New Features and Enhancements
Grid widgets now allows using all the following features which were previously not available in Dashboards and only available in the View component:
- Cross drill
- Dynamic subset selection for row and column dimensions
- In-table Sparkline charts
- Table pop-ups
- ToolBar pop-ups
- Cells with custom Checkbox formatting
2.1. Cross-Drill on charts
Apliqo UX 2.5.2 allows better and quicker analysis options in charts. Users now have the ability to "cross-drill" on charts. (Drill from the context of a given location on any other dimension or alternate hierarchy which exists in the cube).
In charts, unlike in tables, you can perform unlimited cross-drills to navigate data down different dimensions or hierarchies from the starting data point.
For example:
First take the context of Region EMEA, Bikes product category and Budget and drill by Region
Next drill from Portugal by Period (the original context of Bikes & Budget is still in place)
The final result. The user could continue to cross-drill or drill-down from here. Note the breadcrumbs allow the user to navigate back to any previous step on the drill path.
2.2. Drill on row series
Users now have the ability to drill not only the the column series, but on the row series as well.
For example:
Click on Accessories
You can then keep drilling until you get to the leaf level, and always navigate back using the breadcrumb menu.
2.3. Matching colors consistently for elements on all charts in the application
Apliqo UX 2.5.2 enables consistent colors for dimension elements across all charts in the application.
By default if a color attribute has been defined for the member the defined color will always take priority. In cases where no color attribute is either available or applied Apliqo UX will now create a unique color to assign to each element. The algorithm to determine the assigned color is based on the principle element name ensuring that the same element will be assigned the same color ID in every chart.
In the screenshot below note the 2 SKUs "483 - Bike Wash" and "484 - Bike Wash - Dissolver" have the same colors applied in independent charts.
Note: You can always override the algorithm determined color by maintaining a 'Color' attribute for any dimensions requiring specific "element brand identity."
2.4. New chart type :- Funnel Chart
Apliqo UX 2.5.2 introduces "sales funnel" as a new chart type.
The Funnel chart is a specialized chart type that usually demonstrates a "flow" through a business or sales process.
Spreading on consolidated cells is now much easier in UX 2.5.2.
A new advanced option has been introduced which allows data entry on consolidated cells. By default this option is false and consolidated cells are not data enterable. When this option is enabled, you can simply input in a consolidated cell, which will automatically apply a proportional spread to all the leaves which contain values under the consolidation.
- you can input a simple number which will replace the value. (E.g. 100)
- you can also increment or decrement using + or - operators. (E.g. +100)
Tip: you can override the default spreading option from proportional spread to any other spreading type in the advanced options.
Apliqo UX 2.5.2 introduces a new widget called 'KPI Trend'.
The new widget comes with lots of features which can easily be further customized including:
- Background color and text color
- Column, Line or Area chart to show the trend
- Rounded / Original values
- Define custom range for indicating good / average / poor score
Two KPI Trend widgets with the same source data but different formatting options applied
On UX 2.5.2 you can now allocate Toolbar Pop-ups to individual widgets. This allows a better user experience when the task related to the Pop-up is specific to an individual widget.
Apliqo UX 2.5.2 allows administrators to easily track the usability of the application built with Apliqo UX.
We created 2 dedicated cubes in the Content Store to store a log of user connections, and the app activity log (track activity by screen). This allows administrators to analyze general application usage and to drill down and see which parts of the application are most heavily used.
Note: by default the tracking of the reports usage is disabled, in order to enabled it , you must turn the 'UX_App_Log' parameter to True in the default constants file. See the new control parameters section.
Apliqo UX has always supported individual homepages per user. However, until this release the administrator or application builder was forced to build their own view or dashboard to the Content Store }APQ UX UserPreference cube in order to easily set Homepage values or to provide a mechanism for users to select their own homepage.
The 2.5.2 release provides a new section in the "User Default Settings" dialog where users can easily select a new Homepage from the available screens.
Export to PDF has been improved:
- Includes application logo and timestamp
- PDF will generate a multi-page document when data cannot fit a single page
- Custom format on tables will be exported with the correct design
Formerly the attribute which was set to affect the display of element names on filters/rows/columns was fixed in the view definition. Attribute names can now be set to a dynamic value using setting service place-holders. This allows creating more user friendly applications where the attributes can update on the fly per user or per context.
In the example above and below the }ElementAttributes_Product dimension has been added to the FilterBar and is therefore stored to the setting service. The currently selected attribute name of the attribute can be retrieved for the row caption display via standard setting service variable substitution notation $<<UX_Demo.}ElementAttributes_Product.}ElementAttributes_Product>> as this field now accepts text input (formerly accepted only SUBNM selection).
