Qlik Object - Charts

ancoreShare Server offers a very intuitive UI that lets you add multiple Qlik objects, from various sources, in a single report. In addition, it comes with numerous formatting options and support for condition-based styling to help you design visually appealing reports just the way you want them.

Here's a sample HTML export showing a report with multiple chart objects.

For ancoreShare, all Sense visualizations except tables are categorized under charts and treated as images. Therefore it comes with several options to set the resolution and the image quality. As a result, all the objects are rendered as high-quality pictures.

You can use the steps mentioned in this section to work with all Sense charts such as Bar charts, Scatter plots, Maps, Gauges, KPI charts, and so on. You can also add a Text & Image object to your report this way, e.g., to display your logo on the report.

NPQ-Reports allows you to add true data-driven tables with selectable text content. You can also add your tables as images. However, when adding tables as images, they also act as charts; therefore, please read this section to learn how to render tables as images.

See the Tables section to learn about the differences and advantages of using true data-driven tables and the various settings and styling options.

Adding chart object

You will see a gray placeholder for the object.

Selecting chart object

If selected, the Settings bar on the right displays the available element settings for the object.

Qlik Source

Select the Qlik Source from the drop-down list. You will see only those sources that are specified in your Report Record Settings.
If only one source is set for this report, it will be selected automatically.

Qlik Object

If Load Metadata was executed for this source, you will see a list box with thumbnails of all objects from that source, where you can select one. Alternatively, start typing object ID, chart type, or the title of the object in the field Qlik Objects, to filter the suggestions in the box.
The Object ID of the selected Qlik object is displayed in the corresponding field.

Those suggestions in the box are only a snapshot of the time when loading the metadata. It's a feature for convenience when designing a report. At any time you can just straightly set the Qlik ID of an object from that source here. If this ID exists at the time of exporting the report, it will be processed properly.

You can also set the ID of a Qlik object dynamically by using Qlik expressions. Begin with typing an "=" if you want to do so.
As you thereby might as well switch between chart and table objects, the settings bar will always show you all the properties for Qlik objects. 

Chart Title

When you add a chart object, the Qlik ID of the chart is automatically populated as the Title.
You can edit or rename this field to provide a meaningful title that will help you navigate your report elements.

Here's an example showing how the title is reflected on your report designer. 

NOTE: The title is only displayed in the designer to help you quickly find your objects and will not be displayed in the exported report.

Link URL

The Link URL field allows you to add a link to the chart object. When the report is generated, the URL is embedded in it. Clicking the object image on the report redirects the users to the URL specified here.

Filtering chart data

Using the Filter settings, you can restrict, reduce and focus the data that you want to show on your report, from the Qlik application.
Learn how filters work, important details, and see some examples in Filtering Data.

To access filter settings for chart objects, perform the following steps.

1. On the report designer page, select the element for which you want to filter data.
2. Click the Filter tab from the settings bar.
3. Click on a row area below in the filter list - in an empty row for adding a new filter or on an existing one for editing this filter.
   This opens a Filters dialog box.
4. Enter or choose the Qlik Field on which you want to apply the filter or provide a Qlik Expression.
5. Define values of this field that should be set as Filter.
   One filter must contain one or more field values.
   Use semicolons to provide multiple values. In this case, OR logic applies to the field values.
6. Optionally you can add a Variable from the drop-down boxes.
7. Click on Apply.

Top and Pareto

This setting is only available for QlikView sources. It lets you conveniently order and sort the values of a field.
Together with the Max rows setting it lets you create a true-table object with e.g. your top 5 sales men and their ROI values very easily.

Alternatively you can do the same with Qlik expressions for Sense sources in a regular filter above.

When sizing and positioning elements using mouse drag operations, you will also see design guides (shown as green lines in the image) to help you with correct placement.

For charts, you have the following options available:

Position

The chart position defines its distance from the white space on the designer sheet. The position settings specified here are calculated in addition to the Page Margin specified in the Page Settings.

