Unique Use case on Dependent Filters

#1

I have many metric sets (three main types) on a dashboard .
They all have the same Dimensions.
They are on their own layer.
I have set up one filter layer and put all but one Dimension filter on there and made them all dependent to each other.
Because I have left off this one Dimension as a filter and therefore it is not filtering the other filters I am not getting a true shorten list on the other filters.
Confused yet, still with me?
The reason I have left that one filter out is because it should not be changed by the user because if changed then the Table/Chart would not make any sense at all.
You see all 3 metric sets are for the same data but for a specific dimension type (the one I did not filter on globally) that one is set on each metric set to show the set for that metric set.
Ok I think I muddled this, let me get some more detail.
All the Metric Sets are on yearly Goals, I have three Type of goals:

  1. Dollar amount to reach (actual Measure)
  2. Percentage type goal (actual Measure)
  3. General No Measure ( no number)
    I have two columns for the two different measures type (one money one percentage) no column for the general.
    Each type of goal has its own metric set and is set up differently and on each one the Goal Type dimension is filtered on the metric set to the type it is showing.

That causes the problem where these global filters (that filter all the table charts) can not properly filter each other when I set up the dependencies.

The only thing that I can think of is to have three sets of filters that have a hidden Goal Type filter and has the others as dependent.

If I do this I will loose the when you set the company filter it changes it on all charts and graphs, it will just set the company filter for those that are of the goal type.

Oh and there another set of charts that has the goal type set to all, do do a count of goal met for quarter.

I know it is possible to write some javascript so that when I change one company filter (or any of the other that they all share) it will change the other parameters.
I was just wondering if some one had any better idea of how to get this complicated mess i gotten myself into to work.

Thanks in advance.

#2

James,

I may have a way for you to do this without code. How are you switching between the layers - just using the ChangeLayer option on one of the events?

Also, are the charts only filtered by filters, or do you also allow the user to alter filters by clicking chart elements (i.e. drill-downs)?

Wayne

#3

The layers are changed by a change layer option.
I do have the right click filter option visible but can disable it. They can change Level on the date and I like that. the only drill down would be on the date.

#4

I’m going to describe the following not as a solution but as an exercise to clarify your situation, which is still a bit murky.

Pretend for a moment that you dealt with these layers as independent dashboards, each with the same set of parameters and connected filters, including the top-level “parent” parameter/filter that you do not want users to change on some of these dashboards.

Pretend that you set up your navigations such that you mapped all parameters except your top-level parameter, because in the dashboards where you did not want users to change that parameter, you were simply going to set a default value for it and either hide the corresponding filter or set it to read-only.

Aside from dealing with the cascading effect of changing a top-level filter in a dependency chain when you navigated, would this satisfy your requirement. Again, I’m NOT advocating this…just trying to clarify.

Wayne

#5

I was half remembering a way to connect filters but could not remember what feature used the connected filter. I embed a dashboard once and did not like it and have been doing just layers since then (but that was back in version 4).
Let me think about that one. I just woke up. Running late and had not had any caffeine yet.

#6

Agreed it is always difficult to paint with just words what is going on with a dashboard, but with all the sensitive data we all deal with it hard to just take a picture and post it here.

Even then you need access to see how the metric set or dashboard inner parts are set up (it is why we webex with support).

one day, some day, over the rainbow I will have a copy of my data base with fake data (and I will be able to fly too).

#7

No problem. What I was going to say to you was that if the hypothetical scenario I described to you would indeed satisfy your requirements, then there might be a parallel that you could apply to the layer scenario.

#8

I tried it out.
Luckily I have metric set that has all three categories of the Types, So i was able to make filter and parameters to connect to the embedded dashboard.
It 1/2 works. When on the main dashboard I can change a filter and then go to the embedded one and it has what I filtered for but when i change it on the embedded one it doesn’t change the filters on the main.
Am I missing something, like I said I only embedded once before, this might be the reason I didnt like it.
I will find that dashboard and see how it set up.

#9

Nope, I did not set up parameter sharing on the one embedded dashboard i did.

I am going to work on a different part of this project, get my mind off it (that usually helps).

Support reached out to me after reading this post. I might take them up on the offer to take a good look at the situation, as it is way to complicated to fully explain with just words.