MicroStrategy Analytics Desktop

Quick Start Guide

MicroStrategy Analytics Desktop is designed to enable business professionals like you to
explore data, simply and without needing direct support from IT.

Import your data:

From a file ..................................................................2

From a database ........................................................4

Visualize your data...........................................................6

Share your insights ..........................................................7

Visualization gallery .........................................................8

Document Number: 09629416

Import data from a file

Analytics Desktop lets you import and report on personalized data from various data sources, including Excel
spreadsheets, CSV files, and text files.
1

Get started

Click Import Data.

Click Create Dashboard on the left.

Select the type of data source

For this example, select File.

Import a new set of data

Select your data file

To locate a file on your computer, click Browse.

Navigate to the file, select it, and click Open. Then

click Continue.

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Import data from a file (continued)

Preview your data and assign data types

Each column of data is automatically identified as a
business concept, such as Product or Employee
(called an attribute), or a business measure, such as
Revenue or Profit (called a metric).

Save your imported data

Click Continue, navigate to a location within
Analytics Desktop to save the imported data, then
give it a name. Click OK.

You can change these determinations for your data.

Hover the cursor over the header of the data column,
click the arrow icon, and select either Attribute or
Metric.

Note: If you have geographical information in your data,

such as city or country, you can display your data on a
map. You can also add information not originally available
in your data source. For details and steps, click the ?
(Help) button.

A new, blank dashboard is created with your data as

a dataset.

Next: Display your data on your new

dashboard. See Visualize your data, page 6.
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Import data from a database

You can import and report on data stored in your companys databases. Connect directly to a variety of data
sources using the ODBC drivers included with Analytics Desktop.
1

Get started

Click Import Data.

Click Create Dashboard on the left.

Select the type of data source

For this example, select Database.

Import a new set of data

Create a new database connection

on the left.
Click the New Connection icon
Provide the connection information needed for your
data source, name the connection, then click OK.

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Import data from a database (continued)

Choose the tables to import

Drag and drop the name of each table that you want
to import from the list on the left onto the middle of
the page.

Define specific data columns to import

Hover the cursor over the name of a column, then
click the Add icon
. You can import all
columns in a table by clicking the Add icon
to the asterisk (*) at the top of the table.

next

Note: You can create joins, expressions, aggregations,

and filters to define the data that you want to import. For
details and steps, click the ? (Help) button.

Preview your data and assign data types

Click the Execute SQL icon

Each column of data is automatically identified as a

business concept, such as Product or Employee
(called an attribute) or a business measure, such as
Revenue or Profit (called a metric) .

Save your imported data

Click Continue, navigate to a location within
Analytics Desktop to save the imported data, then
give it a name. Click OK.

You can change these determinations for your data.

Hover the cursor over the header of the data column,
click the arrow icon, and select either Attribute or
Metric.

Note: If you have geographical information in your data,

such as city or country, you can display your data on a
map. You can also add information not originally available
in your data source. For details and steps, click the ?
(Help) button.

2014 MicroStrategy, Inc.

A new, blank dashboard is created with your data as

a dataset.

Next: Display your data on your new

dashboard. See Visualize your data, page 6.
5

Visualize your data

After you import your data, you can quickly create an interactive, presentation-quality display, or dashboard,
to explore and understand your data. Add visual representations of your data, called visualizations, to make
your data easier to interpret.
1

Add a visualization

Select the type of visualization

Choose the type of visualization that you want to
add, or select the visualization recommended by

In your new dashboard, click Select a Visualization.

Analytics Desktop, indicated by this icon:

Note: For example images of each visualization, see the

Visualization gallery, page 8.

Display data on your visualization

Analytics Desktop automatically selects data to add

to the visualization, to optimize your display.

Explore other visualizations

Try displaying your data with a different type of
visualization. Click the Change Visualization

To display different data, drag and drop attributes

and metrics from the Dataset Objects panel on the
left onto the different areas of the Drop Zones panel.

icon
5

, then select a different visualization.

Add an additional visualization

Add a second visualization to explore your data in
another way. Click the Add Visualization icon
,
then click Select a Visualization and choose a
visualization. Drag and drop attributes and metrics to
display your data.

Note: Depending on the type of visualization, you can

display your data with different colors, shapes, sizes, and
more. For details and steps, click the ? (Help) button.

Save your finished dashboard

Click the Save icon
. Navigate to a location
within Analytics Desktop to save your dashboard,
then give it a name. Click OK.

Next: Share your dashboard with your

colleagues. See Share your insights, page 7.
6

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Share your insights

Save and share your insights with your colleagues. Analytics Desktop makes it easy.
If your colleagues use Analytics Desktop, MicroStrategy Analytics Express, or the latest version of
MicroStrategy Web, you can share your dashboard and dataset, which they can import into their own
environments. For all your colleagues (even those not using MicroStrategy), you can create an interactive
PDF.
Share your dashboard and dataset with other Analytics Desktop users
From the Tools menu, point to Export, then select MicroStrategy File. Click Save. Depending on your browser, you
may need to navigate to a location to save your dashboard and dataset, give it a name, then click Save.

Other users can quickly import your dashboard and dataset into their own Analytics Desktop environments, then
perform their own analyses.

Export your dashboard as an interactive PDF

From the Tools menu, point to Export, then select PDF.

Note: If you are using Firefox or Chrome, save the PDF using your browsers save option, then open the PDF in Adobe Reader.

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Visualization gallery
Analytics Desktop offers a library of visualizations to provide multiple ways for you to view and interact with
your data.
Graph
Display your data in a variety of graph styles,
such as vertical area graphs, bubble graphs,
pie graphs, and more.

Heat Map
Grasp the state and impact of many variables
at once. Information about your data is shown
through the size and color of nested
rectangles.

Grid
Display your data in an interactive table, then
pivot, sort, move, drill, filter, and perform
additional manipulations on your data.

Network
Identify relationships between items. Data
elements are displayed as nodes, and lines
between the nodes represent relationships
between elements.

Map

Density Map

Display geographical data with differently sized

and colored markers on an interactive map.

Understand patterns for large amounts of

geographical data by displaying color gradients
on an interactive map.

Map with Areas

Display geographical data as colored regions
on an interactive map.

For data requirements and steps to create

each of these visualizations, click
the ? (Help) button.
8

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