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The Kitchen Table

Explore the product knowledge we've built up together

2115 Topics

Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Why are users still seeing the 30 minute logout even if they click "Stay Logged In"Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Oct 2, 2020 There's been some instances where users click "Stay Logged In" but they'll still receive the 30 minute login notification as if persistent sessions was disabled. Try asking the users to log out, reset/clear their browser cookies, and logging back in while checking Stay Logged In.Once they're in, have them navigate to:https://www.hostname.looker.com/account/sessionsAnd check to see if their new session that was created will expire in a month. If so, have their users log out, clear cookies, and log back in! This content is subject to limited support.                  

2770
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Why do I need to specify the type of my dimension?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Aug 16, 2018 Chat tip: Inputting type parameter of dimension isn't required but will default to String if nothing is specified.Specifying a parameter for your dimension isn't required but if not specified will default to String. However, specifying parameters could provide additional functionality.Example: Number Parameter FunctionalityTable Calculations Custom Measure Filter optionsFor more information about dimension types check out our docs.  This content is subject to limited support.                  

150
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Expecting end_of_file, keyword, got { file_name errorKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Jun 17, 2020 When we drag and drop a Data file into Looker, the file extension is kept. However, if we try to rename the file there is no indication that we need to also add the file extension.If we don't add the desired file extension, Looker will understand this is a generic file, and a .lkml format file will be automatically added causing this error. This content is subject to limited support.                  

4540
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

[Best Practice] when creating multiple nodes (for clustered instances)Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Jan 12, 2021 Scenario:You are looking to expand the number of nodes hosting Looker from 2 to 5 and the two current nodes have 96GB memory and you are adding three more nodes with 24GB of memory.Question:Does this make a difference overall? Is it best practice to have the same memory allocation distributed across all nodes?Answer:It is best practice to keep all the instances (nodes) identical in a cluster. This is because Looker won't take into account the memory/cpu of each node, and will treat them all evenly. So if the nodes are different sizes, a smaller node won't be taking a proportionally smaller load from the looker application - The load will be shared equally across nodes, regardless of size. We have seen issues regarding uneven node sizes when scheduling work. This content is subject to limited support.                  

750
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Who ran the lookML validator (logs)Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Oct 7, 2020 Get the project name Search for (replace MY_PROJECT_NAME with your project) GET /api/3.1/projects/MY_PROJECT_NAME/validate, {} Log lines after will show ID associated with userExample Log-lines: 2020-10-07 19:01:48.697 +0000 [INFO|99e1501dbf617994|http_core] :: Request from 127.0.0.1 |c27cb18bed62c29b| GET /api/3.1/projects/contentaccess/validate, {} 2020-10-07 19:01:48.704 +0000 [INFO|99e1501dbf617994|db:looker] :: (0.005524s) SELECT * FROM "ACCESS_TOKEN" WHERE ("LOOKUP_ID" = 'J7KttgkX') LIMIT 1 2020-10-07 19:01:48.705 +0000 [INFO|99e1501dbf617994|db:looker] :: (0.000101s) SELECT * FROM "USER" WHERE "ID" = 1 This content is subject to limited support.                  

110
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

What JDBC driver does Looker use to connect to the internal database?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Mar 12, 2020 For a HyperSQL backend, Looker uses the HyperSQL JDBC driver.For a MySQL backend, Looker uses the MariaDB JDBC driver. This content is subject to limited support.                  

550
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Move the custom drill link to the end of the row.Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Feb 3, 2021 This is a great article to show how to do custom drills on a dimension or measure. But if you want to put the links at the end of the row in a table vis rather than associating it to a specific dimension, it's totally doable!First of all, we need to create a new dimension for the link to "live" on. Example below:dimension: links { sql: "link" ; }Then we need to add the links on it. Bear in mind that we cannot use {{value}} here because this dimension doesn't have a meaningful value, but we could totally use {{ view_name.field_name._value }} to grab the value from a selected field on that row. Example below:html: <a href="/looks/305?&f[users.state]={{ users.state._value }}">{{ value }}</a> ;;Now you brought the links to the end of the table vis like below:​ This content is subject to limited support.                  

