Drilling in to the KPI chart

Remember the introduction to the section on KPI charts? I stated that KPI charts give you the answer to the "What?" question. Now, let's look at the "Why?" of analytics.

Answering the "Why?" question can be a lot more challenging than answering the "What?". Sometimes, significant creativity is required, but here's a checklist of things you might wish to consider:

• What types of visualizations will best show a detailed view of the data?
• How can I slice and dice the details visualizations to show a complete picture?
• Can additional value be gained by showing multiple, related datasets side by side?

We will build a line chart details visualization that shows historical data over time. By way of an example, I will walk you through the thought processes that go into making the line chart more and more insightful and useful. Before I do that, it's time to cover another key Spotfire concept in detail—that of marking.