A dashboard can have multiple library components and all these components are independent from each other. When several components contain parameters which have the same name and come from the same catalog and at the same time contain exactly the same values, by default these parameters are regarded as separate parameters each connected to its own component. To submit a value to all these components you need to submit the value to all of the parameters. However by sharing the parameters you only need to provide a value for one of them as a representative of all the parameters. You need then only submit values to this parameter and all the components will use the specified values.
JDashboard supports sharing two types of parameters coming from different library components in the same dashboard:
The same parameters
The parameters with the same name and coming from the same catalog.
For example, a parameter @Category comes from the catalog A.cat, and in a dashboard it is used by two library components LC1 and LC2. So in the dashboard they are two parameters marked as LC1.@Category and LC2.@Category. These two parameters are the same parameter and only require the user to specify one value for them.
The same meaning parameters
The parameters that are not the same parameters but have the same parameter type and value data type. For cascading parameters they should have the same hierarchies and each hierarchy have the same parameter value type, then they can be shared as parameters with the same meaning even though the names are different.
For example, there are two parameters @Province and @State which have the same parameter type and value type so they can both have the same meaning. For the cascading parameters like (@Country, @Province) and (@Country, @State) which have the same hierarchies and each hierarchy has the same parameter value type so they also can have the same meaning.
Within a sharing group, if all the shared parameters allows for type-in values, the merged value result is the union of the values of all the parameters. The merged value names are distinct. However if any of the shared parameters does not allow type-in values, the merged value result is the intersection of all the values.
Sometimes there may be unexpected parameter sharing that does no harm to the report system and report data, but the dashboard result may be unexpected.
After sharing parameters, their values will be merged. The merged values result may be bigger or smaller than the value lists of some of the shared parameters, which might lead to some values cannot be supported by some components or some values can never be available to some components.
For example in the case of @Province and @State, if the parameters are shared then the list of values will be all states and provinces. However, one library component may use a query that limits the data to US only, thus if the user selects a Canadian province from the list the component will have no data.
on the side bar and then select Share Parameters from the option list. The Share Parameters Setting dialog is displayed. See the dialog.
To add another parameter into a sharing group, select any parameter in the group while holding Ctrl and then select the parameter, then click Share.
To remove parameters from a sharing group, select the parameters and then click Cancel Share which appears in the place of the Share button.
