SpotApps

SpotApps, ThoughtSpot’s scriptable applications, allow you to migrate multiple objects to and from clusters.

A SpotApp is a collection of Pinboards, Answers, Worksheets, Views & tables packaged together as a zip file. SpotApps take advantage of ThoughtSpot’s solution for migrating data models (Worksheets, Tables, and Views) and content (Pinboards and Answers) between different environments, such as development and production. You can optionally edit these ThoughtSpot objects during the migration process.

In ThoughtSpot Software releases 7.2 and earlier, ThoughtSpot refers to any collection of TML files as a SpotApp. These SpotApps are separate from the ThoughtSpot Cloud SpotApp offering. ThoughtSpot Cloud SpotApps are ThoughtSpot’s out-of-the-box solution templates built for specific use cases and data sources, such as Snowflake Performance and Consumption. These pre-built SpotApps are not available on ThoughtSpot Software.

Export SpotApps

You can export your own custom SpotApps from the SpotApps page. Alternatively, ThoughtSpot automatically creates SpotApps for you when you export more than one object of the same type at a time, or when you export an object and its dependents.

To export your own custom SpotApps, follow these steps:

  1. Navigate to the SpotApps page: Data  SpotApps.

  2. Select Export SpotApps.

  3. In the Export interface, select the Pinboards, Answers, Views, Tables, and Worksheets that you would like to include in your SpotApp. For example, for a Marketing SpotApp, you might choose a Marketing Worksheet, a Campaigns Worksheet, a Pipeline Pinboard, and a few Answers your Chief Marketing Officer created.

  4. Click Export.

  5. The Choose what to Export modal appears. Choose whether to export only the selected objects, or the selected objects and their underlying data sources (Worksheets, tables, and Views).

  6. Click Export.

  7. Open the downloaded TML zip file. The SpotApp zip file contains a document called the Manifest file, which defines the objects you exported, their underlying data sources, and any export errors. If an individual export fails, you can find an error message in the Manifest file. The zip file still exports, even if an individual object’s export fails.

See Import and export TML files for more information on exporting and importing objects.

SpotApp export gif

Import SpotApps

You can import SpotApps from the SpotApps page, under Data  SpotApps.

  1. From the SpotApps page under the Data tab, click Import SpotApps.

  2. In the Import interface, click Select .tml or .zip files to upload.

  3. In your file system, find and select the .zip file for the SpotApp.

  4. The GUID parameter in an object’s TML file allows ThoughtSpot to recognize pre-existing GUIDs, and determine if you are updating an existing object, or creating a new one. If you are updating an object with an existing GUID, the system asks if you would like to create a new object, or update the existing one.

  5. You can unselect any files in the .zip file you do not want to upload.

  6. If there are errors in any of the objects you are importing, the Status column says Cannot import for that object. Next to Cannot import, you can click on View Errors to see the errors, and a suggested resolution.

  7. Resolve any errors by selecting the Edit button for the object with errors. This opens the TML editor. Within the editor, resolve the errors using the method suggested under View Errors in the Import workflow.

  8. After you resolve the errors, click Validate, and then Save. Exit the TML editor.

  9. Select the objects you want to import. ThoughtSpot automatically selects objects with no errors, but does not select objects with errors, even after you resolve them. You must select the objects yourself.

  10. Click Import selected.

  11. The Import Status screen displays the status of the objects you imported. You can open the object(s) that you imported, or click Exit to return to the main object page.

Pre-built SpotApps

Once you connect to your data, you can work with your ThoughtSpot contacts to deploy ThoughtSpot’s pre-built SpotApps, which provide an easy way for you to start getting value from your data. They leverage your data in your cloud data warehouse to provide pre-built Pinboards, Answers, Views, Tables, and Worksheets.

ThoughtSpot offers 1 pre-built SpotApp, for ServiceNow. This SpotApp contains a worksheet with your ServiceNow data for your users to query on, as well as several pre-built answers and pinboards based on your data.

When you are ready to move to a production environment, you can migrate these ThoughtSpot objects to your new environment by importing and export TML files, ThoughtSpot’s flat-file editing and migration system for ThoughtSpot objects.

Limitations

You cannot import manually compressed .zip files. You can only import .zip files that you exported from ThoughtSpot: a custom SpotApp, an object and its associated data sources, or multiple objects of the same type that you exported from the object list page.

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