Dashboard
Contents
Introduction
A dashboard groups together multiple views onto a single page. A dashboard can be published and shared. A dashboard can contain Slicers that allow the user to make selections and have those selections apply to parameterized views on the page.
Note: The dashboard functionality is only available with an Enterprise Plus subscription.
Creating a Dashboard
To create a dashboard, select “New dashboard” from the file menu and give the new dashboard a name (title). An empty dashboard is created and you can then add views and slicers to the dashboard.
Dashboard Layout
The dashboard has a layout consisting of five drop areas: top, left, center, right, and bottom.
There are no visible borders between the drop areas. In fact the drop areas themselves are invisible, only contents within the drop areas are visible. Drop areas can be left empty and empty drop areas do not take any space on the dashboard. Therefore, a two-column layout can be created by simply using two of the columns, for example, using the left and center and leaving the right empty.
Responsive Layout
The dashboard layout is responsive to screen size. On small screen (such as a phone), a multi-column display will change into a single-column display. In that case, the views in the center area will be displayed below the views in the left area.
Adding a View to a Dashboard
Use the “Add View” button to add a view to the dashboard so that the view will display in the dashboard.
It is important to note that the view remains independent of the dashboard. Deleting the dashboard does not delete the view and making a copy or publishing the dashboard does not copy or publish the view. The dashboard merely displays the view.
It is also important to note that the dashboard can only display published views. This means that if you later want to modify the view, you’ll need to re-publish it to update the published version of the view that’s displayed in the dashboard.
This is the “Add View” dialog. Next, we’ll describe all the selections on the dialog in detail.
View Type
As we mentioned before, only published views can be displayed on the dashboard. If you select a “My/Shared View”, you can select one of your personal views or a shared view. In that case, a published version of the view will be created and the published version of the view will be added to the dashboard.
View Name
Type part of the name of the view to look it up, and then select from the autocomplete list to select the view.
Location
By default, the new view will be added as the first item in the top drop area. You can select other locations for the view to be displayed.
Width
Setting the width to 100% will automatically size the view to the width of the drop area. For example, in a three-column layout, this may be one third of the width of the screen and in a single-column layout, the entire width of the screen.
Height
Height is not automatic and you need to specify the desired height of the view in pixels.
Acting on a Dashboard View
A view is displayed on a dashboard inside a frame that includes the name of the view in the top-left corner and several icon buttons on the top-left. Those icon buttons allow you and in some cases the user viewing a published version of this dashboard to act on this view.
- The pencil icon allows you (the person editing the dashboard) to go to the view from which the dashboard view was published. If you edit that view, remember to publish it again to reflect the changes in the dashboard.
- The gear icon allows you (the person editing the dashboard) to edit the settings for the display of this view on this dashboard (see editing settings below)
- The full-screen button allows any person viewing this dashboard to open the view in a new browser tab thereby displaying it using the entire browser tab.
- The open button lets you go to the published view. From there you can make a copy of the view, for example.
- The reload button lets you reload the view.
- The close button allows you to remove this view from the dashboard. For someone who’s not authorized to edit this dashboard, the button will temporarily remove the view from the display, but that change will not be saved.
Publishing a Dashboard
When a dashboard is published, a read-only copy of the dashboard is created. The published dashboard contains copies of any slicers that are part of the dashboard being published. However, views are not copied and the published dashboard displays the same views as the dashboard being published. To publish a dashboard, select “Publish” from the “File” menu.
Require the user to log in to see the dashboard
Normally, users must be logged in to view dashboard. If you check this box off, the user will not be required to login to access the dashboard and interact with the slicers. However, they will still be required to login to see the views unless the view itself was published without requiring login.
Publish to ServiceNow
Publishing to ServiceNow creates an iFrame Content Block in ServiceNow that can be placed on any Home Page, Portal page, or CMS page.
Another way of adding an Explore Analytics dashboard to ServiceNow is as a Module with a link type of URL.
Adding a Slicer to a Dashboard
A Slicer allows making selections that control the data displayed in dashboard views via the use of View Parameters. This functionality is described in the Slicer and the View Parameter pages respectively.
