Insights (Advanced) | Dashboard Filter Linking

You can wire filters belonging to one report to other reports on the dashboard. This filter linking means that if a user applies a selected value to a user prompt filter, all linked reports will be updated according to that selected value.

Overview

You can link filters automatically, or manually. Read the below sections for more information.

Filter linking involves creating links between a dashboard filter (that is, a filter added to a dashboard appearing in a filter panel; this is also referred to as the parent filter), and filters in other reports on the same dashboard (aka child filters). 

• Automatic Linking
  
  • Automatic Linking Rules 
  • Enable Automatic Linking
  • Filter Linking Progress
• Manual Linking
  
  • Manual Linking Rules
  • How to manually link filters

Automatic Linking

Automatic linking enables the system to automatically form links between a dashboard filter (or parent filter), and child filters of other reports. 

If auto-linking is enabled, the reports will create links between report filters that match (see rules on how they match below). 

Automatic Linking Rules 

An automatic linking match is successful if:

• The parent and child filters are from the same view.
• Both filters are the same ‘field’ (e.g. Company Name to Company Name).
• Both filters are not from the same report widget (however, you can add another version of the same report and link their filters) 

If linking finds multiple possible matches, it creates the link with the first match.

Automatic links will not be created if:

• Either of the filters is parameter.
  
  
• The child report has a subquery.
• The child filter on the dashboard is already linked to another filter.

Enable Automatic Linking

There are multiple ways to enable automatic linking:

• Click on the Automatic Filter Linking toggle in your dashboard’s properties panel.

• Through a pop-up prompt that appears every time (unless disabled) you add any report to the dashboard.
  
  

Filter Linking Progress

The system sends notifications on the success or failure of automatic linking. Following are the possible linking result notifications.

• Success: If linking was created successfully, a success notification will appear on the bottom-right of the screen.
• Incomplete: If not all filters were linked, then an incomplete status will appear.
• Failed: If filter linking was a failure, the notification will inform the user of this, along with the reason for its failure. For example:

Manual Linking

Users can also manually create links between filters of different dashboard reports. This is ideal if you want to link reports belonging to different views or data sets. 

You have two methods to manually link: 

1. Link multiple filters through the Link Filters button on a filter panel. 
2. Alternatively, you may also link an individual filter by accessing its menu and using the Link To option.

Manual Linking Rules

Use these rules to successfully create a manual link:

• The parent and child filters must be of the same type (e.g. numeric).
• Both must have the same filter operator (e.g. In List).
• The child filter isn't already linked to. (A parent filter can be link multiple times.)
• The child filter isn’t added to another filter list. 

Side notes: 

• You can still create a manual link between filters of different types, however they will not update the child report correctly (thereby resulting in useless links).
• If the child report does not actually have a filter, you can still select a suitable data field. 

How to manually link filters

Here’s how to set this manual linking:

• Add user prompt report filters that you want to show on our dashboard. Refer to this section to learn how to do this.
• In the filters panel, click on the Link Filters button.

• If the dashboard contains other reports to link to, then the Link Filters popup will appear displaying all added filters. The parent filters here will be displayed one by one, along with all the reports that it can be linked to. (You can see the sub tab that each of the reports also belong to, making it easy to locate them on the dashboard.)

• For each report that you want to link to, select a filter from the child report from the dropdown.

• You have the option of linking other parent filters in this popup in the same manner.
• To un-link a field from a linked report, select the --Select-- option from the dropdown.
• Once you have selected all link filters, click on the Apply button.