pszrajber
on - edited on by
ian.anderson
Smart M.App Updates for June 2017
This article describes the new features on M.App Platform, in particular the M.App Studio components: BI Wizard and Spatial Workshop. Please take some time to get familiar with these new options and learn more about how you can improve your Smart M.Apps.
What's New
Display multiple geometries and analyze them together in your BI Smart M.App
With these updates, you can configure two or more geometry sources in your Smart M.App and display them on a Choropleth Map or a Point Cluster Map. You can define the color palette for each geometry separately.
Compose your BI map and use “geometry generalization” to display only the relevant level of detail. You will see one geometry at a time, but when you zoom in or out then the next/previous geometry displays according to the defined scale range. In addition, if you correlate both geometries (geometry keys) with the tabular data, all selections and filters will smoothly move between the layers and widgets will interact with different geometries. Also, you can filter geometry at any level and when you change the scale/view the filter works for another layer as well. The only thing that is required by the user in the configuration is to assign appropriate key fields to corresponding geometry layers.
You can arrange multiple geometries in your Smart M.App with a few steps.
- In the Select Dataset window, add as many geometries as needed. All selected geometries are listed under Selected Geometries. Add attribute tables if necessary. Ensure the Geometry keys are assigned to geometries.
2. Add Choropleth or Point Map layers with each geometry you want to have in your BI App.
- Click Visualization tab
- Select first geometry from the Geometry field
c. Drag & drop choropleth or point map onto the map window
d. Select second geometry from Geometry field.
e. Drag & drop choropleth or point map onto the map window.
f. In the same way add more layers.
3. Define additional map widgets. Widgets will interact with all available layers if appropriate geometry key is assigned to each geometry layer.
Apply scale bands to manage the BI layers visibility
Define the scale range for every single layer in your BI M.App. You get complete control at which zoom level the given geometry displays. It is possible to provide range values for the layer manually or set the desired map zoom and click read current scale of the map for an upper and lower range.
- Set scale ranges for each layer added
- Click Layers tab on the right.
- Select a layer with a particular geometry, the Layer Properties panel opens on the left.
- Provide range values for the layer manually or set desired map zoom and click button read current scale of the map for upper and lower range.
Note, that the scale range setting for a layer will be respected only when you provide both the upper and the lower values.
Apply Data Table widget in your Smart M.App to improve reporting of user findings
Filter data rows by applied selection with a new DataTable widget. In addition, use the widget to download filtered data to a CSV file. End users can use the file to report their analytical findings quickly and easily.
Using the Data Table Widget, you can choose the visible table columns and the date range that users can download. You can allow the following to be downloaded.
- the filtered data rows with selected attributes as configured for Data Table Widget
- the filtered data with all available attributes
- all data with all attributes
For improved readability, you can group by attribute the data displayed in the Data Table widget.
Enhanced Timeline widget makes it easier to select the temporal scope in focus
Optional time range buttons in the TimeLine Widget let users quickly change the predefined time range. With one click, users can decide for what time period data are presented. The choices are: Last 90 days, Last 30 Days, Last 7 days, Last 24 Hours, or Show All.
In order to turn on the chart time range buttons just enable the Show time ranges option in the chart properties panel.
Display multiple columns on one Bar Chart
To improve the comparative analysis of the various phenomena with Smart M.App, we introduced a measure comparison charts container in BI Wizard.
Measure comparison charts or Multicolumn charts show several measures reduced to single values on one chart. This is especially useful when comparing aggregated quantities that are parts of a single phenomenon. For example, showing green space, gray space, and water in absolute values on a single chart.
When you set up these charts, dimensions are not considered just like with the Text Chart. Measures are calculated for all data rows selected with the current BI application filters.
Measure comparison charts react to selection events from the other charts in order to show high level aggregated information.
- Pie chart - Each slice represents one measure
- Row chart - each bar represents one measure
- Bar chart - each bar represents one measure
Other BI Wizard enhancements for improved UX
- Validate custom expressions in BI Wizard
Now when you build a custom expression, either by defining a measure or dimension, you can immediately know whether the expression is correct.
- Improve readability of BI map by applying adaptive color palette
The adaptive color palette for BI automatically and dynamically adjusts color distribution across selected features on the map. This simple feature makes the phenomenon presented on the map more readable when the user filters features on the map. Users are able to spot differences in data distribution faster.
| Relative Colors OFF | Relative Colors ON | |
| Filter OFF |  |
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| Filter ON |  |
 |
| Filter ON |  |
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In order to apply adaptive color palette for a layer in BI M.App just turn on the Use relative colors option in the layer properties panel.
- API for on-the-fly reload of the data source underlying BI Smart M.App.
With the new JavaScript API methods it is possible to reload data of the BI M.Apps on the fly. You can can configure the Smart M.App in the BI Wizard using a static file from M.App Chest, and then dynamically reload it during the Application runtime. New data must have the same columns/properties as it is indicated by the data model defined in the wizard.
/**
* Register new attributes.
* @method registerAttributes
* @param {Object} [config]
* @param {String|Array} [config.tableSource] data url or array of data
* @param {String} [config.stageId] stageId
* @param {Function} callback Callback
* @param {Function} errback Error callback
* @returns {void}
*/
registerAttributes: function(config, callback, errback)
Simplified procedure for publishing recipes in Spatial Workshop
Now you can create a recipe and publish it in one step.
Every valid recipe is published automatically and can be used in Smart M.Apps instantly. This background process validates each recipe on the fly so there are no “published” and “saved” sections in the Recipes panel in Spatial Workshop. All your saved recipes are listed in the My Recipes section, with the status flag indicating whether it is valid or not. The valid status flag displays in both M.App Studio and Spatial Workshop for every recipe. Other flags are Shared with me and Promoted. An additional option available in the Recipe panel lets you quickly filter recipes by valid/invalid status flag. The status flag is updated each time you save the recipe.
Note that the Validate action remains available in the toolbar for on-demand validation of recipes for early errors detection.
With this change, we have enabled one more important feature: automatic update of spatial recipe in the Smart M.App. Now you don't need to reconfigure your Smart M.App each time you modify the recipe configured in the application. You simply update the recipe, and the Smart M.App automatically uses the latest version during execution.
All applications created prior to this enhancement and using spatial recipes published according to the old (legacy) procedure are valid and fully functional. For your convenience, we have created a copy of those recipes with the status flag so you can easily manage updates. However, if you want automatic updates of recipes in your old Smart M.App, edit the app, and reselect the recipe with valid status.
