Introduction

Property controls are a way to control document properties through input elements. Think of document properties are variables that can be used almost everywhere in your analysis. For example, you can set a document property to manipulate the output of a calculated column, be part of a data function input parameter, or part of a custom expression. They can also be used as parameters to retrieve data on-demand or trigger a script when the document property changes to automate a set of actions.

Spotfire provides a set of powerful ways to control document properties through input fields, dropdowns, list boxes and sliders. These are called Property Controls in TIBCO Spotfire, but there are  no check-boxes or radio buttons available out of the box as of yet. However we can easily create them with out of the box features

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Requirements

To create radio buttons or checkbox property controls, we need:

1. A Boolean Document Property and optionally a script to run when this document property changes

2. A Calculated value that uses the Boolean Document Property as the custom expression and a script to change the state of the Boolean Document Property state.

For example, if we want to create a a checkbox that turns on or off the visualization gridlines, you create a "showGrids" Boolean document property and attach a script so when the document property changes, it triggers the script. Now we need another way change the Boolean document property. This can be done by using a calculated value that triggers the script that toggles the Boolean document property

Checkbox Property Control Example

This example demonstrate how to create a checkbox to turn on and off a visualization grid

1. Create a Boolean Document Property called "cb"

2. Create a script that triggers when Boolean Document Property changes

   from Spotfire.Dxp.Application.Visuals import Visualization
   myVis = myVis.As[Visualization]()
   myVis.XAxis.Scale.ShowGridlines = Document.Properties["cb"]
   myVis.YAxis.Scale.ShowGridlines = Document.Properties["cb"]

    

3. Create a calculated value with custom expression and script

 if(${cb},"[X]",[ ])

 Document.Properties["cb"] = not Document.Properties["cb"]

Radio Button Property Control example

In this example we create 3 radio buttons so the user can only select one option to set the label visibility mode

1. Create a Boolean document property for each radio option. For example  "op1", "op2", "op3"

2. Create a script that triggers when any of the Boolean document property changes

   if Document.Properties["op1"]: myVis.LabelVisibility = LabelVisibility.All
   if Document.Properties["op2"]: myVis.LabelVisibility = LabelVisibility.Marked 
   if Document.Properties["op3"]: myVis.LabelVisibility = LabelVisibility.None

    

3. Create a calculated value with custom expression and script

 if(${cb},"(X)",( ))

Document.Properties["op1"] = False
Document.Properties["op2"] = False
Document.Properties["op3"] = False
Document.Properties[dp] = True

Video Tutorial

Here is a video explaining what I mean in this article. Enjoy!