Winter 19 Salesforce Einstein Analytics Release

The winter ’19 Einstein Analytics release delivers more functionalities on the EA Platform. I would highly recommend to check out the release notes for greater depth in the coming days.  In this article, I would try to highlight some of the key updates and upgrades on the platform from this release. Indeed my sincere thanks to the product team for this amazing release roll-out. let’s take a deep-dive

  • New Intro Landing Screen – Onboarding: A new landing page will appear when the analytics studio is FIRST opened. It consists of good resources or links to get started with Einstein Analytics and very helpful for the starters or beginners. Then you can launch it from the help menus whenever you need to check more info. Related to your topics.

 

Snapshot: Landing Screen

 

  • Embedded Help Videos: Introductory and well instructive resizable videos embedded throughout analytics to display the feature & functionality to get you started fast.

 

  • Apps Navigation: Navigation across the EA assets is more user-friendly & intuitive now. Therefore, if you have your assets stored in apps you can easily set the availability in a few clicks. It has moved from the left to the top and providing more space for your dashboard to display.

Snapshot: Dashboard Navigation Menu

Snapshot: EA Asset Selections

 

  • EA Asset Share via Links: Now it is easy to set the shared default EA settings URL link whether the link opens the asset in the Analytics Studio or in the Analytics tab in Lightning Experience. Either way, the link opens the asset to the page or with the selections; it had when you shared it.

 

Snapshot: EA URL Sharing

  • Data manager Menu Accessibility: Very useful extension to add more usability and reduction of clicks to access data manager (Dataflow/Recipes/Connectors etc.) and other helpful resource links from the default landing EA page.

Snapshot: Data Manager Accessibility

 

  • EA Dashboard State Preserve: If you remember when we move from a regular window to a presentation (full screen) back and forth, then we were not able to store the window state to our full-screen mode. Finally, we can preserve the states when moving with window to full screens and can explore the selections while navigating between screens.

 

  • Classic Designer Dashboard Retirement & New Dashboard Creation Screen: From this release onwards user would not be able to create or select classical designer dashboards at all from the environment. The default selection of the new dashboards will be redirecting to the flex designer assets ONLY. In case if anyone is still using the old assets have to plan the transition.

Snapshot: EA Default Template Screen

         Dashboard Template Selection has been transformed and re-organized from this release onwards. Look neater & cleaner

Snapshot: New Dashboard Template Picker

 

  • Lens exploration on Multiple Datasets: This is one of my fav feature from this release. Those who remember the time-consuming efforts of build unions and other co-group in EA and other navigational limitations because of multiple input different load streams in your SAQL. From this release, we can add multiple datasets in our SAQL in just a few clicks. To explore data from multiple datasets, on the Home page, click the primary dataset for your exploration. In the SAQL mode, click Add New Dataset. From the Select, a Dataset dialog box, choose the secondary dataset and run the query. Repeat this process if you want to combine more datasets.

 

                                                                                          Snapshot: SAQL Editor -Multiple Datasets

  • Replication is Now Called Data Sync: Data sync, previously called replication, is how we bring our local Salesforce or external data into Analytics and keep it up to date. From this release, it will be called as Data Sync and will be reflected in every place in an environment wherever this sync will be applied.  Below is the table to give you an overview of the terminology changes in the coming release.

 

 

  • Dataflow Scheduling (Periodic Full Sync): When the Data Sync (replication) is enabled in an org, then EA pulls the data incrementally from the local SFDC objects into the cache. In case of any DML or changes to your data then it compares the changes from the previous sync pull. However, if you do not have the right scheduling strategy enabled then this data can be uncoordinated over time. For example in case of any updates on your formula fields etc. From this release, we can keep our synced Salesforce objects up to date with a periodic full sync. The user needs to select the periodic full sync mode, and then EA performs a weekly full refresh for us. No dataflow updates required.

