Dashboards and Widgets

Posted03/31/2025

Updated09/22/2025

Overview

ResourceFirst has a feature called Dashboards. There are three dashboard spaces where dashboard pages can be displayed: the Home page, the Project Dashboard page, and the Resource Dashboard page. Those pages are used to display pre-defined dashboard pages which can contain widgets, which in turn can contain text, charts, and tables or grids. The data presented in widgets on dashboards is “live” data; that is, it shows data from your current data load or from the database. It is NOT a static report.

Some widgets provide the ability to drill-down where the live data can be modified to correct problems or add to the current plan.

Every ResourceFirst user has a dashboard space accessed by the Home area icon. The Project and Resource areas each have a page named Dashboard which is really a dashboard space on which the user can create or select a dashboard page for display.

Dashboard Pages

Three types of dashboard pages can be created:

Home (appear on the Home page)
Project (appear on the Projects > Dashboard page)
Resource (appear on the Resources > Dashboard page)

ResourceFirst comes with a default dashboard page for each. In addition:

Administrators can create system-wide “global” dashboard pages and widgets (see Administering Dashboards and Widgets).
Users can create their own custom dashboard pages populated with any combination of ResourceFirst widgets.

* Note that users cannot add widgets to global dashboards, only to their personal dashboards. They can, however, rearrange the widgets on a global dashboard for themselves (which only they will see).

Currently, you cannot copy or rename a dashboard or create new widgets, but upon request, your PDWare representative can do it for you.

Widgets

Widget categories include:

General (e.g., profile image, my work, my events, track time, to-do list, my messages, calendar, etc.)
Manager (e.g., headcount by skill, largest projects by demand, least allocated projects, demand by division, timesheet compliance, etc.)
Administrator (e.g., diagnostics grid/graph, etc.)
Time Manager
Executive

Types of widgets that can be created include:

Gauge Widget – can define a number and colors
Pie Chart – Category and Value dimensions (can toggle to grid)
Callouts – present a number or dollar amount, with associated text description
Area Chart – stacked or single (can toggle to grid)
Bar Charts – horizontal or vertical (can toggle to grid) – Note: You can unstack a bar chart with the stack/unstack icon.
Combo Charts – bars plus line – can be stacked bars
Grid – a table without the chart element, users can drill down to “live” data on project or resource name from a table

Widget Guidelines

Though you can have up to 8 widgets on a row, and many more on a whole dashboard, it is best to limit the number to make it more usable.
Aim for 3-4 widgets per row maximum, and up to 8 on a dashboard.
Aim to keep the dashboard to one page without requiring scrolling.
You can also have multiple dashboard pages on a dashboard space, each with their own grouping of widgets.

A commonly asked question is when to create a widget vs. using a Qlik report. Guidelines are:

If it needs to be real-time, widgets are best (widget data is live, whereas reports are dependent on data load frequency).
If the complexity is such that it doesn’t fit within one of the available widget types, then a report is best.
Dashboard elements should answer a question in less than 5 seconds. Reports are more suitable if you need to dive into the data and perform analysis.
Dashboards can contain widgets that are unconnected to one another (each can be based on different filters, parameters, etc.), whereas in Qlik, all the reports and charts are connected.
With grid widgets, you can drill down to live data. With reports, you cannot drill down.

How To

Create a Dashboard Page

Step 1: Click the + icon at the top of any Dashboard page and select Add Page on the dialog.

Step 2: On the Save Dashboard dialog, enter a dashboard name and click Save.

Step 3: Populate the dashboard with widgets.

Step 4: Click the Save icon at the upper right of the page.

Delete a Dashboard

Step 1: Click the icon at the top of any Dashboard page to delete the dashboard.

Step 2: On the confirmation dialog, click Yes.

View a Dashboard

To display an existing Dashboard page, select it in the Dashboard selector dropdown.

Add Widgets

Step 1: Click the + icon at the top of any Dashboard page and select Add Widget.

Step 2: On the Add Widget dialog, select a Widget Category on the left column, then select one or more widgets, and click Add.

Step 3: The widgets by default will be added to the first row (even if they are stacked above one another).

Up to 8 widgets can be added to a row (though it’s best to limit it to 3 or 4 per row).

Step 4: Organize your widgets on the dashboard. (See Rearrange Widgets on a Dashboard below.)

Step 5: Click the Save button in the upper right to save your populated dashboard.

Rearrange Widgets on a Dashboard

Widgets on a dashboard can be resized or rearranged. Be sure to save your changes afterward (see Save the Dashboard below).

Resize a Widget

To resize the height of a widget: Hover the cursor over the bottom edge of the widget until the cursor becomes crosshairs; then drag up or down.

Note: This can also be useful if some widgets on a row are taller than others, leaving a gap. Simply drag the bottom of the shorter widgets down until they are all the same height.

To resize the width of a widget: Hover the cursor between widgets until the cursor becomes a double arrow; then drag right or left (Vertical column lines will guide you, so the width snaps into place.:

Note: In the example below, dragging from the edge of the left widget leftward (to the next gridline) will make the left widget thinner and the right widget wider.

Drag a Widget

Drag to the same row: Click the header of the widget and, when the curser becomes a four-way arrow, drag the widget to the right or left until you see a dotted rectangle indicating the target area. Then release the cursor.

Drag to another row: Click the header of the widget and, when the curser becomes a four-way arrow, drag the widget to the destination row and to the right or left until the desired target area is highlighted as a dotted rectangle.

To make the widget its own new row, drag the widget all the way down (you will see the dotted target rectangle extending across the width of the page, indicating it as a new row).

Note: If you drag a widget up to a row and get unexpected results (e.g., the widget appears on the wrong row), it is possible the target row isn’t a row at all, but an extension of a higher row. In this instance, drag each of the widgets on that row to the bottom so they each become their own row. Then drag the widgets up one at a time in the desired order.

Collapse/Expand a Widget

Click on the header of a widget to collapse or expand the widget panel.

Other Widget Controls

Some widgets have specific controls. For example, on bar charts, there is an icon to toggle between chart view and grid view, and an icon to export the widget data: