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Adding context to your charts

Adding context to your charts

A few articles back, I wrote about Parameter Replacement in Yellowfin to provide better narratives to your reports and dashboards. Another feature that goes hand in hand with this is Set Analysis.

Set Analysis allows you to provide more context to your data. For example, if you just display the sales value for a specific month, it is good information, but it is not actionable. If you compare this value against the same month last year, you have added context to the value. The user can then get more value out of the report or dashboard by starting to look at trends.

Set Analysis was introduced in Yellowfin v7.3 and basically pre-defines a set of data that your charts can use. Using Set Analysis, we can display values corresponding to various sets of data (e.g. a specific time-period, country or category, etc.). In earlier versions this had to be done using sub-queries which required more technical skills.

Let me explain this by using a couple of examples.

Example 1

In the first example we will be comparing the sales for 2017 with the sales of 2016 using two number charts.

  1. Create a new report based on the Ski-Team view. This is part of the tutorial content that can be installed when installing Yellowfin.

  2. Add the Year, Athlete Region and Invoice Amount fields to the columns area.

  3. Proceed to the Charts step.

  4. Drag the Set Analysis Function to the Horizontal axis.

    Set Analysis

  5. In the pop-up window, give your new set a name and set the metric to Sum Invoiced Amount.

    New Set - 2017 Sales

  6. Select Year in the Select Filter Field dropdown and set the year to 2017.

    Select Year Filter

    2017 Sales Set

  7. Click on Submit.

  8. You will now have a number chart with the sales value for 2017.

  9. Create a copy of this chart by hovering with your mouse over the chart thumbnail in the Chart list at the bottom of the screen. Select Copy from the menu.

    Chart Thumbnail

    Copy Chart

  10. Click on the 2017 Sales set in the horizontal axis and select Configure Set.

    Configure Set

  11. Change the name of the set to 2016 Set and update the filter value to 2016. Click on Submit.

    2016 Sales Set

  12. Proceed to the Design Step and build your visualization using the multi-chart canvas.

    Sales Chart

Example 2

In the steps below we will be comparing the sales between the North America and Europe regions by Year. To achieve this, we will create two sets of data (Set Analysis functions), one for the sales in the North American region and another for the sales in the Europe region.

  1. Go back to the Charts step and remove both charts. You can do this by hovering on the chart thumbnail at the bottom of the screen and selecting Delete.

    Delete Charts

  2. Click on Auto Chart and select a Line Chart.

    Select Line Chart

  3. Set the Horizontal Axis to Year.

  4. Drag the Set Analysis Function to the Vertical axis.

  5. In the pop-up window, give your new set a name and set the metric to Sum Invoiced Amount.

    New Set - North America

  6. Select Athlete Region in the Select Filter Field dropdown and set the value to North America.

    Select Region Filter

    North America Set

  7. Click on Submit.

  8. Drag another Set Analysis Function to the Vertical Axis.

    New Set Analysis Function

  9. In the pop-up window, give your new set a name and set the metric to Sum Invoiced Amount.

    New Set - Europe

  10. Select Athlete Region in the Select Filter Field dropdown and set the value to Europe.

    Europe Set

  11. Click on Submit.

  12. The chart will display with a line for each of the regions’ sales by Year.

  13. Next, we want to change the color of one of these lines in order to differentiate between Europe and North America.
    Click on the Europe set in the vertical axis and select Settings.

    Axis Settings

  14. Change the Style too Solid and enable Custom Color.

    Custom Style

  15. Select a color from the color selector.

    Change Color

  16. Click on the X at the top right to close the settings window.

    Close Settings

  17. Your chart should look like the image below.

    Region Chart

By following the same methodology, you can set up more meaningful and actionable visualisations.