Actions

You can configure actions on a dashboard to provide an interactive experience to users. Actions allow you to give the dashboard more context and focus by performing events such as filtering, adjusting a map, and more.

Actions can be initiated by one of the three supported events: URL parameter change, map extent change, and selection change. The dashboard and many of its elements can support various events, while some elements do not support any events. The following table lists the event sources and their supported events:

Event source	URL parameter change	Map extent change	Selection change
Dashboard
Map
Operational layer from a map
List
Serial chart
Pie chart
Table
Category selector
Number selector
Date selector

Tip:

The following are tips for adding actions to a dashboard:

• Always assign dashboard elements a unique and meaningful name on the General tab. This is helpful when configuring actions.
• Finish adding elements and make visual refinements to a dashboard before configuring actions.

Use actions

The action source describes where the event initiates while the action target is where the event occurs. The following types of actions are supported:

• Filter—Reduces the number of features available to the target element or operational layer when it's rendering
• Set extent—Sets the extent of a target map element
• Flash location—Flashes a geographic location on a target map element
• Show pop-up—Displays an information window on a target map element
• Pan—Causes a target map element to pan to and remain centered on a specified location
• Follow feature—Causes a target map element to pan to and remain centered on a specific feature

  Note:

  The Follow feature action is only available on the dashboard's desktop view and is limited to web maps.

• Zoom—Causes a target map element to zoom to a specified location

Some filter actions can be configured to require a selection before rendering an element. You can enable the Render only when filtered option when configuring a filter action to add focus and context to a target element. When enabled, the target element doesn't render the target visualization until a selection is made on the source. The message displayed on an element that requires a selection can be configured in the target element's general settings.

The following table summarizes which elements can be the source of actions and which can be action targets. Some dashboard elements, such as a map legend and rich text, can be neither the source nor the target of an action and are not listed below.

Dashboard element	Action source	Action target
Dashboard
Map
Map's operational layer
Serial chart
Pie chart
Indicator
Gauge
List
Details
Embedded content
Table
Category selector
Number selector
Date selector

Note:

The Show pop-up action is only available on an element when it's configured to show features and its data source represents an operational layer from a map already added to the dashboard. For more information, see Configure actions on dashboard elements and Configure actions on URL parameters.

Considerations for using actions

Actions have a source and a target. An action's source can be the dashboard or one of its elements. An action's target is always one of the dashboard's elements. If the source and target are based on different data sources, the relationship between these sources must be established. This can be either an attribute relationship or a spatial relationship. In an attribute relationship, a field or value from the source element is used to match field values of the target element. In a spatial relationship, the following occurs:

• If an element is configured with Categories from features, feature geometries from the source element are used to intersect geometries of the target element.
• If an element is configured with Categories from grouped values, an envelope around features in a category from the source element is used to intersect geometries of the target element.

Note:

If the source and target are based on the same data source, you don't need to take any steps to establish their relationship.

Considerations for Follow feature

The Follow feature action is only available on an element when it's configured to show features, and its data source represents an operational layer from a map already added to the dashboard. Additionally, the data source must be point geometries and have a refresh interval set. When enabling the Follow feature action, the target can only be the map that the element's data source is from.

When follow feature is used, tools appear in the upper corner of the target map element. These allow the end user to control various aspects of the follow action (for example, pause and resume, show info window, and cancel). When a feature is being followed on a map, manually panning or zooming the map pauses the follow action. It must be restarted using the tools on the map.