Ensuring Accurate PDF Export Headers When Programmatically Modifying Dashboard Filters in Sisense
When working with Sisense dashboards, programmatically modifying filters upon dashboard load via dashboard scripts for a specific user or circumstance is possible. However, an issue can sometimes occur when exporting these dashboards to PDF immediately after such modifications: the filter header displayed at the top of the exported PDF displaying the current dashboard filter state may not accurately reflect the current state of the dashboard filters. This article explains the cause of this issue and presents a solution to ensure that PDF exports display the correct filter information in the header.Passing Filters via URL Parameters for Dashboards with Separate Datasources
Sisense includes a native included feature and format for passing URL filters via URL parameters, as documented here. By default, this functionality copies filters in full, including the datasource parameter of the filter, and includes every filter automatically. It results in very long URL's, and includes many parameters that are not always required, as the full filter object is included. Previous Knowledge Base articles articles have discussed how similar behavior can be recreated customized via scripting for more flexible usage. However, those approaches applied only to member-type filters, excluding other filter types and multi-level dependent filters. The code shared below demonstrates a more flexible filter modification via URL modification approach. It includes both creating URL parameters and reading URL parameters for filter modification, whether this code is in a script or plugin. This method applies to all filter types and can be used to transfer filters between dashboards using different datasources. This code works in both dashboard and widget scripts as well as plugins. If your datasources use different dimension names, this code can be adopted to map and match the aligned dimensions.Redirect users to different dashboards based on dashboard filters
This article discusses and shares the full code of a dashboard script that redirects users to a different dashboard ID based on the user's filter selections or initial loaded filter state. In the particular example shared in this article, the script checks whether the selected date filter (either from a members filter or a from/to filter range) includes an earlier date than the earliest date in the current dashboard's datasource. If this is the case, the script redirects the user to a specified alternate dashboard, preserving any additional URL segments and query parameters in the URL. Any other type of filter state can also be used to determine on when the script should redirect, including non-date filters using similar scripts.Pivot and Table Widget Scripting for Replacing Values with Colored Arrows
Sisense table and pivot widgets offer extensive customization options for data presentation, allowing developers to tailor widget content to specific needs, as discussed in detail in previous articles. While the Pivot 2.0 API includes a built-in transformPivot function for data transformation, Table widgets typically require direct DOM manipulation. This article provides a step-by-step guide for replacing numeric (or other) values in both widget types with arrow characters via scripting. It also demonstrates how to assign colors or apply conditional logic to these transformations. Examples include the use of Unicode arrow characters, though any other characters or combinations of characters can of course be utilized.Dynamically adjusting column precision in Sisense widgets
This article details a script designed to dynamically set the number of decimal places (precision) for specific columns in a Sisense widget. The precision is determined based on the first value from a dedicated "precision" dimension in the widget. This script is ideal for use cases where precision needs to be dynamically adjusted based on filters, whether the filters are set by the user, default filters, or data security. The precision dimension will of course respect all filters and datasecurity, which determines the precision value returned. A common example of this functionality, is if a single Sisense server serves multiple customers, which share a common datasource, but have datasecurity rules to ensure only that customers data is shown. If each customer has their own precision value, the precision value returned will vary as expected between customer, allowing a single widget to serve multiple customers, and vary data as needed. The precision panel does not have to be enabled and visible in the widget, the precision panel item can be disabled and the script will use a custom JAQL request to retrieve the precision value.Setting Date Filter Members to Specific Days of the Week in Sisense Programmatically
Sisense natively supports a wide range of date filter functionalities and formats. However, certain scenarios may call for unusual custom programmatic forms of date filtering, such as filtering to specific days of the week within a defined date range. For example, focusing a dashboard view on only Wednesdays in a given period, or on weekend dates, can yield valuable insights in time-sensitive analyses. This cannot be directly configured with standard Sisense UI filters when only one date dimension is present in the data source. In the previous article, the concept of date calculations was demonstrated by leveraging JavaScript date objects, modifying filter parameters programmatically via dashboard or widget scripting, and converting those date objects into formats Sisense expects. (For reference, see: Using Native Javascript Date Calculations To Modify Sisense Date Filters) The same principle can be applied to "Day of the Week" based filtering. Sisense allows defining a custom set of date members as a filter. By dynamically constructing a list of dates that fall on certain days of the week within a chosen date range, it is straightforward to pass these custom members into Sisense filters, setting them as members of a date member filter and creating a selective date filter. In the snippet below, JavaScript generates a list of dates falling on specified weekdays—such as Saturdays and Sundays—within a given start and end date range. It then formats them into the string format Sisense expects for filter members. These can be applied within the filter object just as demonstrated in the previously linked article on programmatic date filter modification.Using Native Javascript Date Calculations To Modify Sisense Date Filters
Sisense natively supports various types of date filter functionalities. However, there are instances where a dynamically updating date filter is desired based on dynamically changing conditions such as the current date. Such a filter may not precisely align with the filters provided in the Sisense UI. One approach to achieve this custom behavior of a dynamically updating filter is through the use of dashboard or widget scripting.Advanced Scripting for Sisense’s Simply Ask NLQ: Adding Currency Symbols to Pivot Tables
Sisense’s Simply Ask feature empowers users to create visualizations instantly by asking natural language questions, simplifying data exploration without needing technical expertise or manual widget configuration. This Natural Language Query (NLQ) capability accelerates insights generation without the need to manually create new Sisense widgets through the standard UI for each question or data relationship of interest. In a previously published article , it was discussed how to customize Simply Ask NLQ-generated widgets using scripting, providing multiple examples of basic modifications and more detail on the basic mechanics of scripting Simply Ask widgets. In this article a more complex example wil be shared to show how widgets can be customized in more complex conditional ways: programmatically adding currency symbols to specific data columns in pivot table widgets generated by Simply Ask.Modifying Simply Ask Natural Language Query Generated Widgets with Scripting
Sisense's Simply Ask feature empowers users to create visualizations instantly by asking natural language questions, simplifying data exploration without needing technical expertise or manual widget configuration. This Natural Language Query (NLQ) capability accelerates data exploration and insights generation without needing to manually create new Sisense widgets through the standard UI for each question or data relationship of interest. However, these automatically generated widgets differ from standard widgets in that they do not trigger typical widget scripting events, which poses a challenge for applying custom modifications. This limitation can hinder the application of standard dashboard and widget scripting customizations directly to these widgets. Fortunately, it is possible to modify NLQ-generated widgets programmatically by using JavaScript to manipulate the HTML of the fully rendered widgets without relying on Sisense-specific widget scripting events. This approach involves observing changes in the Simply Ask modal DOM and applying custom code when new widgets are rendered. This article explores how to implement such customizations, providing code examples and notes to help customize NLQ-generated Simply Ask widgets.
Limiting Date Range Filters in Sisense Dashboards
Wide date ranges in Sisense dashboards can lead to performance issues, especially when using live models or querying large datasets. For live data models, large queries increase costs as more data is pulled from the data warehouse. For Elasticubes, this can cause performance bottlenecks. To avoid these issues, here is a quick solution to "limit" the date range users can select, ensuring both cost-efficiency and smooth performance. Read more to find out how!