250
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

How to preserve whitespace in string fieldsKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Sep 3, 2020 The ProblemBy default, Looker does not preserve whitespace in string fields. If you have long strings that are broken up by line breaks or other whitespace, these can become difficult to read when stripped of their whitespace.A SolutionThe html field parameter can be used in combination with the rendered_value Liquid variable to specify that whitespace should be preserved.The following LookML code can be added to the field definition:html: <p><span style="white-space:pre-wrap;">{{ rendered_value }}</span></p>;; {{ rendered_value }} returns the value of the field with Looker’s default formatting. The HTML <p> tag defines a paragraph, and the <span> tag is an inline container used to style text. The white-space CSS property specifies how whitespace should be handled for an element, and the pre-wrap value for this property specifies that whitespace should be preserved by the browser, and that text should wrap when necessary and

2710
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

How do I look up unused PDTs in system activity?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Sep 8, 2020 This link will help navigate you to the pdt_event_log explore (Be sure to replace with hostname with your own):https://xxxxx.cloud.looker.com/explore/system__activity/pdt_event_log?fields=pdt_builds.view_name&f[pdt_builds.start_date]=2+months&sorts=pdt_builds.view_name&limit=500&query_timezone=America%2FLos_Angeles&vis=%7B%7D&filter_config=%7B%22pdt_builds.start_date%22%3A%5B%7B%22type%22%3A%22past%22%2C%22values%22%3A%5B%7B%22constant%22%3A%222%22%2C%22unit%22%3A%22mo%22%7D%2C%7B%7D%5D%2C%22id%22%3A0%2C%22error%22%3Afalse%7D%5D%7D&origin=share-expandedYou'll then get a list of views in the result set. If you look up these views in the Field Usage explore you'll be able to see which ones have been used and which ones haven't. This content is subject to limited support.                  

510
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
sam
Looker Staff
samLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Moving Averages in Table Calculations

Last tested: Sep 2020 You can make a moving average of a value in Looker with this simple table calc using offset_list:mean(offset_list(${value},0,7))For every row, this will give you the average of the 7 rows below. You can change the number of rows (it's the last parameter) to increase your window. You can also change the 0 to wherever you'd like the window to start. Positive numbers will move down, and negative numbers move up. So to get average of the ten values above you, you can do:mean(offset_list(${value},-10,10))This Help Center Article explains in more detailMoving average with dynamic number of rowsWe can get another level of flexibility by passing a parameter value into a table calc using a dimension:parameter: period { type: unquoted suggestions: ["1", "2", "3", "4", "5", "6", "7", "10"] } dimension: parameter_taker { sql: {% parameter period %} ;; type: string }And adapting our rolling average calculation from this:mean(offset_list(${inventory_items.coun

24280
sam
Looker Staff
1 year ago
sam
Looker Staff
samLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Error: Could not send webhook to hooks.slack.com/services. missing_text_or_fallback_or_attachmentsKnowledge Drop

  Last tested: Jan 2019 This error comes up when someone tries to send a webhook to Slack directly. You probably want Lookerbot, or the Slack Action Hub integration.This is because Slack expects specific formatting for how the data comes in via webhook and we cannot change how we format webhooks in Looker. This content is subject to limited support.                

1510
sam
Looker Staff
1 year ago
sam
Looker Staff
samLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Who can use System Activity?Knowledge Drop

  Last tested: June 2020 Admins, and any user with the `see_system_activity` permission, can use the System Activity explores and dashboards.   This content is subject to limited support.                

960
sam
Looker Staff
1 year ago
sam
Looker Staff
samLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Git Error: "There was an internal server error while trying to commit."Knowledge Drop

  Last tested: Sep 2020 This is Git's generic error message; it doesn't tell us anything by itself. Steps to troubleshoot:Make sure the Git user has write permissions to the Git repository (outside of Looker). Reset the Git connection in Looker and hard refresh the page. Run the Git Connection Test to get more details. Look at the Looker logs at the exact time that the error occurred; they will have a better error message. If your Looker deployment is hosted by Looker, please open a Looker support request so we can check into your logs for you. (Be sure to let us know exactly the timestamp when the error occurred. It may help to refresh your page to get the error to appear again in order to get an accurate timestamp.)  This content is subject to limited support.                

