Book Description
Over 100 simple and incredibly effective recipes to help transform your static business data into exciting dashboards filled with dynamic charts and graphics
In Detail
The widely used SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards software lets you transform data from any source into interactive dashboards.
The recipes begin by covering best practices for using the SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards spreadsheet. The book then guides you through the exploration of various data visualization components and dashboard interactivity, as well as using alerts, dashboard connectivity, publishing the dashboard, and making the most of the aesthetics of the dashboard. Finally, the recipes conclude by considering the most important add-ons available for SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards, performance tuning, and tips on increasing development productivity.
What You Will Learn
- Become fully equipped with best practices when using the SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards spreadsheet
- Present data using a wide variety of data visualization components
- Discover how to make dashboard components interactive for an enhanced user experience
- Take advantage of Dynamic Visibility features
- Connect your dashboard to live data sources
- Export and publish the SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards model into several environments
- Improve the performance of your dashboards and increase your productivity as a dashboard developer
Downloading the example code for this book. You can download the example code files for all Packt books you have purchased from your account at http://www.PacktPub.com. If you purchased this book elsewhere, you can visit http://www.PacktPub.com/support and register to have the files e-mailed directly to you.
Table of Contents
- SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards 4.1 Cookbook
- Table of Contents
- SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards 4.1 Cookbook
- Credits
- Foreword
- About the Author
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Acknowledgments
- About the Reviewers
- www.PacktPub.com
- Preface
- 1. Staying in Control
- Introduction
- Using the Object Browser
- Searching for components
- Grouping the canvas components
- Making the spreadsheet more readable with colors
- Making the spreadsheet more readable with comments
- Making the spreadsheet more readable with borders
- Using named ranges
- Copying the format of one cell to another cell or range
- Debugging the spreadsheets
- Navigating between worksheets
- 2. Data Visualization
- Introduction
- Adding a line chart to your dashboard
- Using a bullet chart
- Using sparklines
- Using a combination chart
- Using a waterfall chart
- Using a pie chart
- Using a scatter plot chart
- Using a bubble plot chart
- Using a radar chart
- Using an OHLC chart and a candlestick chart
- Sorting series
- Zooming in on charts
- Scaling the y-axis
- Using a tree map
- Showing a trend without a chart
- Displaying raw data
- Illustrating single values
- 3. From a Static to an Interactive Dashboard
- Introduction
- Selecting your data from a list
- Drilling down from a chart
- Using the Filter selector component for hierarchies
- An alternative hierarchy selection method
- Using the Hierarchical Table
- Using Filtered Rows
- Using maps to select data of an area or country
- Adding a Mac OS X-looking dock to your dashboard
- Resetting your data (the reset button)
- Making selections from a custom image (the push button and image component)
- Inputting data values
- Using the Play Selector / Play Control component
- Opening up a Web Intelligence report using dashboard parameters
- Selecting calendar dates
- Using sliders to create a what-if scenario
- 4. Dynamic Visibility
- 5. Using Alerts
- 6. Advanced Components
- 7. Dashboard Look and Feel
- Introduction
- Changing the look of a chart
- Adding a background to your dashboard
- Using color schemes
- Sharing a color scheme
- Working with themes
- Making component colors dynamic
- Dynamic XY positioning and sizing of components
- Using the Panel Container
- Using the Tab Set container
- Making tables look pretty
- Using quadrants smartly
- Creating/using a dashboard template
- 8. Dashboard Data Connectivity
- 9. Exporting and Publishing
- 10. Top Third-party Add-ons
- Introduction
- Managing add-ons in SAP BusinessObjects Dashboards
- Connecting to CSV files with the CSV Connector
- Integrating Google Maps with the CMaps plugin
- Connecting to Salesforce.com with DashConn
- Presenting micro charts in a Tree Grid
- Integrating Web Intelligence with Antivia XWIS Advantage Express
- Advanced printing with Xcelsius Dashboard Printer
- SUCCESS with graphomate charts
- 11. Performance Tuning
- 12. Increasing Productivity
- Introduction
- Using the Spreadsheet Table component to debug
- Time-saving tips during dashboard development
- How to do it…
- Global Fonts
- Grouping from the Object Browser versus grouping with a Canvas Container
- Editing multiple components at once
- Using the alignment, sizing, and spacing buttons
- Using the arrow keys for precise placement of components
- Using the Grid to help with relative positioning
- Copying objects from another dashboard
- How to do it…
- Fixing corrupt XLF files
- A. Real-world Dashboard Case Studies
- B. Additional Resources – Supported Excel Functions and System/Software Requirements
- C. The Future of Dashboarding with SAP Design Studio
- Index