Managing Live Dashboards

Create and maintain dashboards with Live Dashboards, a dashboard builder with numerous widget options and powerful Nexthink Query Language (NQL) for data visualization and drill-down possibilities.

Built-in dashboards

Dashboards installed from Library

Nexthink offers a set of preconfigured dashboards that you can manually install from Nexthink Library. Go to the Nexthink Library module within your Nexthink instance to install, manage, and update predefined dashboards.

Refer to Nexthink Library documentation for more information.

Custom dashboards

Creating a custom dashboard from scratch allows you to monitor specific types of data and application usage according to your own needs and use cases. Refer to Creating dashboards for more information.

Preparing for dashboard design

Define dashboard purpose: operational vs. reporting

Nexthink recommends you first identify the general timeframe the dashboard requires and categorize whether the dashboard fall into operations or reporting category. This affects the dashboard organization, the data it captures and the period over which the data is available.

Below are some useful questions to help you categorize your dashboard:

1. Will this dashboard primarily be used for troubleshooting or reporting purposes?

2. If it is for troubleshooting, how long does it typically take to identify and resolve an issue?

3. How frequently will dashboard viewers visit this dashboard?

Operational dashboard

Operational dashboards typically use operational data available for up to 30 days. These dashboards display the latest data and are ideal for troubleshooting. They offer extensive options for filtering data. The default timeframes for the entire dashboard include:

• Last 30 days

• Last 7 days

• Last 72 hours

• Last 48 hours

• Last 24 hours

• Last 6 hours

• Last 1 hour

The available granularity spans from 15-minute to 1-hour (depending on the timeframe).

It is possible and common to insert time series charts that look back over longer periods to, for example, see the expected range of the metric, based on historical values.

Reporting dashboard

Reporting dashboards exclusively use trend data from up to 13 months. It is intended for:

• Annual, quarterly or monthly reporting

• Tracking longer-term projects

• Troubleshooting issues that only are visible over a period longer than 30 days

• Addressing issues that take more than 30 days to fix

Trend data has two types:

• Trends available in the Nexthink data model, with less (1-day) granularity and stricter limits which is stored for up to 13 months, e.g. DEX scores or Software Metering.

• Custom trends that allow you to define critical data specific to your needs and store them for up to 13 months. The custom trend data also comes with certain limitations including the time granularity of 1 day.

The default timeframes for the entire reporting dashboard include:

• Last 1 year

• Last 6 months

• Last 90 days

• Last 30 days

Charts display data with daily, weekly or monthly granularity.

Note that there are many more constraints for reporting dashboards.

• The filtering options are limited to device properties and metrics.

• There is much tighter limit of the number of Custom trends that you can create versus what was possible with the classic metrics.

Refer to the Data we collect and store and Data resolution and retention for more information.

If you identified any plots that can be covered using operational data or built-in trends, you can already move to Creating dashboards section of this page. Otherwise, you will likely utilize Infinity custom trend functionality.

You can integrate both operational and trend data into a single dashboard. For instance, you might wish to observe the total energy consumption categorized by device model, gathered from 30-days operational data, and juxtapose it with the annual trend of energy consumption on a line chart.diting

Refer to Adding widgets section on this page for more information about setting fixed timeframes for specific widgets.

Creating custom trends for long-term data

Identify which NQL tables store data you want to monitor long-term. Refer to NQL data model for a complete list of NQL tables and fields. Once you identified the tables and specific fields and metrics to monitor, go to Administration → Content management → Custom trends and create new custom trend according to the guidelines included in the Custom trends management page.

Bear in mind that plotting data based on the custom trends consist of two steps:

1. Custom trend NQL definition (storing relevant data)

2. Dashboard widget NQL definition (computing and aggregating data)

Creating dashboards

To create a dashboard for the first time:

1. Select Live Dashboards from the main menu.

2. Click on Create a dashboard in the top-right corner of the empty Dashboards page.

3. Enter a meaningful name for the dashboard and click Save.

After you save your first dashboard, create new dashboards:

1. Select Live Dashboards > Manage live dashboards from the main menu.

2. Click on Create a dashboard in the top-right corner of the Dashboards page.

3. Enter a meaningful name for the dashboard and click Save.

Use the Live dashboards main menu or the Dashboards page to access available dashboards.

