Managing Write-Back Cloud
Summary
Most management operations are done on Write-Back Manager, and they are described on Setup & Configure Write-Back Cloud, however, some technical aspects are important and this page describes them.
Audit
All the actions performed by users in Write-Back (add data, delete or edit) are stored in the historical_audit table. This can help you identify which user did a specific insert and at what time in which dataset, for example.
Historical Audit
The historical_audit table is automatically populated by Write-Back to keep track of all the actions taken by users. Each entry has the following fields:
| Field | Example | Description |
|---|---|---|
| ID | 1234a678-9b01-23c4-5d6e-7f89a0123b45 | ID - primary key. (UUID) |
| ACTIONDATE_LOCAL | 2019-01-21 14:24:47 | Date and time of the user's action. The date is stored in the server time zone. |
| ACTIONDATE_UTC | 2019-01-21 12:24:47 | Date and time of the user's action. The date is stored in UTC. |
| ACTIONNAME | ALTER_DATASET | The type of user's action. Please find below a list with the actions available. |
| ACTIONPARAMS | renameColumn;dropColumn;modifyColumn;addColumn | Details of a user's action. |
DATASET | forecasts_modifications | Name of the data set. |
| DATASETKEY | 1234a678-9b01-23c4-5d6e-7f89a0123b45 | Record's key in the dataset. (UUID) |
| SYSTEM | Server | The system where the user performs actions. Possible values include 'Server' or 'Desktop'. |
| USERNAME | username | The user that performed the action. |
| IDWIDGETCONFIGURATION | 1234a678-9b01-23c4-5d6e-7f89a0123b45 | The ID of the Widget Configuration. |
| WRITEBACK_SITE | default | The site used during the configuration or append of data. |
The action names considered are the following:
| Name | Action Detail |
|---|---|
| DELETE_DATA | The user either on Desktop or Server deletes a data entry |
| INSERT_DATA | The user either on Desktop or Server submits a data entry |
| EDIT_DATA | The user either on Desktop or Server edits an existing data entry |
For the EDIT_DATA actions, there are a few additional combinations to notice:
| ActionParams | Action Detail |
|---|---|
| editDataDelete | The user deleted a cell (when using pivots) or a complete line (when not using pivots) - only shows up when using tabular mode. |
| editDataInsert | The user inserted a new cell/line - only shows up when using tabular mode. |
| 1234a678-9b01-23c4-5d6e-7f89a0123b45 | The user edited an entry, the actionParam refers to the line that was disabled and the new line will be in the datasetKey column. |
Dataset Tables
When a dataset is created a table is also created in the database to store its values. Take the "Sales Forecast" dataset for example, when creating it will create a new table named "sales_forecast" with the defined fields on the configuration.
The creation of a dataset will also add a new line to the historical audit saying that a dataset was created.
Dataset tables will have columns mimicking the configuration defined on Write-Back plus some additional columns that are added by default:
| Field | Example | Description |
|---|---|---|
| SURROGATE_KEY | 1234a678-9b01-23c4-5d6e-7f89a0123b45 | ID - primary key. (UUID) |
| ISACTIVE | True / False | Indicates if the record is active on the latest snapshot. Write-Back never deletes or updates records instead it deactivates the existing version with this flag and inserts a new record. Typically you want to filter this column by True when using on a Tableau data source. |
| TIMESTAMP LOCAL | 2019-01-21 12:24:47 | Date and time of the user's action. The date is stored in the server time zone. |
| TIMESTAMP UTC | 2019-01-21 12:24:47 | Date and time of the user's action. The date is stored in UTC. |