Data Manager

The Data Manager is a powerful local data engine that sends requests to the server-side, then binds the data to the tablesheet when data is ready.

The Data Manager interacts with the database, manages it (sort, filter, group, aggregate), and synchronizes real-time data back to the database using the GC.Data.DataManager class. The addTable and addRelationship methods are used to map a table or relationship in the Data Manager. Similarly, you can also remove a table or relationship using the DataManager class methods.

Data Manager serves as the data core of the application, allowing it to focus more on business logic and rendering. Remote sources such as REST API, OData, GraphQL, and local sources like object array for JSON, a string for CSV, or XML are supported to create a tablesheet.

Data Source Schema

You can provide a schema when you add a data source to define the data table. The schema contains the following properties:

Property	Description
type string	The data type used. One of 'JSON', 'CSV', 'XML', 'columnJson'. The default type is 'JSON'.
countPath string	Used to get data source collection length.
dataPath string	Used to get data source collection after parse.
columns GC.Data.IColumnCollection	The column definitions of the data source table. Its key is the column name, and its value is column information, which contains dataType, dataPattern, dataMap and dataName. The dataType is any of "string", "number", "boolean", "null", "object", "array" or "date". It is the actual data type of original value. It is especially useful for a Date because a Date is a string in JSON data and needs to be converted. The dataPattern is a string for parsing a string to value, such as formatter "dd/MM/yyyy" for a date string, "truthy" and "falsy" value pairs "Yes\|No" for a boolean string, decimal separator "," for a numeric string. The dataMap is a simple map to display the original value in a more meaningful way. Its key could be a number or string, and its value could be a number, string, or Date. The dataName indicates the name of the original data field that be from data source, using this property can map the original field name to the new field name in the data manager.

Property

Description

type

string

The data type used. One of 'JSON', 'CSV', 'XML', 'columnJson'.

The default type is 'JSON'.

countPath

string

Used to get data source collection length.

dataPath

string

Used to get data source collection after parse.

columns

GC.Data.IColumnCollection

The column definitions of the data source table. Its key is the column name, and its value is column information, which contains dataType, dataPattern, dataMap and dataName.

The dataType is any of "string", "number", "boolean", "null", "object", "array" or "date". It is the actual data type of original value. It is especially useful for a Date because a Date is a string in JSON data and needs to be converted.
The dataPattern is a string for parsing a string to value, such as formatter "dd/MM/yyyy" for a date string, "truthy" and "falsy" value pairs "Yes|No" for a boolean string, decimal separator "," for a numeric string.
The dataMap is a simple map to display the original value in a more meaningful way. Its key could be a number or string, and its value could be a number, string, or Date.
The dataName indicates the name of the original data field that be from data source, using this property can map the original field name to the new field name in the data manager.

Note: A date picker is automatically enabled for a Date field.

The snapshot depicts the data schema with dataName, dataType and dataMap.

The following code sample shows how to set up a data schema with dataName, dataType and dataMap for the tablesheet.

var dataManager = spread.dataManager();
var customerTable = dataManager.addTable("customerTable", {
    remote: {
        read: {
            url: apiUrl
        }
    },
    // data source schema - here we set dataType, dataPattern , dataMap etc.
    schema: {
        columns: {
            validFrom: { dataType: "date" },
            billToCustomer: { dataMap: { "Tailspin Toys (Head Office)": "Tailspin Toys(HO)", "Wingtip Toys (Head Office)": "Wingtip Toys(HO)" } },
            buyingGroup: { dataMap: { "Tailspin Toys": "TT", "Wingtip Toys": "WT" } },
            postalCode: { dataType: "number" }
        }
    }
});

The snapshot depicts the data schema with dataPattern.

The following code sample shows how to set up a data schema with dataPattern for the tablesheet.

var myTable = dataManager.addTable("myTable", {
    data: [
        { description: "Mow grass", dueDate: "8/11/2021", priority: "High", assignedTo: "Dad", isFinished: "Yes", isEncouraged: "False", credit: "20,75" },
        { description: "Clean Room", dueDate: "8/9/2021", priority: "Medium", assignedTo: "Daughter", isFinished: "No", isEncouraged: "True", credit: "10,50" },
        { description: "Organize Pantry", dueDate: "8/8/2021", priority: "Low", assignedTo: "Son", isFinished: "Yes", isEncouraged: "True", credit: "10,75" },
        { description: "Prepare BBQ", dueDate: "8/12/2021", priority: "High", assignedTo: "Mom", isFinished: "No", isEncouraged: "False", credit: "30,25" }
    ],
    schema: {
        columns: {
dueDate: { dataType: "date", dataPattern: "dd/MM/yyyy" },
isFinished: {  dataPattern: "Yes|No" },
isEncouraged: { dataType: "boolean", dataPattern: "True|False" },
credit: { dataType: "number", dataPattern: "." }
        }
    }
});