Highlighting data points across visualizations

You can select one or more data points in one visualization and see these data points highlighted in all related visualizations in the current tab of the dashboard or story.

Visualizations are related if they use the same data asset. Visualizations that use different data sets are also connected if there are matching column names in the different data sources. If a visualization doesn't contain the data points, its data is filtered for the selected data points. A data point can be an element in the visualization, such as a bar or bubble, or an axis label, or a column or member in the legend.

About this task

For example, you have several visualizations on the same tab. The first one shows the breakdown of course costs by organization. The second one shows how many external people were hired in each organization. The third one shows how many positions each department plans to add. The fourth one shows the total for the expenses.

Visualizations showing course cost by organization, external hires by organization, planned position count by department, and expense total

You select the GO Asia Pacific operations box in the first visualization. GO Asia Pacific operations is immediately highlighted in the second visualization. The data in the third and fourth visualizations are filtered to show only the departments in the GO Asia Pacific operations organization and a filter icon is added to these visualizations.

"GO Asia Pacific operations" is highlighted in the visualizations that show course cost by organization and external hires by organization while the visualizations for planned position count by department and expenses are filtered

In some cases, some visualizations do not appear to be filtered. This might happen when the highlighted visualizations and the to-be filtered visualizations are only dimension tables joined by multiple fact tables where the filter cannot be applied to any of the fact streams and is dropped. To avoid this situation, an explicit fact table needs to be added to the visualizations.

Procedure

  1. Click the data point that you want to highlight. To select multiple data points, touch and hold (Ctrl+click) each additional data point.

    The data points are highlighted in each visualization that contains them. Other related visualizations that do not contain the data points are filtered and a filter icon is added to the visualizations. To see info about the current filter, click the Filter icon Filter icon in the visualization.

    If a column is in the Repeat (row) or the Repeat (column) data slot for a tree map visualization, you cannot select one of its members and see it highlighted in all related visualizations. For example, a tree map includes the Year column in the Repeat (row) data slot and a bar visualization includes the Year column in one of the axes. You can highlight a specific year by selecting it in the bar visualization and that year will be highlighted in the tree map but you cannot select a year in the tree map.

  2. To remove the highlighting, click in the background of the visualization.