Setting Range and Resolution

After you've chosen your properties, you then need to choose how much data you want.

This is done by choosing a range (the amount of time you want to cover) and the resolution (the amount of detail) you're looking for.

Set the range by using the time control to choose a start and finish time, or pick from one of your events, such as a specific batch or shift.

Then choose how detailed the data is. There are two options here…

• Specifying the total number of points, and
• The time between samples.

Choosing the number of samples works very well for visualisations. For example, an A4 page printed at 300 DPI only has room for 2460 'dots'. If you're producing a line-graph, there's no need to ask for any more than 3000 samples of data, regardless of the amount of time you're covering.

If you are performing analytics and you're trying to target a specific time resolution, choosing a time-between-samples is a better option. For instance, a time-between-samples of '1' will give you one-second resolution.

Please note that the resolution options are a suggestion to the system. The response you get may have significantly fewer or more data samples, depending on the underlying data sources and the nature of the information. This is particularly true when working with discrete (ie. on/off) values, or data from many out-of-sync data sources.

The last thing to choose is the format for your data. Available formats include CSV, TXT (Tab-Delimited), JSON and HTML.

Note that the 'Export' button will only appear once you've chosen a time range and a valid resolution.

You'll also see a copy of the AQL query (the query language used by ARDI to request data) just above the export button. You can copy this query to re-use and automate the export you've created.