Create and Manage Views

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Overview

View in Cloudability is a powerful data filtering tool to organize and control how cloud cost and usage data is presented and shared among Cloudability users for your organization. They act as application-wide filters that help you focus on the data that matters most.

With Views, you can:

  • Filter and Segment data by accounts, vendors, tags, account groups, or business mappings.
  • Control visibility by sharing some data broadly while restricting sensitive information to specific users or groups.
  • Enable flexibility by allowing admins to create multiple views, such as cost data by business unit or environment.

Administrators can configure Views with different sharing settings—Private, Entire Organization, or Specific Users/Groups—to ensure the right level of data access to right set of users. Each View provides a tailored perspective on your cloud resources, empowering teams to analyze costs, optimize usage, and make informed decisions.

Example Use Cases:

  • A finance team needs a View to monitor monthly spend by vendor across all accounts.
  • A business unit leader needs a View to track cost allocation by department.
  • A DevOps team need to have a View to analyze compute costs in production vs. staging environments.

How to

Create a view

  1. Navigate to Organize > Views .

  2. Select New View . The Add a view panel opens.

    add views screenshot

  3. In the Name field, enter a name for your view.

  4. In the Description field, describe the purpose for your view.

  5. In the Privacy section, indicate your privacy settings.

    • Select Private to prevent others from accessing your view.

    • Select Entire Organization to make your view accessible to all non-restricted users and administrators in your organization.

    • Select the Individuals to share your view with specific users. Use the Shared With dropdown to select specific users to share the View with.

    Note:

    When users are assigned a view, they can not see any data until they have the ViewsFeatureFullAccess permission. For more information, visit Managing user permissions and roles

  6. In the Filters section, select the Add Filter button to narrow the scope of your view.

    1. In the Measure field, select the dimension you want to include in your filter argument.

    2. In the Operator field, select the operator for the filter, for example equals .

    3. In the Value field, type a string of text to use as the value to filter on.

    4. Select Submit .

    5. For example, this filter limits the scope of the view to the Business Unit called engineering .

    filter views screenshot

  7. (Optional) If you want to include another filter in your view, select Add Filter again. When entering multiple filter arguments in a single view, the system will infer an implied OR between the same dimension and an implied AND across two dissimilar dimensions.

Duplicate a View

As a View Admin, you often need to create multiple views that share similar filters and permissions. Manually recreating each view by applying the same filters and settings can be time-consuming and repetitive. With the Duplicate View feature,

  • You can clone or duplicate a view in just one click.
  • All filters, permissions, and settings will be copied.
  • You simply rename the view and make any adjustments needed.

This feature helps you save time, reduce errors and making it easier to customize and organize Views for your teams.

  1. To duplicate, navigate to Organize > Views .

  2. Click the ellipsis (…) icon on the row of the view you want to clone/duplicate and select Duplicate.

  3. This will open a side panel with all the data prefilled with the information. Simply rename the view and make any adjustments in filter conditions and permissions as needed.

Clone duplicate a view

Manage an existing view

You can edit, share, and delete existing views in Cloudability.

Edit a view

  1. Navigate to Organize > Views .

  2. Click the ellipsis (…) icon on the row of the view you want to edit and select Edit.

  3. If you want to edit multiple views at once, select the check boxes to the left of the views, then select the EDIT MULTIPLE icon. The Edit a view panel will open.

Delete a View

When a View is deleted, the following behavior applies for users who have it set as their default view:

  • If a default view (including an HV) is deleted, the user’s default will automatically revert to the Org-level default view.
  • If no org-level default exists, the default view will be set to blank.
  • A warning now appears when deleting a view to inform admins that it may impact user defaults.

Before deleting, Admins can see who is using a specific view as their default via: View → Show Default Usage. Also, Users can always update their default view at any time via: Manage Profile → Preferences.

To Delete a View:

  1. Navigate to Organize > Views .

  2. Click the ellipsis (…) icon on the row of the view you want to delete and select Delete.

  3. If you want to delete multiple views at once, select the check boxes to the left of the views, then select the Delete Views icon.

Change privacy permissions of an existing shared view

Views authors can change the permissions (increase or decrease) of an existing Shared View. However, when permissions are decreased or removed, the following behavior applies:

  • If a default view's (including an HV) access is removed from the user, user’s default will automatically revert to the Org-level default view.
  • If no org-level default exists, the default view will be set to blank.
  • A warning now appears when modifying its permissions to inform admins that it may impact user defaults.

Before modifying the permissions, Admins can see who is using a specific view as their default via: View → Show Default Usage. Also, Users can always update their default view at any time via: Manage Profile → Preferences.

