Hi,
We’ve heard feedback that many would like to have more flexibility when it comes to building charts and performing calculations in a viz. Tell us what you think of this idea: create an aggregated calculation in a chart that evaluates based on the chart’s grouping dimensions.
For example, let’s assume you want to create a chart showing profit margin. A simple version of this is sum(profit)/sum(sales). Doing this once in a Prepare is easy enough, but you soon realize that for every combination of grouping dimensions in your dataset (maybe 1) month, 2) product, 3) month+product), you need to create a different Flow branch with a Group recipe, followed by a Prepare so that the math for margin works out. Then you realize that if you want to filter out a given SKU or territory, you need to do that upstream...and that's extra work that takes you extra time.
With a user-defined aggregation function, you’d define the profit margin function, sum(profit)/sum(sales), in the charts tab of your dataset and place it onto the chart as if it were a measure. Then you could add any dimension(s) to your chart, and the result would be grouped by those dimensions. Plus, you’d be able to easily apply those filters for those SKU or territories without adding a filter upstream.
If you’re reading this post and think this would be a great capability to add to DSS charts, be sure to upvote it! ( ⬆️ = “yes, please!” ). Feel free to leave a comment in the discussion about how this capability would help you or your team.
Cheers,
Ashley