topic Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard in ArcGIS Dashboards Questions

Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

AdrianWelsh — Wed, 24 Jun 2020 20:43:00 GMT

Hi, I am using the serial chart widget in a dashboard and while it is easy to bring in values of existing features, I want to show all in my domain, even if it is blank. That might not make sense.I'll try to include a screenshot.

In my two serial charts on the right, for the above one, I want to show the 'roadway design' and another bar, but that other bar needs to have zero (0) for its value. Same for the bottom chart - I want to add one more attribute with a zero value so users will know it's there. Is that possible?

It seems that I can add as many categories as I want but it the category has zero features, then it won't show. Am I missing a check box somewhere that says "show even if it has zero features"?

Thanks in advance. Tagging the dashboard mastermind Derek Law‌

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

DerekLaw — Fri, 26 Jun 2020 03:38:28 GMT

Hi Adrian,

If the attribute table does not have any data, then the serial chart can't display a "zero" value. Sorry.

Can you provide some more details/context on how the feature layer table is structured?

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

AdrianWelsh — Fri, 26 Jun 2020 04:11:42 GMT

Derek,

Thanks for the reply. This is the link for the web map:

https://www.arcgis.com/home/webmap/viewer.html?webmap=5fb6211052a5476c96d2dd412741563f

And this is the link for the dashboard:

ArcGIS Dashboards

The map is showing parcels in Utah that are going through the right of way process. They are signified by two categories, a "stage" and a "status" which are hierarchical. The map has two layers that are symbolized by these attributes - the parcels (called ownerships), which are larger land ares are symbolized by the stage (and only has like 5 colors). And then when you zoom in far enough, those turn off and the "takes" turn on which are symbolized by the "status" and has more than 5 colors (maybe like 15?). Both layers have basically the same fields as each other.

Anyways, the dashboard is getting a count of all the records that fall into a certain stage on one side and ideally, we wanted to show a bar graph (serial chart) of all the statuses on the other side, including zero values. Both these fields are in 'domains'.

I hope that makes sense.

Thanks!

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

DerekLaw — Fri, 26 Jun 2020 22:25:45 GMT

Hi Adrian,

Nice dashboard, thanks for sharing.

I've double checked with the Dev team and unfortunately, there isn't a workaround for what you want to render in the chart. Sorry. The charts in dashboard only show categories that have a non-zero value. Please submit an enhancement request on the ArcGIS Ideas site for ArcGIS Dashboards.

Hope this helps,

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

AdrianWelsh — Tue, 22 Jun 2021 08:39:14 GMT

Thanks for the feedback. The idea is here:

https://community.esri.com/ideas/18658

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

ArthurPoon — Wed, 29 Jul 2020 22:49:27 GMT

Hi Adrian!

Did you ever receive any follow up regarding this subject?

I've got the same issue. I've created a dashboard of bar graphs showing vegetation land classes and have linked them to each other as well as a category selector. I would like the classes to remain the same when selection changes

Thanks!

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

AdrianWelsh — Wed, 07 Oct 2020 16:17:51 GMT

Hi Arthur Poon, no I have not. Please vote up the Idea here:

https://community.esri.com/ideas/18658-include-blank-values-for-a-serial-chart-in-dashboard

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

Anonymous User — Wed, 30 Jun 2021 18:30:56 GMT

Hey Adrian,

In case you haven't already found a solution, I fixed this problem by using the "DefaultValue" function in Arcade for my dashboard.

My dashboard has an indicator that displays all of the locations on the loaded map with a number to represent weekly customer amounts for each location. Sometimes the entry for the weekly customer amount for a specific location is "null" in the data table. This would result in just the title of the location being displayed and nothing else which is very confusing from the perspective of a regular user. I used the DefaultValue function to force the indicator to list null values as "No Data." The DefaultValue function works by assigning a value of your choosing to a feature when there is no value present.

From my perspective as a total layman to coding, it doesn't make sense such a useful setting would require coding to enable. It took me a couple hours of research as well as corresponding with a few different coworkers to make my indicator display this tiny piece of info whereas it would take someone affluent in coding mere moments to tailor an indicator in this manner. If this were a built-in feature of dashboards, there would be no time loss from either party. I will share my thoughts on the ideas page you linked to earlier in this thread.

Best regards,

James

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

njennings — Tue, 03 Aug 2021 19:26:49 GMT

Hey James -

Did you use Arcade in a Web Map for the given layer style to allow for this or did you do it in the Bar Chart gadget on Ops Dashboard?

Figured it out.

Added the same function you did for the for the layer styling in the Web Map.
I also had to change the "null" label from "null" to "No Lamp Type" in my case.

I also had to choose a number field for my "count" statistic vs the "Lamp_Type" (string) field in my data.

Thanks for the post. This is lame that code is required for such things.

Thank you,

Nate

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

Anonymous User — Wed, 08 Sep 2021 13:04:44 GMT

Hey Nate,

Sorry for the late reply. I am glad you were able to figure out your problem.

I implemented this solution directly to an indicator using the "advanced formatting" option. Deciding where to implement expressions to dashboards always depends on what function(s) you are trying to use and how you are trying to abstract your data. I was lucky and did not have to use any fancy expressions because indicators have advanced formatting built in. If your chosen data element does not have advanced formatting, you will have to program the data element from scratch using an expression written in Arcade.

