Why is my data not being filtered?

Filters are a great help to better select which data can be retrieved and to zoom into massive amounts of data. However, not using them properly may lead to problems.

crystal allows filtering insights with two different criteria: through static and dynamic filtering.

Let’s try to clarify what are the differences between them.

Static filters

Static filters can be added during the topic configuration phase, after you have decided which data to use when building your selected visualization type:

These particular filters are called static because they are always applied when the chart is generated and shown by the advisor, and they cannot be removed once the topic is published.

Static filters are exclusive, meaning that they exclude some results from the data source shown in the visualization.

For example, if your company has several plant sites all listed in the data source you are using and you want to create a topic retrieving only one site information, the static filter will allow you to exclude all the other sites from the topic.

Dynamic filters

Dynamic filters can be applied in the filter step of the topic creation process, which is optional, but for sure helps a lot in better detailing data insights.

They are useful for exploring a part of the overall data (once they have been presented with the overall data) and have a more specific view of a portion of it.

For example, if you are dealing with sales from different company branches and you don’t add any static filters in the configuration step, you may add dynamic filters to zoom into information and ask for one particular branch.

However, you will still have all data available.

These filters are called dynamic because it’s up to the user whether or not to apply them in the questions they ask. They are used to make the visualization browsing experience more efficient, as they can be used to include chunks of data without having to create multiple topics to highlight specific segments of the data. This allows you to obtain different information from the same topic and to avoid the creation of multiple topics for the same group of data.

In summary, remember:

  • you can set your filters only when a topic isn’t published

  • static filters are applied during topic configuration, dynamic filters are optional and are applied during the filter step

  • a static filter will always be applied (whether you want it or not) each time you ask crystal about a topic

  • a dynamic filter gives you the option to apply a filter in the conversation with the advisor.

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