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Foglight 7.3.0 - Web Component Guide

Introducing the Web Component Framework The Web Component Framework Configuring Views and Context Queries Functions Bindings Additional Components

Anatomy of a Typical Dashboard

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A dashboard consists of a container, which in turn contains views. See View Components for more information about containers.
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Views are assembled from WCF components.
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View components are often required to display specific data, which might be set at design time or might be based on user interaction. This demands query-based data retrieval and a mechanism for passing information in the form of parameters. WCF provides both.
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In WCF, the query mechanism retrieves data from a data source, for example, from the Monitoring data source.
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Queries can be parameterized, which gives them an extra degree of flexibility with regard to the dynamic data that they retrieve.
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A flow mechanism permits pages to be updated or linked to other pages.
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A context mechanism enables values, which may be objects, to be passed to dependent pages. Thus, dynamically retrieved data on a parent page can be passed to a dependent page.

The starting place for working with WCF components is the Definitions dashboard. You may find it useful to have the browser interface open and navigate to the Definitions dashboard so that you can refer to it as you continue reading.

The Web Component Framework (WCF)

WCF consists of a structure for hosting related views called view components, and container services that host data sources. It is a superset of the View Component collection that contains other control components, such as renderers. It is used to build thin client interfaces for products that are primarily (but not necessarily) in the systems management domain.

WCF is written in JavaTM and is capable of running in a Web container such as Apache Tomcat. It can be used on contemporary Web browsers without requiring the use of a plug-in. It is portal-like, but is not a JSR-168 standard portal.

WCF supports multiple data sources. With it, you can configure multiple data queries and display the retrieved data using views. Queries are the primary mechanism used to extract data from WCF data sources. A view can use more than one query to extract data for display, and a query can use more than one data object.

Apart from creating browser interface elements using WCF, there are several important considerations:

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The Dashboard interface (default views)
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Data interface (data representation, relationships in the system, ability to query data)
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Persistence interface (data storage)
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Permissions interface (ability to set rules and privileges).

See the Foglight® core documentation set for more information about these elements.

View Components

View components are elements of WCF. They are the visible components in the browser interface. Multiple components can be arranged on a page, and some components can be nested within others. A view contains both view components and configuration information. Views can be interactive and respond to user actions.

Types of view components:

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Containers, such as various layouts, splitters, and reports. Layouts control the placement of the components they contain, which are known as child components. For more information, see the Web Component Reference.
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Data visualization components, such as charts, tables, gauges, labels, and trees. These views can manage child views using links on the navigation or action panels, or if defined as customizers. For more information, see the Web Component Reference.
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Input components, with batch submit capability for use in forms.
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Specialized components, such as RSS feeds. For more information, see the Web Component Reference and Setting up RSS Feeds .

The configuration settings include flow control, contextual inputs, data binding, and query specification.

The Foglight® User Guide covers the following topics in greater detail.

Pages can be decorated with headers, which may contain:

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Breadcrumbs, which include the present page name preceded by other page names
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Time Region, which may contain
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Timestamp, if no time range is applied to the page
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Time Range, if available and applies to all views
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A Zonar, if available, permits a choice of the time interval
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Nothing, if multiple time ranges are represented
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Optional Page Scope Actions, such as:
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Time Range, changes the time range for components on the page

The Module List Pane

Navigate to Dashboards > Configuration > Definitions and you will see the module list pane at the upper left. Foglight view components are grouped into modules that potentially contain views, queries, functions, renderers, and so on. Modules are an organizational framework for keeping related view components together. Top-level modules are created by Foglight® designers, but it is possible to create sub-modules in any of the system modules. User modules, such as My Definitions, the current user’s own workspace for creating a new view component, cannot have sub-modules.

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