Declarative specification of visualization queries

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10963477-B2
Application number	US-201816019877-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jun 27, 2018
Priority date	Oct 10, 2014
Publication date	Mar 30, 2021
Grant date	Mar 30, 2021

Abstract

The technology disclosed relates to a platform for ultra-fast, ad-hoc data exploration and faceted navigation on integrated, heterogeneous data sets. The disclosed method of declarative specification of visualization queries, display formats and bindings represents queries, widgets and bindings combined on a dashboard in real time, with flexible display options for analyzing data and conveying analysis results.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of animating data visualizations at a live dashboard builder engine, the method comprising:
receiving a first user input signal indicating a first set of data filtering criteria, wherein the first user input signal triggers generation of a first query comprising the first set of data filtering criteria;
querying for a first set of data from one or more read-only pre-packaged data sets stored in a general-purpose memory caching system associated with the live dashboard builder engine based at least in part on the first query;
displaying, in a user interface, an animated widget comprising a first visual organization of the queried first set of data;
receiving a second user input signal indicating a second set of data filtering criteria, wherein the second user input signal triggers generation of a second query comprising the second set of data filtering criteria;
querying for a second set of data from the one or more read-only pre-packaged data sets stored in the general-purpose memory caching system associated with the live dashboard builder engine based at least in part on the second query;
determining an animation sequence for morphing the animated widget from the first visual organization of the queried first set of data to a second visual organization of the queried second set of data based at least in part on the second set of data, wherein the animation sequence comprises a plurality of intermediate visual organizations between the first visual organization and the second visual organization, each intermediate visual organization of the plurality of intermediate visual organizations associated with a relative timestamp within the animation sequence; and
morphing the animated widget from the first visual organization to the second visual organization according to the determined animation sequence.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a third user input signal indicating a third set of data filtering criteria, wherein the third user input signal triggers generation of a third query comprising the third set of data filtering criteria;
querying for a third set of data from the one or more read-only pre-packaged data sets stored in the general-purpose memory caching system associated with the live dashboard builder engine based at least in part on the third query;
determining an additional animation sequence for morphing the animated widget from the second visual organization of the queried second set of data to a third visual organization of the queried third set of data based at least in part on the third set of data; and
morphing the animated widget from the second visual organization to the third visual organization according to the determined additional animation sequence.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first set of data filtering criteria comprises a value or a range of values of at least one dimension for the first set of data and the second set of data filtering criteria comprises a value or a range of values of at least one dimension for the second set of data.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein querying for the first set of data and querying for the second set of data comprises:
parsing a first set of key-value properties in a first configuration file to identify the first query; and
parsing a second set of key-value properties in a second configuration file to identify the second query.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
generating the animated widget, wherein the animated widget comprises a chart, a graph, or a combination thereof.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
selecting a type of animated widget, wherein the type of animated widget is selected from a group of animated widget types comprising a donut chart, a time chart, a horizontal bar chart, a stacked horizontal bar chart, a scatter plot, or a combination thereof.

7. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
calculating a location in the user interface to display the animated widget, wherein the animated widget is displayed based at least in part on the calculating.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the animation sequence comprises pixel-level instructions for each intermediate visual organization of the plurality of intermediate visual organizations.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a third user input signal comprising a user selection of one or more segments of the second visual organization;
identifying a subset of the second set of data corresponding to the one or more segments of the second visual organization;
determining an additional animation sequence for morphing the animated widget from the second visual organization of the queried second set of data to a third visual organization of the identified subset of the second set of data based at least in part on the identified subset of the second set of data; and
morphing the animated widget from the second visual organization to the third visual organization according to the determined additional animation sequence.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the second user input signal comprises a regrouping control signal for the first visual organization, the method further comprising:
generating the second query based at least in part on the regrouping control signal.

11. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
storing the first user input signal indicating the first set of data filtering criteria in memory; and
storing the first query comprising the first set of data filtering criteria and an indication of the stored first user input signal.

12. The method of claim 11 , further comprising:
receiving a third user input signal, wherein the third user input signal is a same user input signal as the first user input signal;
identifying the stored first user input signal in the memory based at least in part on receiving the third user input signal;
retrieving the stored first query from the memory based at least in part on the indication of the stored first user input signal and the identifying; and
querying for a third set of data from the one or more read-only pre-packaged data sets stored in the general-purpose memory caching system associated with the live dashboard builder engine based at least in part on the stored first query.

13. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
storing the animation sequence in memory;
receiving a replay request signal for the animation sequence; and
morphing the animated widget from the first visual organization to the second visual organization according to the stored animation sequence based at least in part on the replay request signal.

14. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
transforming data extracted from a data repository to generate the one or more read-only pre-packaged data sets; and
storing the one or more read-only pre-packaged data sets in the general-purpose memory caching system associated with the live dashboard builder engine for querying.

15. An apparatus for animating data visualizations at a live dashboard builder engine, comprising:
a processor;
memory in electronic communication with the processor;
instructions stored in the memory and executable by the processor to cause the apparatus to;
receive a first user input signal indicating a first set of data filtering criteria, wherein the first user input signal triggers generation of a first query comprising the first set of data filtering criteria;
query for a first set of data from one or more read-only pre-packaged data sets stored in a general-purpose memory caching system associated with the live dashboard builde

Assignees

• Salesforce Com Inc

Inventors

• Prophete Didier
• Im Fred
• Chakravarthy Vijayasarathy

Classifications

• G06F16/2455

  Query execution · CPC title

• G06F40/205

  Parsing · CPC title

• G06F16/248 Primary

  Presentation of query results · CPC title

• G06F16/904

  Browsing; Visualisation therefor (for navigating the web G06F16/954; browsing optimisation for the web G06F16/957) · CPC title