In Visual Analytics, there are two types of filters: static filters and dynamic filters. In my previous article, I showed how to use static filters to subset your data to focus on anomalies or inconsistencies that are discovered during analysis. In this post, I will explain how to create dynamic filters using prompts and actions to design reports versatile.
Prompts can make reports versatile to access the import information by filtering. Prompts are control objects that are placed in a special area on the canvas.
There are two types of prompts are available:
Report prompts - Subset all the data in the report
Page prompts - Subset all the data on a single page.
Tips:
By the default, report and page prompts areas hidden. You can display them
by selecting the Expand page controls or Expand all page controls options on the page tab:
by selecting down arrows:
by selecting the following options from the More button:
Both report and page prompts can be created by using control objects to filter or narrow the scope of the data that is used in the report. To use controls effectively, you need to select the appropriate control for your data. One option is to use auto controls. Visual Analytics chooses the appropriate control based on the type (category, datetime, or measure) and the cardinality of the data item by dragging data items to the report or page prompt area.
If you don't like the control which is chosen by Visual Analytics, you can change it:
Alternatively, you can select preferred control object.
For date and measure data items, a slider control is appropriate to select a single value or a range of values.
For category data items, the control that you use depends on whether you want the viewer to select a single value or multiple values.
To select a single value, you need to consider the cardinality to choose control:
Categories with few distinct values > 5 ===> Button bar
Categories with a moderate number of distinct values (between 5 and 40) ===> Drop-down list
Categories with many distinct values more than 40 ===> Text input
To select multiple values, a list control should be used. In addition, you can specify options to search and to select or clear all values. Please note the list control can only be used in the report and page prompt areas inside a prompt container or when the report and page prompt areas are on the left or right of the canvas.
Actions also can make reports versatile to access the import information. Those are used to direct a report viewer’s attention to specific results in a report.
There are two types of actions can be added to a page.
Automatic actions - between all objects at the page level
Manual actions - between specific objects on a page.
Tips
Each page can either have manual actions or automatic actions, but not both.
Automatic actions can be added between all objects on a single page. Three types of automatic actions are available:
Linked selection
One-way filter
Two-way filter
When automatic linked selection actions are added to a page, all objects on the page have linked selection actions between them. In this example, the page contains two objects, a bar chart and a crosstab. If the viewer selects a value in the bar chart, the same data in crosstab will be highlighted:
The automatic one-way filter action enables viewers to apply filters between objects in any order. The filters are applied in the order in which the data is selected on the page. In this example, the page contains two objects: a bar chart and a crosstab. If the viewer selects a bar in the bar chart, the crosstab will be filtered:
The automatic two-way filter action enables viewers to apply filters between all objects on a page, even previously selected objects. This enables viewers to see the impact of filters on previously filtered objects as well. In this example, the page contains three objects: a bar char, a list control and the other list table.
If the viewer selects a bar on the bar chart, the other objects on the page are filtered. Then, if the viewer selects an item in the list control, all the objects on the page, including the previously selected object are filtered.
Manual actions can be added between objects on a page or between controls in the report and page prompt area. Two types of manual actions are available, filter and linked selection. Filter actions enable you to subset the data to display necessary data. Linked selection actions highlight related data to identify relationships on the page.
Prompts and actions can make your reports more versatile by enabling viewers to access the information that’s important to them, even if that information is different for every viewer. It allows viewers to focus on their needs by presenting information interactively.
Here are the links
SAS Demo | Use Automatic Actions in SAS Visual Analytics for Fast Data Exploration
SAS Demo | Use Text Input for Custom Text Search in SAS Visual Analytics
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