Data connections in the Spotfire web client

When you use a Spotfire web client, you can access and analyze data from virtually any external data source that you can connect to in the installed client. Depending on the data source and method for connecting to it, you have access to different amounts of functionality in the web client.

For some data connectors, you have full authoring and access capabilities in the web client. This means you can create and edit connections to the corresponding data sources directly in the web client, to add data to your analysis.

For some other connectors, you only have the capability to access your data in the Spotfire web client. This means that connections to the corresponding data sources must be authored in an installed client. You can then continue to work on analyses that contain connections to these data sources in the web client. You can also open data connections that have been saved to the library, to add data to your analysis.

Connectors with web client authoring support

The following connectors are available with authoring capabilities in the web client:

Limitations when authoring data connections in the web client

In the web client, you can open and use any data connection. However, to use some functionality, you must create the connection in the installed client.

The following data connection authoring capabilities are not available when you create or edit data connections in the web client:

Writing custom queries
Adding and editing prompting
Selecting data from stored procedures
Saving a data connection or connection data source to the library
Manually creating structural relations

TIBCO Cloud™ Spotfire

In TIBCO Cloud™ Spotfire (TCS) environments, all data connectors are not available for use in the web client. See Supported data sources in the TIBCO Cloud™ Spotfire® web client.

To ensure stable performance, certain limits exist on data loading from external systems. Depending on the load method used, keep these limitations in mind when working with data connections in the web client.

Table 1. In-memory loading limitations in TCS web clients
Limitation	Description
Data import row limit	The maximum number of rows in a data table that can be imported from an external data source in TIBCO Cloud Spotfire web client is 20 million. If an imported data table contains more rows, only the first 20 million rows will be included. If you want to work with data that contains more rows, this is supported by configuring the connection to allow in-database loading of the data tables. This configuration can be done in an installed client, by the connection author.

Table 2. In-database loading limitations in TCS web clients
Limitation	Description
External data row limit	The maximum number of rows that can be retrieved and visualized is 500,000, when working with in-database data. This does not limit the number of rows allowed in the underlying data table in the external data source, but only the amount of data that can be fetched in a query to the data source. The limit affects, for example, visualizations, the expanded data panel, and certain filter types. You might exceed this limit if you configure a complex visualization where too many items are shown on the axes, or if you create a filter for a column that contains too many unique values. You can often work around the limit by, for example, filtering the data or configuring the visualization to show fewer items. If a visualization or filter is configured to show more than 500,000 items, these elements will not be rendered in the analysis, and an error message will be displayed.
Table visualization row limit	The table visualization can display a maximum of 10,000 rows of data, when working with in-database data. If the data table contains more rows, only the first 10,000 will be visualized.