Create Business Object

Before creating decisions and visualizations, you must define and activate a Business Object

Business Object

A container for measures, dimensions, and metrics that defines aggregations and data sources.

— a model of the data you want to process.

Use case

For our use case, we’ll create a Business Object that captures data such as the guild name, message sent, purchase item, and purchase item value.

We’ll capture that data as either a numeric measure (message sent and purchase item value) or a qualitative dimension (guild name and purchase item).

This is a sample of the JSON structure we’ll use to map

Mapped/Unmapped

Whether the data source for a measure or dimension has been defined or the action has been configured.

the defined measures

Measure

Quantitative, numeric values that can be measured. Measures can be aggregated, and calculations (for example, sum or average) can be performed on them.

and dimensions

Dimension

Qualitative values (places, products, people) that can be used to categorize and segment data or measures. Used to slice & dice measures.

with our app’s data.

[
   {
       "chatMessage": 1,
       "guildName": "Rockin Guild",
       "purchasedItem": "Wood Fort",
	 "purchaseValue": "5",
       "discountCode": "FORTFREE"
   },
       {
       "chatMessage": 1,
       "guildName": "Hurrah",
       "purchasedItem": "Metal Fort",
 "purchaseValue": "8",
       "discountCode": "FORTX"
   },

show all 17 lines

We’ll later create metrics

Metric

What exactly is evaluated using measures, dimensions, and aggregation functions.

(one for each measure) to aggregate the data and activate the Business Object at the end to let Illuminate start capturing data.

Check configuration details

Steps

Follow the sections to prepare a Business Object — create and map measures and dimensions, add metrics, and activate it.

Create and map measures and dimensions

Start by defining what data you want to track (measures) and how (dimensions).

Watch video

Step-by-step guide

1. On the Business Objects home page, click the Create Business Object button. The Create new Business Object modal is displayed.

   

2. Provide the name (Game engagement experiment) and optional description, and assign at least one PubNub app and keyset to the Business Object by clicking the Choose Apps & Keysets button.

3. Add two separate measures by clicking the + Add measure button.

   a. Type in a measure name (Messages and Purchase Value).

   b. Map the measures to a data source by clicking the Map button, providing JSON path expressions ($.message.body.chatMessage and $.message.body.purchaseValue), and confirming your choice.

4. Add two separate dimensions by clicking the + Add dimension button.

   a. Type in a dimension name (Guild Name and Purchase Item).

   b. Map the dimensions to a data source by clicking the Map button, providing JSON path expressions ($.message.body.guildName and $.message.body.purchasedItem), and confirming your choice.

5. When you’re done, click Save to create the Business Object.

   

Now that you have your Business Object created, you can either activate it or add metrics to it — the order doesn’t matter, but both steps are required. Once the Business Object is activated and at least one metric has been created, you can either create a Decision or a Dashboard.

Order of steps

You can add metrics even before measures and dimensions are mapped.

Create metrics

Add calculations to your measures and/or dimensions.

Order of steps

You can add metrics before measures and dimensions are mapped.

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Step-by-step guide

1. On the Business Objects home page, click the row with the Business Object to which you want to add the metric. The Business Object details view opens.

   

2. In the Metrics section, click the + Create metric button and the Create metric modal opens.

   

3. Provide the following details for the Message sum metric:

   a. Type in the metric name (Message sum).

   b. Select the aggregation Function to use for the metric (SUM).

   c. Choose Messages as a Measure.

   d. Set the Period to 30 minutes.

   e. Select the Guild Name Dimension you previously added to the Business Object.

   Dimension selection

   If you don’t select a dimension for your Metric, you won’t be able to use it as a criterion in decisions and dashboards in further steps.

   f. Don’t set any Filters for our use case.

4. When you’re done, click Create.

   

5. Repeat steps 2-4 to create the Total purchased value metric:

   a. Type in the metric name (Total purchased value).

   b. Select the aggregation Function to use for the metric (SUM).

   c. Choose Purchase Value as a Measure.

   d. Set the Period to 30 minutes.

   e. Select the Purchase Item Dimension you previously added to the Business Object.

   f. Don’t set any Filters.

   

A ready and activated Business Object with metrics looks as follows.

Activate Business Object

To start capturing and storing the data, you must activate the Business Object.

Conditions for activating a Business Object

Head to the Additional details section for details on conditions that must be met to activate a Business Object.

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Step-by-step guide

To activate a Business Object, open this Business Object and click the Activate button.

From now on, Illuminate will start capturing the requested data until you deactivate or delete the Business Object. You can't add or remove measures or dimensions once you've activated a Business Object, but you can add a metric to it.

Data you defined in Business Objects and subsequently captured are housed in a single database for 90 days.

With the Business Object that is configured and active, you can create a Decision or a Dashboard.