2280
sam
Looker Staff
1 year ago
sam
Looker Staff
samLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Lookerbot Error: "s3: access denied"Knowledge Drop

  Last tested: Jan 2019 You'll want to check that all the keys have write access and are set up according to the repo. One useful tidbit is that the access keys need the s3:PutObjectAcl permission. This content is subject to limited support.                

410
sam
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

What happens when an actively logged-in user is disabled by a second user? Does the first user's session immediately end?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Dec 3, 2020  Yes. They are immediately logged out and see the above screen. This content is subject to limited support.                  

70
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Weekly Rollup CalculationKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Mar 17, 2020 Like many people out there, you like to automate processes and cringe at the idea that is "manual." Contrary to popular belief, also like many people out there you like to create weekly rollup ranges in you Explore. Well by golly do I have a solution for you.The Dirty:(${week_field} >= add_days(-1 * mod(diff_days(date(2008,01,01), now()) + 1, 7), now()) AND ${week_field} <= add_days(28,now()) AND (extract_years(${week_field}) = extract_years(now())))OR(${week_field} <= add_days(-1 * mod(diff_days(date(2008,01,01),now()) + 1, 7), now()) AND ${week_field} >= add_days(-28,now()) AND (extract_years(${week_field}) = extract_years(now())))To-Note: Order of the two filter conditions doesn't particularly matter here. The only substitutions necessary are swapping out week_field for your week date field.The first filter condition calculates for 4 weeks from now. Whereas the second calculates for weeks prior to now. Within each calc we are comparing a week fi

960
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Expand Tables in PDF - APIKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Jul 20, 2020 We have the pdf_paper_size option for the render_task() endpoint, so where's the Expand Tables option, like in the UI?There isn't one. Pendo feature request here.WorkaroundUse anything from the ScheduledPlan set of endpoints. Instead of downloading, we are creating a schedule of the dashboard to deliver this as a PDF. We can use the create_scheduled_plan() endpoint, since this gives us the long_tables option."long_tables": true This should give us the same behavior as expanding tables in the UI. For one-off downloads, we should be able to use scheduled_plan_run_once() for this. This content is subject to limited support.                  

1230
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Query execution failed: - FULL OUTER JOIN cannot be used without a condition that is an equality of fields from both sides of the joinKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Aug 28, 2020 We see this happen in Standard SQL (BigQuery uses Standard SQL as the default dialect). It comes up when we have multiple conditions for one join using OR - apparently Standard SQL doesn't like this.The workaround here is to join this table multiple times, once for each new condition. If we're using multiple conditions due to null values, we can then add a COALESCE() like: COALESCE(table1.customer_name,table1_alias1.customer_name,table1_alias2.customer_name) in the SELECT statement.If we're writing this in the Explore definition itself, we'll want to make use of the from parameter (joins) and join the same underlying view multiple times to the base explore - then, we'll want to make sure that we bring the correct fields into the explore per joined view, depending on which of the multiple conditions each view is associated with.The cited Stackoverflow article helps describe the behavior a bit further with a full example.cite: Stackoverflow This content is subje

7820
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

RendererNoDataError, while rendering pdf/png.Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Apr 19, 2020  2020-04-08 10:05:54.770 +0000 [INFO|0097a|event:render] :: Render job data not found by user 12020-04-08 10:05:54.772 +0000 [ERROR|0097a|] :: Looker::Render::RendererNoDataError : Render job 9d16e8a23065a16edc63f09c21a04a51 data not found uri:classloader:/helltool-component-build/lib/helltool/render/manager.class:491:in `get_render_results' uri:classloader:/helltool-component-build/lib/helltool/controllers/render_controller.class:163:in `block in GET /render/result/:slug/:filename'2020-04-08 10:05:55.021 +0000 [WARN|0097a|http] :: (0.306463s) Request complete: 500 /render/result/9d16e8a23065a16edc63f09c21a04a51/Internal%20Price%20Checker%202020-04-08T0304.pdf One of the possible causes that might trigger this exception that I came across was the fact that time was out of sync on one of the new nodes that were added to the cluster. We essentially treat nodes that have a bad heartbeat as impostors. It'll still pick up tasks but it won't be allowed to talk to th

