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The Kitchen Table

Explore the product knowledge we've built up together

2111 Topics

Department of Customer Love
Moderator
Department of Customer LoveModerator
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Referencing the Quarter Timeframe in table calcsKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Jun 25, 2020 Say you're using a quarter timeframe that results in 2020-Q2, for example. If you were to create a table calculation referencing this, sayif(to_string(${quarter_field}) = "2020-Q2", ${arbitrary_field}, null)You would never satisfy the Yes condition of the if() statement. This is due to the fact that quarter timeframes are being transformed via html from the format yyyy-mm to `yyyy-Qm`. We can confirm this is we open up the query in SQL Runner!SolutionSince the quarter timeframes are actually appearing like "2020-01" for Q1, "2020-04" for Q2 and so on, you want to reference that date rather than the quarter format. Like so:if(to_string(${quarter_field}) = "2020-04", ${arbitrary_field}, null)  Now you should see the Yes condition properly evaluated! This content is subject to limited support.                  

880
Department of Customer Love
Moderator
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Moderator
Department of Customer LoveModerator
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

How do I get a list of dashboards that a user has access to via the API?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Dec 28, 2017 First, you will want to pull down the content_metadata_id and id fields from every dashboard using the all_dashboards endpoint. We don't need the other fields, so limiting to just those two helps save some time.Be sure to grab the dashboard folder's content_metadata_id, rather than the dashboard's content_metadata_id. (Both are included in the response from the all_dashboards endpoint.) The content access information for dashboards (and Looks) is associated with the folder's content_metadata_id, since you manage content access at the folder-level. Using the dashboard's content_metadata_id will give you an empty result from the all_content_metadata_access endpoint you'll use next.Next, use the all_content_metadata_access endpoint to pull down all of the content access information. Each content_metadata object has a list of group IDs that have access to the content represented by it. From there, you will want to map group_id to content_metadata_id to the dashboa

3380
Department of Customer Love
Moderator
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Moderator
Department of Customer LoveModerator
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

System Activity History: Result source is "stale_cache"Knowledge Drop

Last tested: May 28, 2020 If the value for the History table's Result Source field is "stale_cache", this can be the result of an instant dashboard. When instant dashboards are turned on, the results can return from a cache that has expired (aka "stale" cache).The dashboard should rerun when this happens. This content is subject to limited support.                  

250
Department of Customer Love
Moderator
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Can we set user attribute values temporarily in an API session?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Jun 17, 2020 Not exactly - API calls use the user attributes of whoever's credentials are being used.We can use the set_user_attribute_group_values call to set user attributes, but these will persist past the API session - if you wanted to revert the user attribute values after the session, it would need to be done in another call. This content is subject to limited support.                  

210
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Help! SAML overwrote my user names!Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Apr 30, 2020 This is expected - Looker rechecks the IdP every time a Looker user is authenticated and the first and last names would sync with SAML provider even if you changed them in Looker.Make sure, therefore, to have whatever names you want your users to have configured on the SAML side. This content is subject to limited support.                  

20
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Action Hub error: Errno::ECONNREFUSED: Connection refused - Failed to open TCP connection to localhost:xxxxKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Aug 13, 2020 The Action Hub server has to be hosted separately from the Looker host with a publicly resolvable URL. This error may happen if you are trying to host on the same machine.In one case, the problem seemed to be fixed by configuring "ACTION_HUB_BASE_URL" environment variable on the Action Hub host This content is subject to limited support.                  

1060
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Do we have any limitation of size to store a user attribute value type string?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Sep 14, 2020 it looks like the max size of a user attribute is absolutely massive. From the code, it looks like it's 16777216 charactersThat said, I'd definitely suggest caution since storing massive strings is probably going to lead to performance issues down the line (or maybe even immediately) since these values will likely have to be stored in memory wherever they go This content is subject to limited support.                  

610
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Does deleting a user affect that user's alerts?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Apr 28, 2020 Unlike scheduled plans, alerts do not get deleted when a user does.The alert ends up remaining on the /admin/alerts panel with no owner set, and the 'reassign' button works to assign a new owner for that alert. This content is subject to limited support.                  

90
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

What could cause the "condition" field to be blank in an alert?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Jun 12, 2020This can happen when you create an alert on a field in a pivot and the value becomes null - since there isn't a value for the pivot column, Looker treats it as if it never existed. The pivot columns are purely based on data and not defined in LookML or the DB itself, so if it's not in the results, we don't know about it.We can fix this issue by not limiting the data to one row, and instead showing a range, so that the pivot data are included. This will allow the alert to still function. This content is subject to limited support.                  

230
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Table calculation to create descending row numbersKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Oct 16, 2020 Using the row() function will get you an ascending list of row numbers. You can use this to make it descending:max(row()) - row() + 1 This content is subject to limited support.                  

4080
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

How to get single value viz to report last value of running totalKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Apr 8, 2020 Say you have a running total table calc on a dataset that's sorted by date in ascending fashion. You want to grab the value of the last row of the running total column (value for the most recent date).To do this, we can create a new table calc if(row()=max(row()),yes,no), then select “Hide No’s from Visualization”. All of the rows except for the last row will be marked “no”, so the single value viz will pick up the latest date. This content is subject to limited support.                  

1480
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Replace commas in a list field with carriage returns using liquidKnowledge Drop

Last tested: May 26, 2020 Say you have a field that shows up like a, b, c but you want it to display in a single row asa b cYou can use a Liquid for loop with the split function to achieve this!html: {% assign items = your_dimension_here._value | split: ", " %}{% for item in items %}{{ item }}{% endfor %} This content is subject to limited support.                  

