at widget level in Sisense, you can use the Edit Script option available in the widget menu. To open the widget edit menu, click on the Edit (pencil) icon in the top-right corner of the widget and click on 3 dots at the top right corner of the widget in edit mode. To write JavaScript script code at dashboard level in Sisense, you can use the Edit Script option available in the dashboard edit menu. To open the dashboard edit menu, click on the 3 dots in the top-right corner of the dashboard. The most optimal location for crafting global events is within a plugin. Plugins offer the capability to design solutions that manage global events seamlessly. Streamlining Workflows with the Widget Script Manager Plugin One of the challenges designers and administrators often face is managing scripts across multiple widgets, especially when these scripts are used across various widgets of the same type or specific dashboards. This is where the WidgetScriptManager plugin comes into play. It is designed to simplify the process of managing scripts for various widgets and dashboards, this plugin offers a centralized repository for scripts and comes equipped with a wealth of pre-built, handy widget scripts. Key Features of Widget Script Manager Free handy scripts example. Easily decide on which widget you would like to deploy the code based on: Specific widget All widgets from a specific type All widgets on specific dashboard Any combination of the above For example, you can trigger a script to run on a specific set of widgets within a specific dashboard. Prevent widgets scripts discrepancies between dashboards. Save time of developing and deploying your widgets scripts. Enjoy the benefits of a plugin while keeping the flexibility of the widget scripts. Can be easily integrated within your Git repository. Ready to streamline your script management and unlock the potential of handy widget scripts? Check out Paldi's Widget Script Manager for more information

  • Unleashing Interactive Data Visualization: Sisense BloX vs. Indicator Card

    BloX widgets, essentially JSON objects rendered as HTML within your dashboards, provide a highly customizable platform with a rich array of capabilities, including the addition of images, embedding iframes, implementing actions, and collecting user input. Some common BloX use cases involve incorporating multiple KPIs, trend icons, sparklines, and jump-to-dashboard functionality. The Indicator Card simplifies the implementation of these use cases by offering predefined elements and extensive design options, all without the need for coding. Let's delve into the key features of each plugin and explore when to opt for one over the other. Sisense BloX: A Versatile Framework for Custom Visualization Sisense BloX is a powerful plugin that empowers users to transform their Sisense dashboards into dynamic and interactive experiences. With BloX, you can create rich widgets using JSON objects rendered as HTML, allowing for highly customizable content. It offers extensive interactivity and data collection options, making it ideal for those with coding skills seeking to build content-rich applications within their dashboards. However, the trade-off is that creating BloX widgets may be time-consuming and require a proficiency in coding. Some of the key features of Sisense BloX include: Dynamic Widgets: Sisense BloX allows you to create dynamic, rich widgets, enhancing your dashboard's interactivity. Customizable Content: You can use JSON objects to customize the content of your BloX, allowing for a high degree of flexibility in design. Interactive Actions: BloX supports multiple types of actions, enabling you to create content that responds to user interactions. Data Input: You can collect input from users through BloX widgets, making it possible to use them for data collection and feedback. Images to the widget: With Sisense BloX, you can effortlessly add images to your widgets, enhancing the visual appeal of your content. Embed iFrames: The ability to embed iFrames in BloX widgets allows you to seamlessly integrate external content into your dashboards. However, it's important to note that Sisense BloX does require coding skills and can be time-consuming to set up, making it best suited for users who are comfortable with coding. Indicator Card: Effortless Visualization for Everyone On the other hand, the Indicator Card is designed with accessibility in mind. It is a game-changer in the world of data visualization. This plugin is tailor-made for simplicity, ensuring that designers without coding backgrounds can easily harness its capabilities. Key features of the Indicator Card include: Designer-Friendly: Indicator Cards are designed to be more accessible to non-coders, making it easier for designers to create visualizations. Supports Various KPIs: Indicator Cards can display multiple Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) with ease, simplifying the process of presenting data. Trend Icons for KPIs: This plugin offers the option to add trend icons to your KPIs. These icons provide visual cues about the direction of data trends. Sparkline Chart Integration: You can choose from various visualization types, including bar, column, line, and area charts, making it versatile for different data types. Additional Tooltip Information: Indicator Card  supports the inclusion of additional information in tooltips, accommodating both dimensions and measures. Customizable Tooltips: Indicator Cards allow for customizable tooltips, without the need for coding, to provide additional information when users interact with the data. Advanced Jump-to-Dashboard: You can easily configure advanced jump-to-dashboard features without needing to write code, enhancing user experience. Interactivity: All KPIs within the Indicator Card are interactive, allowing users to change the value axis of the sparkline by clicking on any KPI. Filter Like a Pro: For refined data exploration, you can integrate a filter box within the Indicator Card. This allows you to efficiently filter all elements within the widget, boosting the interactivity and utility of your visualization. Design Freedom: In addition to these features, the Indicator Card offers an array of design options to shape the look and feel of your visualizations. This ensures that your visualizations seamlessly align with the overall design of your dashboard. Choose between Indicator Card and Blox In summary,Sisense BloX and the Indicator Card are two valuable tools for creating dynamic and interactive content.  Sisense BloX is a feature-rich plugin that allows users to create highly customized widgets using JSON, HTML, and CSS. However, it demands coding skills and can be time-consuming for those less experienced in programming. On the other hand, the Indicator Card simplifies the process of data visualization. All elements of Indicator card including KPIs, sparkline, trend icons, tooltip, Jump-to-dashboard, filter box etc are highly customizable – all without requiring any coding expertise. The choice between these tools depends on your specific requirements and your team's level of coding expertise.