Importing dashboards

From the Dashboards page, import custom dashboards previously exported from the Live Dashboards module, or a pre-built dashboard from the Nexthink Library module. All imported dashboards are categorized as custom content.

To import live dashboards—in JSON—from your local device:

1. Click the Import button in the top-right corner of the Live dashboards > Manage live dashboards page.

2. Choose or drag multiple JSON files from your hard drive to import them into the system.

   • All imported items from local devices are listed as custom.

Tagging dashboards

Tagging allows you to quickly sort dashboards. Open the Tags right-side panel to:

• Search for a specific tag at the top of the panel.

• Select one or more tags to filter the dashboard table.

To add one or more tags to a dashboard, from the Live dashboards > Manage live dashboards page:

1. Hover over a dashboard to display the action menu and choose Manage tags.

2. From the Manage tags pop-up you can:

   • Type in a new tag or choose an existing one to add it to the dashboard.

   • Open the action menu of a specific tag item to Delete tag or change the tag color.

     • Deleting a tag only removes it from the dashboard it is associated with.

3. Alternatively, select multiple dashboards to Manage tags in bulks.

Managing dashboards

To edit a dashboard, click on a dashboard’s name from the Live Dashboards main menu or navigate to the Dashboards page by clicking the Manage live dashboards button.

Use the action menu in the top-right corner of the page to:

• Edit dashboard content (edit mode).

• Duplicate dashboards.

• Export a dashboard as a file.

• Delete a dashboard.

Editing dashboard content

To activate the dashboard’s edit mode, choose the Edit option from the action menu in the top-right corner of the dashboard details page.

While in edit mode, you can modify the dashboard content:

• Add and manage widgets.

• Add and manage widget filters.

• Add and manage tabs and tab descriptions.

• Rename a dashboard and change its properties.

When you activate edit mode, the Nexthink web interface displays editable dashboard elements in light blue.

Adding widgets

To add widgets in edit mode:

1. Click on the + icon to add a new widget.

2. Select the widget type you want to add:

   • Visualizations to present data as a line chart, bar chart, gauge chart, table or other type of visualization.

   • Heading to enter the name of the new section or a group of widgets on your dashboard.

3. Optionally, paste a widget that you've previously copied to the clipboard, for example from another tab, to quickly reuse its configuration.

1. Fill in the visualization fields in the Add a widget pop-up.

2. Click Save widget.

Filling in widget visualization fields

The following table displays the visualization widget fields and how to define them:

Managing widgets

To manage widgets in edit mode, hover over an existing widget to open the action menu.

1. Select the Edit option to modify the visualization fields of the widget.

2. Select Copy widget to copy it to the browser clipboard and then paste it in any dashboard that you have edit permissions to. Use the add widget (the + icon) to paste it to your desired location. Note that the first time you try to paste, the browser will ask you to grant permissions to access the browser clipboard.

3. Select Delete to remove the widget.

4. Select Group with right/left/top/bottom option to cluster adjacent widgets under the same section or heading.

Click Exit edit mode to save changes.

Adding widget filters

Widget filters allow you to view a subset of the data, displaying values from a specific field. The system currently supports strings, enumerators, Booleans and versions as field types.

To add a widget filter in edit mode:

1. Click Add filter widget in the top-right corner of the page.

2. Fill in the Add filter widget popup to define the custom filter widget:

   • Filter label: provide a meaningful label for the filter widget.

   • Table and Field: select the NQL table and field to populate the filter’s drop-down menu.

   • User can select multiple values: tick this option to enable users to select one or multiple values from the filter's drop-down menu.

