Dashboards¶
A dashboard is a board of live gauges and trend graphs built from any channels in your account, whatever their location. A location's page answers "how is this site?"; a dashboard answers a question across sites: all freezer temperatures, all tank levels, this month's use everywhere.
A dashboard is made of panels, and each panel holds widgets. Each dashboard has its own view and edit roles, so you can build boards for particular teams.
Click Dashboards in the top menu to open them.
Note
The Dashboards page has a shorter menu of its own, without Alerts, Tanks or Flow Meters. Click My Devices to return to the rest of the portal.
The dashboard bar¶
Across the top of the page:
| Control | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Current Dashboard: | The dashboards you can view. Your last choice is remembered |
| Add New Dashboard (button) | Create a dashboard |
| Add New Panel (button) | Add a panel to the current dashboard |
| Configure Dashboard (button) | Rename the dashboard or change its roles |
| Delete Dashboard (button) | Delete the dashboard, after you confirm |
The buttons are icons: hover over one to see its name. With no dashboards yet, the page says No Dashboards Yet! and only Add New Dashboard is shown.
Note
On a phone, the dashboard buttons are hidden: build and change dashboards on a computer.
Create a dashboard¶
Creating, changing and deleting dashboards needs the Add/Edit Dashboards role (see Roles and permissions) as well as the dashboard's own edit role.
- Click Add New Dashboard.
-
In Create New Dashboard:
Field Notes Dashboard Name: At least 3 characters. #, / and ? can't be used Which role can view this dashboard? Who sees it in their Current Dashboard: list Which role can edit this dashboard? Who can add, change and delete its panels and widgets -
Click Create. You'll see "Your new dashboard was created."
Configure Dashboard opens the same fields to rename the dashboard or change its roles. Delete Dashboard asks "Are you sure you want to delete dashboard: '\<name>'?" first. Both need the dashboard's edit role; without it you'll see "You do not have the appropriate role to edit this dashboard." (or delete).
Panels¶
Click Add New Panel and fill in Create New Panel:
| Field | Notes |
|---|---|
| Panel Name: | At least 3 characters |
| Panel Type? | Device (Gauges) or Device (Graphs) |
| Panel type | Layout | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Device (Gauges) | A row of compact live readings, several side by side | Seeing the current state at a glance |
| Device (Graphs) | Full-width trend graphs, one under another, all sharing one time range | Comparing channels over time |
People who can edit the dashboard see three buttons in each panel's header: Add Widget, Configure Panel (rename) and Delete Panel. Drag a panel by its title to move it up or down the dashboard; the new order is saved straight away. Widgets are reordered the same way, by dragging their titles within the panel.
Add a widget¶
- Click the panel's Add Widget button.
-
Fill in Add New Widget:
Field Notes Name: The widget's title. #, / and ? can't be used Widget type: Gauges panel: Round Gauge, Linear Gauge, Digital Gauge, Consumption Gauge, Text. Graphs panel: Linear Graph, Digital Graph, Consumption Graph Location:, Device:, Channel: Choose the data, narrowing at each step. Hubs with Modbus turned on are listed as \<name> (Gateway) Parameters: Depend on the type (below) -
Click Create. You'll see "Your new widget was saved."
| Widget type | Parameters |
|---|---|
| Round Gauge, Linear Gauge | Range - Low: and Range - High:, the expected range. The reading's position and color are judged against it |
| Text | Range - Low: and Range - High: (optional) |
| Consumption Gauge | Period: today, month or year. The widget shows Today =, This Month = or This Year = |
| Digital Gauge | The State Colors: table (below) |
| Linear Graph | Up to 6 traces (below) |
| Digital Graph | On Text: and Off Text:, the labels for the two states |
| Consumption Graph | None |
Each widget's header has its own Configure (the same fields, in Configure Widget) and Delete buttons.
Several traces on one graph¶
A Linear Graph can show up to 6 channels together. Click Add trace for each extra channel, and choose its Location:, Device: and Channel:. For each trace you can also set a Label: (otherwise the channel's name is used) and a Color: (otherwise one is chosen automatically). Channels with different units get their own scale, and a legend shows which line is which.
Digital Gauge state colors¶
A Digital Gauge shows a large label and a colored dot for the channel's current state. You decide what each value means in the State Colors: table, which has Value, Color and Text columns:
- Three rows are always there: Default (used when the value matches no other row), 0 and 1. Out of the box, 0 is red Off and 1 is green On.
- Add State adds a row for any other value your channel reports (2, 3, …), for equipment with more than two states, such as Off / Running / Fault / Maintenance. Remove an added row with its − button.
- Colors are red, yellow, green, blue, orange, purple, gray, black and white.
- Every row needs a value, a color and a text, and each value can be used only once.
Reading a dashboard¶
- The widget's header color is the channel's alert status: green normal, red one or more active alerts, blue alerts snoozed. The header is orange while the status is loading.
- Gauges and text widgets show the reading, its units, and when it was taken.
- A widget whose channel hasn't reported recently shows -- and No recent data.
- Digital graphs draw the Off periods red and the On periods green, labelled with your On and Off text.
- Hover over a graph for exact values. Linear graphs also have a menu for printing or saving the graph.
- Temperatures follow your App Settings → Temperature choice.
The time range on graph panels¶
Each graph panel has a time range control that drives all the graphs in the panel at once: set the period once and every graph follows.
From top to bottom, a graph panel shows:
- Start Time: and End Time:
- a full-width range slider: a small preview of the data with a handle at each end
- the graphs
Choose the period¶
Change Start Time or End Time to load a different period; every graph in the panel reloads together.
- A panel first shows about the last 25 hours.
- The shortest period is 1 day. A shorter choice is refused with "The minimum allowed range is 1 day".
- Long periods load averaged data, so a month still draws quickly. Zoom in to see more detail.
Zoom and pan together¶
The slider works on the data already loaded, so it's instant:
- Drag the handles inward to zoom every graph in the panel to that part of the period.
- Drag the shaded window left or right to move along the period on every graph at once.
- Drag the handles apart to zoom back out.
Because the graphs stay in step, it's easy to line up an event across channels: pull the handles around a temperature spike and read the door switch and compressor state at the same moment on the graphs below.
Tip
Set Start Time and End Time to the day or week you care about, then investigate with the slider: it's instant, and every graph stays in step.
Note
The time range belongs to one panel. Two graph panels on the same dashboard each have their own, and can show different periods.