610
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Can I migrate System Activity Dashboards?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Apr 13, 2020 YESScenario:I have a System Activity Dashboard that I've created on one of my instances and I want to migrate that over to another instance.How to (LookML Dashboard way [not gazer]):Access the System Activity Dashboard and get a copy of the lookML version of the dashboard Navigate to your other instance and go into the IDE of one of your existing projects Add the lookML dashboard file Paste your dashboard lookML from step 1 into this file Navigate to your model file and add an include statement to include dashboard lookML file. Go back to the LookML Dashboard file and click the upside down triangle and we should be able to see a View Dashboard option. Another way to access your newly migrated System Activity Dashboard is to access it from the LookML Dashboards Folder (All Folders > LookML Dashboards) Steps 4-6:Explanation:As you'll see when we get the LookML Dashboard file for our System Activity Dashboard, the model that it's based off is called system__ac

850
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

How do I embed in Salesforce?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Nov 18, 2019 We have an article on how to privately embed Looker in Salesforce on Community: https://community.looker.com/embedding-looker-powered-by-looker-75/embedding-looks-and-dashboards-into-salesforce-sfdc-561OKay, but what if i want to use sso embed?If you are using SSO embed, you'll most likely want to create unique embed URL parameters based on the credentials of the Salesforce user. Normally this function would be performed in a script in your internal app, but you can use Salesforce Apex to write the script to generate your embed URLs inside Salesforce itself. You can retrieve the current Salesforce user’s email address, then use that to create a unique external_user_id from that address and specify permissions, models, user attributes, etc. accordingly. Here is an example script: https://github.com/looker/looker_embed_sso_examples/pull/3/files This content is subject to limited support.                  

6140
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Blank Response from Server ErrorKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Apr 27, 2020This error has surfaced a few times, and it's typically caused when we have too many filters as well as having a large row limit. Most of the time, this error is caused by the browser hitting a limit on the information to display; either reducing the filter count or lowering the row limit should allow the query on the Explore/Dashboard to run successfully! This content is subject to limited support.                  

2040
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Build Postgres Tables in HerokuKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Apr 16, 2020 It's common to want to explore some data in Looker, this post is to show you a way to add data to a postgres database that can be connected to Looker. Note, as it's a free tier, you can have a max of 10,000 rows.To do this, you will need an understanding of Python and some data!To start, head to signup.heroku.com and create an account.When you have an account, you need to create an app. To do this, go to dashboard.heroku.com and click New - Create New App (top right). You need to give your app a unique name, eg sam-test-looker​​You now have the framework for an app, from here you can do all sorts. For example you can host a flask app on Heroku. For this card, we are going to to add a database to our app. In Heroku, a database is classed an Add-on. We are going to add Heroku Postgres as an Add-on to our app. https://elements.heroku.com/addons/heroku-postgresql To add this, you need to click Install Heroku Postgres (top right). Then search for your app in the se

7130
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

How do I show all of the values of a column in a liquid parameter's allowed value definitionKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Jun 11, 2019 Say you have a parameter with allowed values yes and no, but also want an option for end users to choose all values (essentially no filter applied).You can enter two double quotes "" in the value for the filter which equates to 1=1, such as:parameter: filter_for_yes_no_all {type: stringallowed_value: {label: "Yes"value: "1"}allowed_value: {label: "No"value: "0"}allowed_value: {label: "ALL"value: ""}} This content is subject to limited support.                  

490
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
Department of Customer LoveLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Element 'x' is already defined - LookML DashboardKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Oct 1, 2019 If you see this error it means that one of your dashboard elements, like a title, has a duplicate name. That needs to be cleared before moving on. This content is subject to limited support.                  

160
Department of Customer Love
Looker Staff
1 year ago

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