This topic is for application designers who need to define data tables, attributes, properties and relationships.
To configure your application to display data to users, you need to:
- Load data into PhixFlow using analysis models. Configure connectors to access your existing data sources and store the data as tables in PhixFlow's own database. You can also set up complex, bulk processes to manipulate large volumes of data; see Analysis Model.
- Define the data structure using ERDs. These diagrams define the logical structure of the data and the relationships between tables; see Understanding ERDs and Views and Defining Data Structures using ERDs. You can:
- either define an ERD before adding any data to PhixFlow
- or you can load data from external sources first. You can then drag tables into the ERD and simply add the relationships. This method is recommended as it ensures the data types will be correct.
- Compile data views that show application users only the data that they need to see; see Compiling Views.
- Connect data to screens; see Showing Data on a Screen. You can:
- add data components, such as grids and charts
- connect a parent component to a data view, so that it's child fields can display data from the same source.
Once the data is connected, you need to configure parts of the screen, such as buttons, with actionflows. This enables users to make changes to data; see Actionflows and Action Configuration.
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Overview
PhixFlow Entity Relationship Diagrams (ERDs) define the logical structure of the data in your application. "Entities" represent the things in the world that you want to represent as data.
The ERD Window Layout
Here is a simplified view of the ERD window:
- The toolbar provides ERD specific options, such as displaying the available data tables that you can add to your ERD and creating a new screen for your data.
- On the toolbar, click
to list all available tables in the repository pane on the right.Insert excerpt _tables _tables nopanel true - The main part of the window is the canvas, where you create the ERD.
- To add a new table, from the toolbar, drag the
icon onto the canvas.Insert excerpt _tables _tables nopanel true - To add an existing table, on the toolbar, click
. PhixFlow lists the available tables in the repository. Drag a table from the repository onto the canvas.Insert excerpt _tables _tables nopanel true - To add an Excel or CSV spreadsheet, drag it directly onto the canvas. PhixFlow imports the data and uses it to create a new table.
- To add a new table, from the toolbar, drag the
- The tables and the relationships between them.
- A table is represented as a box, containing a list of all of the attributes it contains and their associated data type.
- A line connecting tables represents the relationship between them. The line connects the primary key of one table to a foreign key in a different table; see Relationship.
ERD Example
The following example shows an ERD for a school. Here the school has entities: departments, teachers, students, classrooms and so on. All these entities are represented as tables and the lines connecting them show their relationships to one another. We can see from this diagram that a School Department has many Class Rooms and Teachers. This example is covered in detail in Understanding ERDs.
Creating an ERD
- On your application's home page, click the Data link to list the existing ERDs. Alternatively you can click the data link from the header bar.
- Click the
button to create a new ERD.Insert excerpt _add _add nopanel true
Opening an ERD
- On your application's home page, click the Data link to list the existing ERDs. Alternatively you can click the data link from the header bar.
- Double-click any ERD to open it.
Already Have Data?
If you have data to import into PhixFlow, such as a database or API, use an analysis model to import it. This allows you to configure connectors to access your existing data and store the data as tables in PhixFlow's own database. see Importing Data and Importing Data Through an API.
You can also use an analysis model to set up bulk processes to manipulate large volumes of data before it is presented to your users; see Analysis Models for Batch Processing Data.
What's Next?
Understanding ERDs covers ERDs in more depth to help you design your own ERDs and views to display your data.