Introduction

Compared to Classic Analysis (CA), the Visual Dashboard user interface is streamlined with relatively few buttons and menus. The display is divided into a thin Toolbar at the top of the Visual Dashboard window, an even thinner Status Bar at the bottom, with the majority of space allocated to the Canvas, where the user constructs his or her personalized dashboard. This section focuses on the Toolbar and Status Bar. Of the two, the Toolbar is most functional, providing button or menu access to all Dashboard functionality. The Status Bar indicates field and record counts for the current data set and the number of "gadgets" present. The status bar also contains a Dashboard zoom widget, and buttons to control the appearance and layout of gadgets on the canvas.

Toolbar

Overview

The Toolbar consists of a group of eight icons on the left for accessing Dashboard functions via menu or directly by mouse click.  A box on the far right indicates the current data source by project and form.  Immediately to the right is a menu with three choices: Analysis, Data, and Variables.  Analysis is the default condition, displaying the Dashboard in the Canvas below. Data replaces the dashboard with the current data table, similar to the output from the Analysis Commands→Statistics→List function in Classic Analysis. Variables displays a view of the corresponding data dictionary, similar to the output from Analysis Commands→Variables→Display function in the same module. 

Icons

Of the eight, the first icon from the left is the Options menu.  This is the master menu for Visual Dashboard, giving the user access to the majority of its functions.  The Options menu is also available on the Canvas itself and can be accessed by clicking the right mouse button. The individual functions will be discussed in detail in Menu Commands. The first and second icons from the right open tools for the creation and management of data filters and user-defined variables, respectively.  The remaining icons provide alternative ways to access commands in the first section of the Options menu. The Set Data Source button allows the user to search for a project and "attach" it to the dashboard.  Doing so loads data from form tables and enables the Options menu where users can add a related data source to relate data to other tables joining on a common key (analogous to the RELATE command in CA). The Options menu also supports the same data export and file format conversion capabilities that are in CA.

The Visual Dashboard can save and load dashboard canvases to files, capturing their analytical capabilities in a manner analogous to saving scripts from the CA Program Editor, without ever seeing a line of code. Upon opening a saved canvas, Visual Dashboard automatically connects to the data source and runs the analysis gadgets using the latest data.  In fact, users of the same project or data source may be entering data while other users monitor the dashboard. The Visual Dashboard user can recalculate all of the analyses using the latest data by clicking on the "Refresh" button.

Functional Requirements

The Toolbar shall enable the user to:

1. access the Options Menu by clicking on a standardized and generally recognizable icon representing a menu.
2. access the following functions by clicking on the corresponding icon:
   1. refresh the current data source ("recycle", "refresh", or "update" icon);
   2. attach a data source (Epi Info™ 7 project, database connection, Excel spreadsheet, etc.) to a new, blank, Visual Dashboard canvas ("database" icon);
   3. open an existing Canvas file that has saved instructions for connecting to the data source and may contain gadgets, defined variables and filters that use or describe the data ("folder" icon);
   4. save the current Canvas to a file using the original file name ("diskette" icon);
   5. save the current Canvas to a user-supplied file name ("save as", or "multiple diskette" icon);
   6. expand the Dashboard Variables gadget to add or edit variables ("script 'x' variable" icon); and
   7. expand the Dashboard Filters gadget to add or edit filters ("Büchner funnel", icon).
3. switch between the following Dashboard views:
   1. "Analysis": displays the Canvas and associated gadgets;
   2. "Data": displays data records in rows and fields/variables in columns; identical in content to Options→Add Analysis Gadget→Line List gadget with all variables selected; and
   3. "Variables": displays information on variables including name, form prompt, data type, Epi field type; identical in content to Options→Show Data Dictionary gadget.
4. see the current data source in the format <ProjectName>/<FormName> under the title "Data Source".
5. see the number of records in the data source currently available for analysis, not counting:
   1. records marked as deleted during data entry (using the Enter module)
   2. records that have been filtered using Visual Dashboard's built-in filtering mechanism.

Status Bar

Overview

The Status Bar provides a mix of status data and tools for controlling the Canvas and its contents.  On the left, the Status Bar displays the number of gadgets currently on the Canvas, the number of fields per record, and the number of records currently accessible from the data source (excluding deleted and filtered records).  On the right, there is a slider controlling the Canvas zoom level with an indicator showing the level as a percentage relative to its initial size.  There are two buttons, one toggling the display of gadget borders and title-bar controls, the other toggles the automatic vertical stacking of gadgets and disables drag-and-drop repositioning of the gadgets.

Functional Requirements

The Status Bar shall enable the user to:

1. view the current number of the following objects:
   1. gadgets on the Canvas,
   2. records in the data source, and
   3. fields or columns in the data source.
2. increase and decrease the zoom level of the Canvas.
3. view the current zoom level percentage.
4. toggle the display of gadget borders and controls for:
   1. configuration,
   2. expansion/contraction, and
   3. closure/destruction.
5. anchor a pair gadgets to one another, allowing them to be moved as a unit, by:
   1. dragging one gadget to the left or right of another and aligning their top edges, or
   2. dragging one gadget above or below another and aligning their left edges,
   3. note: multiple gadgets can be anchored by repeating the process, successively adding new gadgets to the growing cluster.
6. toggle a mechanism to automatically arrange unanchored gadgets in a vertical stack.
7. view the current number of the following objects:
   1. gadgets on the Canvas,
   2. records in the data table, and
   3. fields in the data table. 

Future Development

Functional Requirements

As a component of the Toolbar,

1. the Options Menu shall support menu item "Refresh Data Source" by:
   1. remaining grayed out until a change in the source table is detected, after which clicking on the menu item shall reload the source data^[1]; or 
   2. being active at all times, regardless of whether the data source has been updated relative to that currently in memory.

Notes:

1. Currently, Options→Refresh Data Source is grayed-out and non-functional until the first gadget is created on the Canvas or a Canvas populated with gadgets is loaded.  To refresh the data source when the menu option is disabled, the user must click the recycle icon, below (second icon from the left on the Toolbar).