To change the permission:

  1. Navigate to Organize > Views.

  2. Click the ellipsis (…) icon on the row of the view you want to edit.

  3. Change the permission between ‘Private’, ‘Entire Organization’ and ‘Individuals’.

Identify Users using the View as Default

Before deleting or restricting access to a view, Admins can now see who is actively using it as their default view, helping them make informed decisions when restricting view permissions or deleting it. The feature shows exactly which users rely on a specific view as their default - whether it was shared directly, through User Groups, Entra ID Groups, or with the Entire Organization.

  1. Using 'Show Default Usage' option:

    1. Navigate to Organize > Views.

    2. Click the ellipsis (…) icon on the row of the view and select 'Show Default Usage'.

    3. In side panel, you'll see the list of users who're using this view as their default view.
    show default view users

  2. Using CSV Export:

    1. Navigate to Organize > Views.

    2. Use the 'Export' button to download the list of all the views.
    3. In the CSV, the View Default Users column lists all users who have set that view as their default.

Set a Default View

Your default view is the view you see when you initially log in, and it also applies to your daily Cloudability emails. To set your default view:

  1. Click on your Profile icon on the top right, then click Manage Profile .

  2. On your Profile page, click the Preferences tab.

  3. Under Default Account View , select a view.
    Note: You can also select Hierarchical View (HV) as your default view. Only HVs to which a user has access to will appear in the drop down list and only the highest level node, can be set a default.
    Note: Cloudability remembers the last view you accessed and saves it in your browser cache. On your next login, it restores that same view instead of your default one. If you clear your browser cache and log in again, Cloudability will load your default view.

    set default views screenshot

  4. Click Save Settings .

Select a View

Selecting a view narrows the scope of the data you see throughout Cloudability according to the filter conditions of your view. To select an existing view:

  1. Click the Current View drop-down in the top navigation.

  2. Choose a view from the list.

Cloudability will now display data only from dimensions that have been specified in your view.

Dropdown list displaying dimensions specified in your view

Frequently Asked Questions

Q1: Why do new users see multiple Views even though no specific access was granted?

If a View Admin has shared Views with the “Entire Organization” permission, those Views become accessible to all users by default, including newly added users.

Q2: How does bulk editing (Edit Multiple) work for Views? (with examples)

You can select multiple Views and use Edit Multiple to update their permissions in bulk. Filters cannot be bulk edited because each View has its own unique filters. When bulk editing, the combined permissions of all selected Views are displayed.

Examples:

  • Example 1: If View A is Private and View B is shared with the Entire Organization, the bulk edit screen will show Entire Organization as selected. Any changes you make will apply to both Views.
  • Example 2: If View A is shared with users u1, u2 and group g1, and View B with u2, u3, the bulk edit screen will show u1, u2, u3 and g1 selected. Saving will apply these combined permissions to both Views.

Important: If you only want to add one new user to multiple Views, bulk edit may not be ideal. For example, adding u4 to both Views using bulk edit will also merge all existing permissions, resulting in both Views having u1, u2, u3, u4 and g1.

Best Practice Tip: When to use bulk edit vs. individual edits

Use Edit Multiple only when you want to standardize permissions across multiple Views. If your goal is to make small, specific changes (like adding a single user), edit each View individually to avoid unintentionally merging permissions.

Q3: Why don't I see duplicate view option for Hierarchical Views?

Duplicating or Closing feature is not available for Hierarchical Views. This is because each Hierarchical View A Hierarchical View is built from a Hierarchical Business Mapping. To create a new Hierarchical View group, a new Hierarchical Business Mapping needs to be added first. This limits us from duplicating the Hierarchical View.

Q4: Why isn’t my default view selected when I log in to Cloudability?

Cloudability remembers the last view you accessed and saves it in your browser cache. On your next login, it restores that same view instead of your default one. If you clear your browser cache and log in again, Cloudability will load your default view.

Q5: What happens when Admin deletes a View or removes a permission of view from a user?

A user can expect following behavior when Admin deletes a View or removes a View's permissions from an user:

  1. The user’s default will automatically revert to the Org-level default view.

  2. If no org-level default exists, the default view will be set to blank.

  3. Users can always update their default view at any time via: Manage Profile → Preferences.

Troubleshooting

  • Can't see any data under a View? Ensure you have the ViewsFeatureFullAccess permission.

Best Practices

  • Use consistent naming conventions for Views (e.g., BU_Prod_Cost) to make them easy to identify.
  • Provide a clear description for each View to explain its purpose and intended use.
  • Limit “Entire Organization” sharing to essential Views only. Overusing this option can reduce the effectiveness of Views by making too many accessible to everyone.
  • Regularly review and clean up unused Views to maintain an organized and efficient environment.