You can now have access to all the attribute values belonging to context elements currently held by the settings service. Previously the setting service held only the element principal name and the last selected attribute display value. A new syntax has been introduced to access all other possible attributes:
$<<InstanceName.DimensionName.HierarchyName::AttributeName>>
Building a wizard in 2.5.2 is now much easier than before. It is now possible to build a wizard without needing the App Management screen at all.
You can now duplicate existing wizard steps / existing dashboards & views as sub-steps directly from the wizard in edit mode without having to navigate to App Management.
Apliqo UX 2.5.2 ships with a new component UXToolkit. In the root of the apliqo server you should notice a new folder "py" which contains an executable uxtoolkit.exe. This is a packaged TM1Py utility which performs metadata synchronization tasks between the Content Store and the reporting instances providing data to the UX application.
The utility performs 4 basic functions:
- store :- stores connection parameters to a settings.json file to authenticate to the Content Store instance (passwords are encrypted and not stored as plain text)
- transfer :- syncs metadata from reporting instances to the Content Store
- create attributes :- provides a mechanism to easily create attributes in selected dimensions whihc are useful for UX applications
- clean :- when upgrading from instances which have previously hosted UX 1.x applications removes all redundant "}APQ C3 Canvas*" objects from the server
The most important function is the "transfer" mode. For other modes the utility will probably be run once manually for initial configuration. However for transfer mode the utility will most likely be scheduled on a daily basis to ensure metadata is always up to date. Transfer has 4 sub-modes:
- transfer -initialize :- reads the instances.json file and checks that each instance in the file has a placeholder set up in the Content Store
- transfer -security :- copies all users, groups and group membership relationships of all connected reporting instances to an intermediate staging area in the Content Store (the "push" to the Content Store's internal security model is managed by a separate process).
- transfer -data :- copies all cube and dimension names from connected instances to the Content Store. For dimensions the default member ID is also copied.
- transfer -all :- this is the default transfer mode if not specified. Performs both the "security" and "data" steps.
Note: the uxtoolkit.exe is only supported for Windows x64 environments. For customers running UX on Linux we can provide a python script and setup instructions of correct python version, tm1Py version and python module dependencies.
Note: When using CAM authentication the user ID which is used when logging on to CAM must be passed with the NamespaceID and password not the user ID from the TM1 }Clients dimension.
Apliqo UX 2.5.2 ships with a new admin app to make configuring and administering your UX application easier. Much of the functionality of the admin app is provided in the background by the UXToolkit utility which is covered in the section above.
Apliqo UX 2.5.2 ships with a new admin app to make configuring and administering your UX application easier.
You should see a briefcase icon named "Content Store Toolkit" in the admin apps section. The app is split into 3 parts:
- Application Setup (Wizard) :- once off configuration tasks
- Maintenance (Wizard) :- regular maintenance tasks
- Review & Analysis (Folder) :- reporting
All screens make use of the info text feature for tooltips on what each step does and each screen has a help PopUp with more detained instructions on what is required on each screen.
You can fine more information in the UX Apps section of the Content Store components guide. Or you can just use the app!
13.1. Application Setup
The application setup app walks the administrator through the process of the initial Content Store configuration and configuring the metadata syncing service done by the uxtoolkit utility.
This workflow takes the user through initial Content Store configuration, such as setting the dependency to 7-zip for automated backups and setting the path to the Content Store data directory and default import and export folders, and then the setup for the uxtoolkit utility to sync metadata from reporting instances to the content store.
Most if not all of the tasks covered in this workflow are once off initial configuration and will not need to be repeated. (Although it is highly recommended to regularly schedule the metadata syncing once it is set up and working!)
13.2. Maintenance
This workflow takes the user through tasks that are more likely to be classified as "regular maintenance". Although it could be that some of these tasks are also once off initial configuration only depending on how the application is maintained and degree of automation.
13.3. Reporting & Analysis
These are apps which don't fit in a workflow. Currently there are 2 screens in this section:
User Stats:- connection log and app activity log analysis
This app allows users in the APQ Admin group to analyze user connections to Apliqo UX by time and user as well as by screen size, browser, device type and operating system. This level of logging is always enabled.
Detailed statistics of the number of page impressions by screen is also available. However this feature must first be enabled be setting UX_App_Log=true as described in the application constants.
Process Log:- internal Content Store TI logging
This app allows administrators to track each unique execution of all internal TurboIntegrator calls made from the UX to the Content Store. History is available by time or process ID. This is very useful for troubleshooting as runtime parameters and userID are easily associated with and process error logs.
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