Hi Kirk, Can provide you with some general rules-of-thumb based on my experience. They actually apply irrespective of the technology, but from what I can tell with Exhibit, they also hold true with the SIMILE framework.
1. Always decompose your data to its most atomic form. In your case, I would avoid the temptation to concatenate individual data. If I understand your requirements correctly, you'd end up with the following set of "columns": CUSTOMER YEAR QUARTER REVENUE AMOUNT REVENUE RANK GROSS PROFIT AMOUNT GROSS PROFIT RANK etc (The two "RANK" columns are questionable, since I presume that you can derive the ranking based on the value, but I leave that to you.) 2. When performance of the application becomes an issue -- and it's not a question of if but when -- you will need to "tailor" the dataset accordingly. For example, you could subset so that Exhibit only has to deal with the last 10 years. Having the source data in a database makes this a snap, but no matter what there are invariably ways to do this without impacting the application's functionality. HTH, -Mark On Aug 25, 11:19 am, Kirk <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi,My apologies in advance for the length of the question - I couldn't > figure out how to make it shorter. > > I am trying to create an exhibit of customer data for "higher-ups". I > have 8 > quarters of data so far, and will be appending more with each passing > quarter. The overall population of customers numbers 400-550, with > around > 200 of those buying product each and every quarter. > Each quarter's data is initially captured in excel and, beyond the > customers, consists of revenue and gp (gross profit) dollar amount > columns > and an ordinal ranking for that customer for each of the two > measures. It > is a requirement to be able to compare year over year (like quarter) > changes > in some, if not all, of the measures. I can either do that as formula > columns in my spreadsheet or as functions in my exhibit( thoughts?). > As you > can see I will basically have the same "properties" for each quarter: > rev$; > gp$; rev rank; gp rank; and then any formula columns I may use. > So, my question is, what is the best way to handle this? If I add the > values > as individual columns, I am concerned my dataset may eventually get > too > large. If, for each quarter, I add a column (property) like "Q4-09" > with a > value for each customer like "1 - 22,000,000 - 3 - 1,750,000" (rank - > rev > amount - rank - gp amount), how will the user "massage" the data? i.e. > compare, say Q4-08 to Q4-09. > Again, sorry for being so verbose, and sorry if I have been unclear. I > work > at a company that is rather backward when it comes to web technologies > and > would like to demonstrate the usefulness of the semantic web and the > tools > available. As you can see my conundrum is the similarity of each > quarter's > data. > Thank you in advance for any and all help you may offer. > Best Regards, > Kirk --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "SIMILE Widgets" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/simile-widgets?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
