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Dashboards

A dashboard composes cards on a responsive 12-column grid. Creating one requires the Explorer tier (T2) or above. If you need pixel-perfect, fixed-size layout instead, see Canvas.

Composing the grid​

In the dashboard editor, the Insert panel offers three ways to add an item:

  • New card -- create a card in place, from a dataset (Explorer T2+) or from SQL (Builder T4+). See Cards.
  • A favourite -- place a saved template at its default size; you get an independent copy.
  • Text -- headings, body text and captions for structure and commentary.

Drag cards to rearrange and resize them by their handles; positions snap to the grid. The grid reflows responsively, so the same dashboard works across screen widths. Duplicating a dashboard deep-clones every card on it, so the copy is independently editable from top to bottom.

Dashboard filters​

Filters are viewer-controllable parameters declared on the dashboard. Each filter has a name, a label, a type -- date, datetime, text, number or select (with a fixed option list) -- and an optional default. Names must be unique on the dashboard and SQL-safe (letters, digits and underscores, not starting with a digit).

Viewers set values in the filter bar at the top of the dashboard. The values feed the matching curly-brace placeholders in the SQL of the dashboard's datasets and SQL cards -- a filter named start_date supplies {start_date} -- substituted server-side as proper query parameters. A card whose SQL references no placeholders simply ignores the filters.

Cross-filtering​

Bar, horizontal bar, pie and donut cards support click-to-filter: clicking a bar or slice pins that value, and the other cards on the dashboard re-filter to match -- applied instantly in the browser, with no new queries. Pinned values show in a bar above the dashboard, where each can be cleared individually or all at once.

Certified and playpen​

Every dashboard sits in one of two buckets:

  • Playpen -- the default for new dashboards; work in progress.
  • Certified -- it has passed certification and carries the trusted badge viewers see in the library.

Certification is granted by a Builder (T4) or above -- see Certification and peer review. Dashboards are also filed into folders for navigation; see Library and navigation.

Themes​

A dashboard can adopt a theme -- background, card surfaces, fonts and chart palette, each with a light and dark variant. See Themes and branding.

Good to know​

  • A dashboard can be marked sensitive, hiding it from everyone except its owner, T8 Owners and an explicit access list -- see Sensitive data.
  • Viewers opening a dashboard are served each dataset's cached result and never trigger warehouse queries themselves -- see Datasets and SQL.
  • For getting dashboards in front of people -- navigation, exports and alerts -- see Exports and Alerts.