3. Save filter and Exit edit mode to use widget filters.

Managing widget filters

To manage widget filters in edit mode:

1. Hover over the top-right corner of the filter widget to open the action menu.

2. Select the Edit or Delete option.

3. Click Exit edit mode to save changes.

To change the position of a widget filter in the Nexthink web interface, delete the filter and then add it back into the desired position.

Adding tabs

Further organize widgets by adding tabs to the dashboard. Each tab can contain different sets of widgets and layouts.

To add tabs in edit mode:

1. Click on the + icon below the filter bar to add a tab.

2. Use the tab’s action menu to rename or delete a tab.

3. Click and drag on individual tabs to reorder them.

4. Click Exit edit mode to save changes.

When adding tabs to a dashboard, consider the following:

• The first tab you create takes on the layout of all existing widgets in your dashboard.

• Add up to 8 tabs in total.

• The system exclusively runs the NQL query of the currently selected tab.

• The timeframe picker and filters operate on a dashboard level and apply to charts in all tabs.

Managing tabs

To manage tabs in edit mode:

1. Hover over the tab and click on the action menu.

2. Choose the Rename or Delete option.

3. Click Exit edit mode to save changes.

When managing tabs, consider the following:

• Deleting the last remaining tab removes the tab, but keeps all widgets/visualizations.

• If there are multiple tabs, deleting a tab deletes all widgets on that tab and removes the tab.

Adding tab descriptions

Tab descriptions allow you to communicate the purpose of the dashboard to other users by providing details of how to interpret and use the data in a specific tab.

To add tab descriptions in edit mode:

1. Click on the question mark on the right side of the Nexthink web interface.

2. After the bar expands, click Edit to add text.

3. Save the tab description.

4. Click Exit edit mode to save changes.

When adding tab descriptions, consider the following:

• There is a rich text editor with the following features: font size, bold, italics, bullets, links.

• Descriptions are tab-specific.

Renaming a dashboard and changing its properties

To rename a dashboard or one of its properties in edit mode:

1. Hover and click on the action menu in the top-right corner of the page.

2. Choose the Edit properties option.

1. Fill in the fields in the Dashboard properties pop-up:

   • Name: This field allows you to rename the dashboard.

   • Default timeframe and graularity: This drop-down allows you to set the default timeframe and granularity to apply when a user opens and loads the dashboard. The global default timeframe is Last 7 days.

Duplicating a dashboard

To duplicate a dashboard, click on a dashboard’s name from the Live Dashboards main menu or navigate to the Dashboards page by clicking the Manage live dashboards button.

From the dashboard page:

1. Click on the action menu in the top-right corner of the page.

2. Choose the Duplicate option from the action menu.

Exporting an existing dashboard

To export a dashboard, click on a dashboard’s name from the Live Dashboards main menu or navigate to the Dashboards page by clicking the Manage live dashboards button.

From the dashboard page:

1. Click on the action menu in the top-right corner of the page.

2. Choose the Export option from the action menu. The system exports dashboards as JSON files.

Sharing dashboards

If you have Manage all dashboards permissions, you can share dashboards with users who don’t have Live Dashboards access.

Refer to the Roles documentation to learn how to manage Live Dashboards permissions.

To share a dashboard:

1. Navigate to Live Dashboards > Manage live dashboards.

2. Hover over a dashboard to reveal the action menu on the right side of the table.

3. Choose the Share option.

1. Fill in the Share dashboard pop-up:

   • Add the profile you wish to share the dashboard with.

   • Select permissions for the profile from the drop-down menu. The options are View or Edit.

   • Click Grant permissions to add them to the dashboard list.

Giving Edit permissions does not grant View permissions. Both permissions are required for editing rights.

In the Share dashboard pop-up, you can view the profiles with access to the dashboard. To remove permissions for a specific profile:

• Hover over the permissions column of a profile to reveal the action menu.

• Click Remove all permissions.

Scenarios for shared dashboard permissions

Share dashboard permissions reference table

Built-in dashboards

By default, the edit option for built-in dashboard is disabled.

Custom dashboards

RELATED TOPICS

• Using Live Dashboards

• Widget types