  • Enhancing Functionality and End-User Satisfaction in Healthcare Analytics with Paldi Solutions

    GeriMedica is a well-established company catering to the Dutch healthcare sector. For over 16 years they’ve specialized in serving elderly care homes. Their services encompass data management for these care homes and maintaining an ERP-like digital medical file system. With a substantial market presence, GeriMedica currently boasts around 130 clients, constituting a commendable 50% market share, and employs a workforce of 90 dedicated professionals. Challenges About 90% of end-users (medical and support staff) lacked data expertise. After testing various BI tools, Sisense was chosen for its user-friendly interface. However, challenges were encountered with widget scripts and Blox in Sisense. Technical requirements alienated non-BI expert medical staff. Challenges arose in designing dashboards for quick data consumption by all users. Until 2018, GeriMedica primarily focused on exporting medical data for their clients. However, as healthcare professionals increasingly required broader access to data, a new dimension of challenges emerged. While customers utilized data for business intelligence (revenue analysis, cost assessment, and productivity evaluation), end-users - the medical staff - were largely excluded from the data utilization loop. GeriMedica estimated that about 90% of their end-users were not data-savvy, they were medical and support staff, who still needed access to data but lacked the necessary expertise. “We set out to build a data-business unit that served our customers in the best way possible, with a focus on our end-users which are the medical practitioners”, says Hamza, Head of Data Analytics at GeriMedica. In short, GeriMedica had to build technical dashboards aimed at end-users without technical expertise. And Sisense was chosen as the best platform to build these dashboards on. However, GeriMedica soon encountered new challenges within Sisense as their requirements evolved. Making the use of widget scripts (which are in javascript) and Blox is necessary but difficult to implement. Hamza: “Sooner or later we always had to make complicated use of Sisense’s SDK that they use to create widgets and quickly had to move to use widget scripts, which is in javascript, or we needed to be working with BLOX, which was also not the best way of doing things.” These technical requirements further alienated the end users - the medical staff - who are not BI experts. This presented a challenge in terms of designing dashboards and ensuring seamless (and quick) data consumption and analytics by both business customers and medical staff. Solutions Facing these challenges GeriMedica turned to Paldi Solutions for help. Paldi's plugins helped improve user experience and accessibility. By simplified data filtering, formatting, and visualization. Increased stability, speed, and satisfaction with Sisense. No technical training is needed for end-users. GeriMedica currently uses a multitude of Paldi plugins including: Expendable Pivot Tutorial Button Lazy Loading Advanced Filters Viewer's Dashboard 2.0 Advanced Dim Switcher Advanced Measure Changer Dashboard Styler Export Button Advanced Input Parameters Advanced SVG Mapper Tree Filter Facing these challenges GeriMedica reached out to (the fully HIPAA compliant) Paldi Solutions. “With the help of Paldi Solutions, we were able to leverage Sisense to create a better user experience from a designer and user perspective.” " said Hamza. Helping to realize the growing demand for better user experience and accessibility, Paldi Solutions provided a suite of self-service plugins that addressed these critical needs. With these plugins, GeriMedica was able to craft a superior UX/UI for both dashboard designers and end-users. One example provided by GeriMedica is how the ability to add filters on a dashboard level - with drop downs - made it much easier for users to both view the data they needed and save it as a favorite filter (bookmark) to