For example, if you have specified the page margin as 5, and the left margin as 15, then the chart would be placed at 20 from the left edge of the page, as shown in the image.

• Top: Distance of the element from the page margin. The object is placed at a distance of page margin value + Top value from the edge of the report page.
• Fixed: Enable this option to fix the position of the element on the sheet. In this case, the position of the element remains fixed on the page and will not move according to the size or position of the element above it.
  NOTE: This is applicable only to the top position of the object, as it can only be impacted by elements (typically, a table) above, which would shift the object further down (as tables are the only elements that have no predictable height). It has no impact on the horizontal position.

• Left: Specifies the distance of the element from the left margin of the page. The object is placed at a distance of page margin value + Left value from the edge of the report page.

NOTE: If you have enabled the Header on the Page Settings and your object touches inside the header area, it will be repeated on each report page.

Size

You can specify the chart size using:

• Width:  Specifies the width of the element on the page.
• Height: Specifies the height of the element on the page. This setting also takes effect if a table object is processed as an image.

Rotation

Specifies the angular placement of the element on the report page.

Scale

Scale specifies the content resolution of a chart element. For example, if you have set the scale as 2, the chart scales twice in size, showing a more detailed view. The text gets smaller with an increase in scale, but as this is still a dynamic web object at the time the image is taken in Qlik, it adjusts on the container automatically, and therefore, may display more details.

See the image showing an example on the right to know how it works.

Appearance

As the name suggests, the Appearance settings allow you to define how the chart elements look.

• Opacity sets the transparency level for the chart element in percentage. This means, a value set as 0 is fully transparent and 100 fully opaque.
• Border color and Width set the outline for the element. It doesn't add to the size of the element as it grows inside the elements.
• Cell Padding is only relevant for true data-driven tables and text elements, but not for charts or tables as images.

Image Processing

Use the settings here to define Image Processing or the dpi (dots per inch) settings for chart images.

For Image Processor, you can select between any of the following two methods:

• Qlik Printing: Select this option to get a high image quality of the chart. It takes around 3-6 seconds to process such an image, as it will include all the parts and details and offers higher dpi settings.
  You can select the image quality preset from Low (96dpi), Medium (192dpi), and High (384dpi), or specify a value in between. The lowest and highest values are limited by Qlik.
• HTML2Canvas: Select this option for faster image processing. However, some of your chart details (e.g. a legend or a caption) may not be rendered in the image. You cannot define any dpi settings for the fast mode, and the images are always displayed in low quality. This option is especially useful for seeing a quick preview of the outcome while designing a report. 

Sense Theme

Qlik Sense comes with certain themes which you can choose for exporting Qlik objects (Sense Classic, Sense Focus, Sense Breeze, and Qlik Horizon). This is only applicable to chart elements.

NOTE: The chart thumbnail on the report designer may continue to show the default theme. However, the generated report will contain charts in the theme specified here.

Note

You can add Notes to your chart objects on PDF and PPTX exports to provide additional information to your users.

For example, you can add notes for commenting on something, drawing attention to a specific area in the report, taking a note for yourself, giving some context for colleagues, adding information that is not in the title or legend of the chart, and so on.

To add a note:

1. Specify the Title (optional) and Notes in the corresponding fields.
2. You can also specify the Position of the note with respect to the object. Select the position from the four available options, top-left, top-right, bottom-left, and bottom-right.

For PDF reports, notes are exported as actual annotations in the PDF file. Users with sufficient privileges can further edit them, enabling active collaboration. The appearance of notes depends on the PDF viewer being used. For example, PDFs displayed on web browsers may appear different from what they appear in the Acrobat Reader.

In the case of PPTX exports, the notes are shown in the notes area at the bottom of each slide. As the PPTX does not show notes directly on elements, all the notes are shown collectively at the bottom, if you have several elements with notes on one page. It is recommended to use Titles for notes to segregate them for each element.