Results and previews

Every question you ask produces a result: a preview that opens in the center and collects in the Explore pane. A result is a first look at your data, and its tabs show how it was computed so that you can check it.

The preview editor

Click a result in Explore, or double-click it, and it opens in the center with six tabs:

• Chart: the chart or the table, and its configuration.
• Data: the underlying rows, as a table.
• Statistics: the figures the written answer was built from: the highest and lowest values, the spread, the period, a correlation or a trend strength, each with what it means, and any caveat about the data. The tab computes them when you first open it.
• Query Flow: how the result was computed, step by step, in plain language.
• SQL: the query behind the result, which you can edit; the SQL page describes it.
• Review: the question as you asked it, your note, and, once your reviewer has judged the report, their verdict and comment.

The data source of a result is its SQL query; there is no separate table selector. You can also start a result by hand: + New in the Explore pane opens an empty editor.

Chart types

The Chart Type list offers:

• Bar Chart and Horizontal Bar: compare categories; both support grouping and stacking.
• Line Chart: show a trend over time, with grouping and stacking.
• Pie Chart: show the parts of a whole.
• Plot: show the relationship between two columns. With two numeric columns it draws a scatter plot; with one category column and one numeric column, a box plot. A Display option forces one or the other, and Show Outliers switches the outliers on and off.
• Histogram: show how the values of one column are distributed.
• Big Number: show one figure, such as a total.
• Grid: show the rows as a sortable table.

Chart options

The configuration beside the chart changes how the result is drawn, not what it contains. Which columns are plotted, how they are grouped and how they are aggregated come from your question or from the query on the SQL tab; the panel has no control for them, so the chart, the data, the statistics and the query flow always describe the same thing.

The groups shown depend on the chart type:

• Chart Configuration: the title and the chart type.
• Axis Labels: your own text for the X and Y axes, for charts that have axes; the column names are the default.
• Series, for a bar or line chart with several series: Stack (Grouped or Stacked), Normalize (Index to 100, Min-max or Z-score) to compare series on different scales, and X-Axis Order (by label, by value, or as is).
• Legend, for charts that have one: its position, and whether it scrolls.
• Number Format: a per-result override of the decimal separator, the thousands separator and the number of decimal places, with a live preview.
• Chart Options, for a plot: Display (Auto, Scatter or Box) and Show Outliers.
• For a grid: Display Options (sorting, row numbers, alternating row colors, row height), Column Selection, Default Sorting (column and direction), Footer Aggregations per column, and the text shown for empty cells (NULL Display).

On the chart itself, hover for the values, and zoom or pan with the mouse.

The Query Flow

The Query Flow tab retells the SQL in plain language as a diagram of steps. The steps show what was read, filtered, grouped and calculated, with the number of rows at each step. It is the tab for a reader who does not read SQL, and it is also what travels into the follow-up report for your reviewer.

Totsum shows a flow only after it has checked that the flow describes the query. When a query is too complex for that check to pass, the tab says so: “This query is too complex for Totsum to retell in plain language. Rather than show you steps we cannot check, we leave them out — the SQL tab has the query itself.”

The What-if panel

The What-if panel is under the tabs, collapsed. Its header says what it is for: “Change a value and check the answer moves the way it should.” Click the header to open it.

Pick a source table of the result. In the grid, change a value, or select a row and press Delete row. Changed cells are highlighted, and each column accepts only values it can hold: a date picker for dates, digits for numbers. Press Apply: the chart, the Data rows, the Statistics and the Query Flow steps are all rebuilt from your edited data. Press Reset to restore the real data.

The panel lets you test the query with a value you control. Suppose the result is a chart of sales by country and you want to be sure it really totals sales. Change one country’s sales to a huge number, 50 billion, and press Apply. If that country’s bar jumps to the top, the chart does total sales. If nothing moves, or the wrong bar moves, the query is not counting what you think it is, and that is worth knowing before the chart goes into a report.

Your data itself is never modified. The panel applies your edits as a temporary layer over the table, only for this result and only until you press Reset; the file you loaded and the table in Ingest stay exactly as they were.

While a What-if is applied, no report can be exported, because an exported chart of invented numbers would look like a real one. Press Reset to export again.

Shortlist or rule out

Every result is in one of three states, named by the chip above the tabs: Not reviewed, Submitted to expert, Reviewed. Only the first has choices. ★ Shortlist marks a result for your reviewer’s report; ⊘ Rule out closes a line of inquiry that you examined and decided to leave. The two exclude each other; clicking the active one clears it; a new result starts unmarked. When you shortlist, add your note on the Review tab while the reason is fresh: what caught your attention and what you want checked. The note travels into the report.

The other two states change by themselves. Adding a result to a report submits it to the expert, and the expert’s verdict makes it reviewed. Once submitted, the only way to change the triage is to remove the result from its report. Ruled-out results do not enter reports.

In the Explore pane, a shortlisted result shows the ★ beside its name, and, once judged, the verdict glyph left of it: ✓, ✗ or ?. Hover a result for its full name, its triage and your note, where it stands, and the reviewer’s comment when there is one.

Organizing results

Right-click the Explore pane for New Folder, or a folder for New Subfolder, Rename Folder and Delete Folder. Move results into folders by dragging them, or with Move to Folder in a result’s menu. Right-click a result, or click the ··· button that appears when you hover it, for Refresh, Rename, Move to Folder and Delete; F2 renames in place; Ctrl-click or Shift-click (Cmd-click on macOS) selects several results to delete them together.

There is no export on the Explore pane. The export functions are on the follow-up report.