review different important data sets with 1 click. This “Filter Bookmark” plugin massively reduced the amount of time medical staff required before viewing potentially life-saving information. GeriMedica also talked about Paldi’s Expendable Pivot Plugins (Part of Paldi Solution’s new Self-Service powerup), saying that: “One of our most frequently used chart-type is the Expendable Pivot, with its ability to create a really big pivot table quickly, while retaining the power to present a more focused overview by collapsing and expanding sections. As well as its ability to present custom format values, for example from integers to a time format. This is all done with just a click of a button instead of using widget scripts with all kinds of difficulties. With the help of Paldi Plugins, you can just click and it’s there.” The Paldi plugins solved several endemic problems for GeriMedica by: - Enhancing stability between different Sisense versions. - Improving UX/UI and data clarity. - Optimizing processing speeds. This enabled GeriMedica to leverage the strengths of Sisense while overcoming its challenges. The collaboration with Paldi Solutions allowed for a more intuitive and interactive data visualization, catering to both the medical workers and the business analysts within the elderly care homes. The benefits derived from Paldi Solutions' integration were gigantic. GeriMedica's end-users, who mainly consist of medical professionals with limited technical proficiency, are now able to immediately access all necessary data without any additional technical training. Paldi’s plugins also facilitated the creation of 60+ predefined dashboards that tell an effective story through data, enhancing interactivity and ease of understanding. As measured through bi-annual customer surveys, GeriMedica witnessed a substantial spike in customer satisfaction across their application after implementing Paldi's solutions. Users mentioned Paldi’s free “Tutorial Button” plugin specifically as something that helped improve their experience and ability to interact with their data. Onboarding and Implementation “Sisense out-of-the-box doesn’t have everything, but it gives the capabilities to use Scripts or community plugins. The downside of using Scripts - and especially community plugins - is maintainability. Sisense version upgrades can break scripts and community plugins, or a certain functionality or feature stops working or gives errors” That’s where GeriMedica's adoption of Paldi Solutions came in, removing the downsides of not being maintained. Paldi’s plugins were safer in use than community plugins or Scripts, due to their simplified installation and single-click update capabilities. Unlike the extensive manual update process prevalent with other plugin makers. Paldi Solutions also guarantees industry-leading support and maintenance and ensures that clients are always up-to-date with the latest features and improvements on both Windows and Linux. Future Outlook Looking ahead, the future outlook is promising. GeriMedica is committed to further enhancing its BI dashboards through continued collaboration with Paldi Solutions. The success of the “Self Service” plugin suite and the “Tutorial Button” is indicative of the potential for more tailored solutions catering to specific pain points within the BI landscape. As both companies continue to evolve, Gerimedica is poised to expand its reach and impact within the healthcare sector, while Paldi Solutions is dedicated to continued innovation in BI plugins and solutions that transform data into actionable insights. Conclusion The partnership between GeriMedica and Paldi Solutions exemplifies the power of innovative collaboration in overcoming BI challenges and elevating user experiences. By addressing the unique needs of non-technical end-users within the Dutch healthcare sector, Paldi Solutions enabled GeriMedica to bridge the gap between data-savvy analysts and healthcare professionals.

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