550
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Wrong numbers in user_facts viewKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Apr 6, 2020The user_facts view is rebuilt every hour on the hour, so if you are making updates to users and want to see them in system_activity, wait at least an hour after updating them for the changes to be reflected This content is subject to limited support.                  

60
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Can I build an application without specifying the connection in the model?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Apr 17, 2020 As users build custom apps, they will want to find ways to share model files without including a connection parameter value.This is what constants are for! Constants are specified on install, so the connection doesn't need to be hardcoded into LookMLMore info here: https://github.com/looker-open-source/extension-template-react This content is subject to limited support.                  

70
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Can I use a transient schema for PDTs?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Aug 19, 2020 What are transient schemas? https://docs.snowflake.com/en/user-guide/tables-temp-transient.html#comparison-of-table-typesCan I use them?Yes - Transient tables still need to be explicitly dropped, the difference with them and a permanent table is that there is a fail safe period for permanent tables of 7 days (in those 7 days, permanent tables can be restored with UNDROP TABLE, transient cannot) This content is subject to limited support.                  

50
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Can I schedule a Look to the emails listed in the Look?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Jul 17, 2020 You can with the API!Retrieve the look id associated with a scheduled plan using /scheduled_plans/{scheduled_plan_id}. If you run that look using /looks/{look_id}/run/{result_format}  you’ll get the results. You could then use the /scheduled_plans/run_once to send reports to retrieved email addresses This content is subject to limited support.                  

240
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Dashboard filter for ${field1} = ${field2}Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Aug 17, 2020 If you don't mind editing the model then here is a solution where setting the filter value to "Yes" will apply the filter rules, and setting it to anything else will just not do any filtering:filter: apply_equality_filter { type: yesno sql: CASE WHEN {% parameter apply_equality_filter %} = true THEN ${field1} = ${field2} ELSE 1=1 END ;;}  This content is subject to limited support.                  

250
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Can I have a homepage for embedded users?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Aug 24, 2020 Nope. The default homepage is /browse which is not an embeddable page. Feature requests:https://portal.feedback.us.pendo.io/app/#/case/50470what about a custom homepage?Nope. Even if you were to set an embeddable URL for the main homepage or for user-specific homepages via the landing_page attribute, it wouldn't do anything because embed users are not redirected to the homepage upon login—they are redirected to whatever path is specified in your embed URL.In general, you will need to specify where the embed user will land after login in the embed URL itself. This content is subject to limited support.                  

230
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

"I can't see _ from my work computer, but can from my personal computer"Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Jul 24, 2020 If a user is not seeing something in Looker that others are seeing, have them tryan incognito window accessing Looker from a different network other browserIf either of those work, this indicates that the user might have browser extensions (like an ad blocker) or network restrictions that are blocking Looker requests. You can also have them check the JS console for error messages (message are variable but look something like this):Also, clearing cache in browser works if you don't find anything in JS console but still incognito/other browser was working. This content is subject to limited support.                  

90
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Duration type returning imprecise dataKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Jul 24, 2020 Date/time diffs tend to count whole units between timestamps - if a duration type is returning 0s, it could be because every individual duration calculated is less than an hour This content is subject to limited support.                  

30
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

What is the difference between history and query create date?Knowledge Drop

Last tested: Oct 16, 2020 Query created date is the time that a specific query was first run. The history created date will have a new row every time that query is run.So if you run a specific explore for the first time, the history and query created date will be exactly the same. If you run the same query (same fields, filters, vis config) a couple days later, you'd have another, new history row with a new created date two days later, but the query created date would be the same. This content is subject to limited support.                  

260
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Test user permissions before setting up accountKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Dec 7, 2020While you can't completely set up a user to test without including an email address, you can use a fake email address to test setting up a user - this way you can confirm permissions without giving the user access. This content is subject to limited support.                  

210
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Table calculation for time difference accounting for negativesKnowledge Drop

Last tested: June 15, 2020 The general logic here is, if the time diff is negative, then build own results using diff_minutes/diff_seconds, otherwise; do the calculation.if(${history.created_time}<${history.completed_time},concat("-",ceiling(diff_minutes(${history.created_time},${history.completed_time})/60), ":", abs(mod(diff_seconds(${history.created_time},${history.completed_time}),60))),to_string(${history.completed_time}))  This content is subject to limited support.                  

70
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
molly.lippsettLooker Staff
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Error "The resource already exists" while using create_dashboard endpointKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Nov 9, 2020Check if you're passing a slug in to the call - each slug needs to be unique system wide, so that's a possible cause for this error. This content is subject to limited support.                  

380
molly.lippsett
Looker Staff
1 year ago
Department of Customer Love
Moderator
Department of Customer LoveModerator
published in Technical Tips & Tricks

Table calculation for time difference accounting for negativesKnowledge Drop

Last tested: Jun 1, 2020 The general logic here is, if the time diff is negative, then build own results using diff_minutes/diff_seconds, otherwise; do the calculation.if(${history.created_time}<${history.completed_time},concat("-",ceiling(diff_minutes(${history.created_time},${history.completed_time})/60), ":", abs(mod(diff_seconds(${history.created_time},${history.completed_time}),60))),to_string(${history.completed_time})) This content is subject to limited support.                  

130
Department of Customer Love
Moderator
1 year ago

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