It is important to note that "Arcade" is literally just javascript with an expanded library of functions. If one knows javascript, one basically already knows Arcade, it's just a matter of understanding and implementing the functions offered by the expanded library.

To hopefully help any users who may need assistance implementing DefaultValue, the exact code I used was this:

DefaultValue($datapoint["CUST_COUNT"], 'No Data')

As stated before, my indicator needed to display weekly customer counts. The data is uploaded by individuals/individual groups and thus there is noticeable margin of error at times. In the case of CUST_COUNT, this error would arise as a blank or "null" string entry in the .csv when there should be a zero integer.

DefaultValue works by checking a field of your choosing for null and blank entries and then returns a text string of your choosing upon encountering such an entry. It leaves "0" (zero integer) entries as is. All you need to do to implement the function is to insert the name of your field into square brackets with quotation marks as I did. After the comma, type what you want your dashboard element to display upon encountering a blank entry in quotation marks. It does not matter if you use single or double quotations for either/both inputs.

Hope this helps. Thanks Nate for your input!

-James

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

KevinPiraino2 — Tue, 10 Aug 2021 18:44:03 GMT

For anyone that is having a similar problem, I have found an additional minor workaround utilizing ArcGIS Arcade. As an FYI, this workaround builds a new table/featureset in Arcade and will remove any dynamic connectivity from the original data.

Create a new serial chart
Use the "Data expressions" section when choosing data
Build a new data expression
Access original data layer using "FeatureSetByPortalItem" function
Use "Filter" function to find records that match specific category criteria
Use "Count" function to create integer variable to count instances of records from step 5
Build JSON string of a blank featureset using the name of the categories and the count of records from step 6 to populate the JSON string.
Use JSON string from step 7 to create a new featureset using "FeatureSet" function
Build serial using new featureset

See attached images/code for the Arcade Expression and the configuration of the serial chart

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

AdrianWelsh — Fri, 03 Sep 2021 16:39:12 GMT

Alright y'all, I think I have solved my own problem with some creativity and without using JSON or other Arcade like coding.

In ArcGIS Pro, if I add an empty row at the bottom of my attribute table (without adding any geometry - by clicking "Click to add new row"):

I can populate that row with the values of my domain. Doing this, I can make every value show up in my attribute table, and then republish my map. Those values now exist without any polygon data.

Now, in order to make them show up in the Serial Chart on dashboards, I just tell it to do a count of my main identifying value (which for me is the "ownership number"):

And voila! I now have "zero" values for all the attributes I want to show in my serial chart!

I hope this helps some of y'all!

One thing to point out, I was using object_id as my counting variable. If I continued to use object_id, it would count all my records and I would not have zero values. It would look something like this:

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

CraigPrisland2 — Thu, 16 Sep 2021 18:50:39 GMT

Hi Adrian,

I am working through this same issue and am intrigued with your workflow. Could you please expand on where you entered your domains into the new (non-spatial) row? Are you entering all of your domain values into a single row or is each domain value in its own row?

Thanks,

Craig

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

AdrianWelsh — Thu, 16 Sep 2021 20:33:04 GMT

Hi Craig,

In my non-spatial rows, the domains are still in the same field. All fields are valid data entry points so that you can put whatever and still have it behave with domain rules, if that makes sense. Each domain is on a new row. To illustrate, here is a screen shot of the bottom of my attribute table. The highlighted rows all have no geometry:

Let me know if you have more questions.

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

CraigPrisland2 — Thu, 16 Sep 2021 21:20:51 GMT

Thanks for the reply Adrian. I do have one additional question. I tried doing a test with some data add added the domains into a 'Blotter' field. These are non-spatial. I then used the 'Activity' field as my counting variable. This is the field that I have all my spatial data (my identifying data). However, my dashboard only seems to be using the 'Blotter' field and since I added each attribute in once, it is only displaying it as 1 in my chart. I cannot figure out what I am I doing wrong. Thanks again!

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

AdrianWelsh — Thu, 16 Sep 2021 21:50:23 GMT

Hmm, that is a little tricky. Thanks for sharing your screenshot. This is what my full setup looks like:

For my chart, it looks for anything with a "stage" value of "Acquisition". In my table itself, there are 10 rows with this value. But for counting, it is looking for anything with "ownership number". Only 7 of those 10 rows have a value in ownership number. The other 3 are <null>. One more thing to point out, I am symbolizing my chart by a field called "Status1" so it is not using "stage" or "ownership number". I wonder if that makes a difference.

Does this help? I would play around with the different variables and make sure the counting one has a null value where you want it to show zero. Let me know what you find out.

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

CraigPrisland2 — Fri, 17 Sep 2021 17:30:31 GMT

Adrian,

Thanks for the additional information. For some reason I am still getting a result of 1 even when my counting variable is null. I'll keep playing around with this and see if I can determine the correct workflow.

Thanks again.

Re: Including blank values for a serial chart in Dashboard

AdrianWelsh — Sat, 18 Sep 2021 01:25:00 GMT

That's the hard part; the try-and-test method! Maybe that "is not null" value in the filter is causing issues? I would try messing with the filter, the category field, and the counting field, just to try and force it to show you what you want to see.

Maybe also another thing to check, is to fully make sure your data table is showing you what you need it to show you (you can click on "Show data table" at the top).

In my table, I can see that three of my "ownership numbers" have no value, or a null value here: