Creating New Dimension Hierarchies

You may find it useful to define a hierarchy of dimensions, to enable visuals with variable levels of granularity over the same range of data.

Availability Note.

This feature is available only to users with administrative privileges.

The following steps demonstrate how to define such a hierarchy on the dataset World Life Expectancy [data source samples.world_life_expectancy]. We will use the dimensions un_region, un_subregion, and country to define a dimensional hierarchy called Region.

  1. On the main navigation bar, click Data.

    Click DATA on main nav

    The Data view appears, open on the Datasets tab.

    Main landing page of DATA
  2. In the left navigation menu, click samples.
  3. In the Datasets area, select World Life Expectancy (samples.world_life_expectancy).

    Selecting Dataset 'World Life Expectancy'
    Selecting Dataset 'World Life Expectancy'
    .
  4. In the Dataset Detail menu, select Fields.

    Dataset Detail for 'World Life Expectancy'
    Dataset Detail 'World Life Expectancy'
  5. In the Fields interface, select Edit fields.

    Editing Fields of Dataset 'World Life Expectancy'
    Editing the Fields of Dataset 'World Life Expectancy'
  6. In the editable Fields interface, under Dimensions, find the field un_region.
  7. Click (down) icon on the un_region line, and select Create Hierarchy.

    Turning off the visibility of a column
    Starting Hierarchy Definition
  8. In the Create Hierarchy modal window, enter the values for Hierarchy Name and Hierarchy Comment, and click Create.

    We named our hierarchy Region, and described it as Geographical Granularity.

    Column Visibility is off
    Creating the Hierarchy
  9. Note that Measures now contain a hierarchy Region, denoted by the (hierarchy) icon. The hierarchy contains a single element, un_region.

    hiding other columns
    Hierarchy Appears on the list of Dimension Fields
  10. To add more levels to the hierarchy, simply click and drag the relevant dimensions or measures to the newly created hierarchy. Be sure to arrange them in order of scale, from largest to smallest.

    Below un_region, we added un_subregion.

    adding 2nd level to hierarchy
    Adding a Second Level to the Hierarchy

    Below un_subregion, we added country.

    adding 3rd level to hierarchy
    Adding a Third Level to the Hierarchy
  11. Click Save.

    Note that the hierarchy Region appears alongside the dimensions obtained directly from the data table.

    region hierarchy as part of fields
    Hierarchy as One of the Fields of the Dataset

Defined dimension hierarchies, such as Region that we created here, can be used just as any other dimension field of the dataset.