 

Snapshot: Sync Mode Initiation

 

Snapshot: Sync Mode Type Selection

 

  • External Data Sync Trigger: Earlier we have to check manually or monitor our external objects data updates or extension for our dataset. From this release, EA checks for referenced external objects that have not been synced since the data flow was created or updated. If Analytics finds any, it synchronizes them for us before running the data flow. Indeed very useful feature and can save lots of time & overhead when you are dealing with heavy external volume data scheduling.

 

  • New Transformed Dataset Creation Page: We all love fewer clicks. This is another favorite feature of mine, now we have consolidated view & functionality related to our datasets creation types in one single place.

Snapshot: Dataset Creation Page

 

  • New Dataset Edit Page: Now we can start a recipe, create a story in Einstein Discovery, or explore the data in a lens, all from the dataset edit page.

Snapshot: Dataset Edit Page

 

  • New Dataflow Scheduling Limits: Another extension to the data job run, now we can make in a rolling 24-hour period from 40 to 50. Small jobs, which takes less than two minutes, will not be counting towards this 24-hour dataflow run limit

Snapshot: New Dataflow Limits

 

  • Null Values – Tool Tip Handling: Tooltips are very handy when it comes to EA adoption and giving some information about the key KPIs. However, if you have more blank values then it will take some space with no meaningful purpose on the end user side. From this release, we can control and hide the null values from the top tip.

Snapshot: Null Values Too Tip

 

  • Hide Widget Actions from Dashboard Viewers: Another useful feature in order to increase the EA Usability or adoption. From this release, we can hide the widget’s action menu to prevent users from downloading, sharing, and exploring the widget’s results. Alternatively, we can hide it when it is not used or when the action drop-down arrow is too distracting in smaller widgets to end users.

 

Snapshot: Widget Actions Control Settings

 

  • New Chart Themes: From this new release there will be new themes added for the charts. So now, we can add more flavors to our UIJ. Below is the new themes overview :

 

Snapshot: Themes Overview

 

  • New Transformed App Picker Template: New app template view can provide the single view to find the app, which can fit any business needs faster. From this release, we will have an improved user experience to pick up the relevant apps for the business and create quick dashboards.

Snapshot: New App Template Picker View

 

  • Point & Click GEO Maps: Apart from default prepackaged enabled maps such as Bubble Map & Geo Map etc. in Einstein Analytics. There was an effort to add another custom map in our EA instance. Those who know the steps or efforts to enable custom maps such as shaping or adjusting the geoJSON maps then file limits of 10 MB file upload in the backend. This is another great feature extended from this release, now we can directly upload the geoJSON file to the user interface to create our custom maps. It is easy to create multiple maps from the same geoJSON by applying unique boundaries that focus on different regions. Below is the permission set requires to perform this action.

 

Snapshot: New Custom Maps Permission

Snapshot: Custom geoJSON Maps

 

  • Load and Append Multiple CSV Files with the Amazon S3 Connector:  Another great extension on the data integration side from this release. Earlier we had to download the files locally and then upload them manually into Analytics. In addition, to merge the data from multiple files, we had to use the data flow or a recipe Now we can handle these append operations by using Amazon S3 connector.

 

Global Release Roll-out Timeline:

For the Winter ’19 Release, the Preview Instances will be upgraded to Winter ’19 on September 7 and September 8, 2018. Non-Preview Instances will be upgraded to Winter ’19 on October 12 and October 13, 2018. Between now and September 7, 2018, all sandbox requests will be routed to Preview Instances.

Next Steps – Stay Tuned:

Overall there has been quite a lot of updates on the design & user experience from this release. Also, a very essential aspect to have smoother rollouts & EA adoptions. I would like to cover few grounds on SAQL new functions & Recipies in the same blog in the next days. I hope you got a higher level overview about the coming winter 19 release features from this article. Let me know your thoughts.

 

 

Cheers!

Varun

 

 

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *