Building a tabbed dashboard with Looker components

One simple example of how UI components can enhance an embedded application is to use them to create tabbed navigation for dashboards:

A sample dashboard with a tabbed interface.

The following example adds tabbed dashboards to a basic TypeScript extension that was built using Looker's extension framework.

To work through this example, make sure your setup meets the requirements and then use these steps:

  1. Build a basic TypeScript extension.
  2. Create the file src/Dashboards.tsx to connect and store dashboards.
  3. Create the file src/Tabs.tsx to store the Tabs component.
  4. Replace the HelloWorld reference in src/App.tsx.
  5. Update the manifest.lkml file with embed entitlement.
  6. Publish the extension to your Looker instance.

Requirements

You will need a few elements before you start:

  • You must have access to a Looker instance with the Extension Framework enabled.
  • You must have develop permission.
  • You should have several user-defined dashboards within Looker to place within the UI tabs.
  • Whether you're building in the extension framework or in your own stand-alone React application, it is important to authenticate with Looker's API and have access to the Looker SDK object. Read about Looker API authentication or our extension framework for more information.
  • This example uses the Looker Embed SDK. To allow the Embed SDK to run against your instance, http://localhost:8080 must be included in the Embedded Domain Allowlist inside the Embed page of the Admin panel.
  • Make sure you have installed the Looker Components NPM package. Information on installing and using the components package can be found in the README document, available in GitHub and NPM.

Step 1: Build a basic TypeScript extension

Follow the instructions on the Introduction to building a Looker extension documentation page to build an extension. To make the extension a TypeScript extension, use the following modifications:

  • If you use the create-looker-extension tool to create the extension template, choose TypeScript as the language you would like to use in the second step.
  • If you clone the Git repository to create the extension template, navigate to the extension-examples/react/TypeScript/helloworld-ts directory in the second step.

Step 2: Create the file src/Dashboards.tsx to connect and store dashboards

Inside the src directory of your new extension, create a Dashboards.tsx file. This file will connect and store the dashboards that you've built inside Looker.

Inside the file, paste the following code. This code creates three dashboard objects and specifies them by ID. You can create more or fewer dashboard objects, depending on your needs.

There are three locations in the code of an instance URL, https://mycompany.looker.com. Change this to your Looker instance URL.

import React, { useCallback } from "react";
import { LookerEmbedSDK } from "@looker/embed-sdk";
import styled from "styled-components";

export const EmbeddedDashboard1 = (props: { id: number | string }) => {
 const [dashboard, setDashboard] = React.useState();
 const setupDashboard = (dashboard: any) => {
   setDashboard(dashboard);
 };
 const embedCtrRef = useCallback((el) => {
   const hostUrl = "https://mycompany.looker.com/";
   if (el && hostUrl) {
     el.innerHTML = "";
     LookerEmbedSDK.init(hostUrl);
     LookerEmbedSDK.createDashboardWithId(props.id)
       .withNext()
       .appendTo(el)
       .build()
       .connect()
       .then(setupDashboard)
       .catch((error) => {
         console.error("Connection error", error);
       });
   }
 }, []);
 return <EmbedContainer ref={embedCtrRef}></EmbedContainer>;
};

export const EmbeddedDashboard2 = (props: { id: number }) => {
 const [dashboard, setDashboard] = React.useState();
 const setupDashboard = (dashboard: any) => {
   setDashboard(dashboard);
 };
 const embedCtrRef = useCallback((el) => {
   const hostUrl = "https://mycompany.looker.com/";
   if (el && hostUrl) {
     el.innerHTML = "";
     LookerEmbedSDK.init(hostUrl);
     LookerEmbedSDK.createDashboardWithId(props.id)
       .withNext()
       .appendTo(el)
       .build()
       .connect()
       .then(setupDashboard)
       .catch((error) => {
         console.error("Connection error", error);
       });
   }
 }, []);
 return <EmbedContainer ref={embedCtrRef}></EmbedContainer>;
};

export const EmbeddedDashboard3 = (props: { id: number }) => {
 const [dashboard, setDashboard] = React.useState();
 const setupDashboard = (dashboard: any) => {
   setDashboard(dashboard);
 };
 const embedCtrRef = useCallback((el) => {
   const hostUrl = "https://mycompany.looker.com/";
   if (el && hostUrl) {
     el.innerHTML = "";
     LookerEmbedSDK.init(hostUrl);
     LookerEmbedSDK.createDashboardWithId(props.id)
       .withNext()
       .appendTo(el)
       .build()
       .connect()
       .then(setupDashboard)
       .catch((error) => {
         console.error("Connection error", error);
       });
   }
 }, []);

 return <EmbedContainer ref={embedCtrRef}></EmbedContainer>;
};

export const EmbedContainer = styled.div`
 width: 100%;
 height: 95vh;
 & > iframe {
   width: 100%;
   height: 100%;
 }
`;

In the previous code example, the following things are happening:

  • The import statements are bringing in the needed dependencies.

    import React, { useCallback } from "react";
import { LookerEmbedSDK } from "@looker/embed-sdk";
import styled from "styled-components";

  • The next code block creates an EmbeddedDashboard1 object, which is an EmbedContainer object that contains a dashboard iframe. The iframe is generated from the Looker Embed SDK using the dashboard ID passed to it. Be sure to update https://mycompany.looker.com/ to your Looker instance URL.

    export const EmbeddedDashboard1 = (props: { id: number | string }) => {
const [dashboard, setDashboard] = React.useState();
const setupDashboard = (dashboard: any) => {
  setDashboard(dashboard);
};
const embedCtrRef = useCallback((el) => {
  const hostUrl = "https://mycompany.looker.com/";
  if (el && hostUrl) {
    el.innerHTML = "";
    LookerEmbedSDK.init(hostUrl);
    LookerEmbedSDK.createDashboardWithId(props.id)
      .withNext()
      .appendTo(el)
      .build()
      .connect()
      .then(setupDashboard)
      .catch((error) => {
        console.error("Connection error", error);
      });
  }
}, []);
return <EmbedContainer ref={embedCtrRef}></EmbedContainer>;
};

  • The next two code blocks repeat this process for EmbeddedDashboard2 and EmbeddedDashboard3. Once more, be sure to update https://mycompany.looker.com/ to your Looker instance URL.

  • The final block styles the EmbedContainer.

      export const EmbedContainer = styled.div`
    width: 100%;
    height: 95vh;
    & > iframe {
      width: 100%;
      height: 100%;
    }
`;

Step 3: Create the file src/Tabs.tsx to store the Tabs component

Inside the src directory of your new extension, create a Tabs.tsx file. This file stores the Tabs component and references the Looker dashboard ID for each dashboard.

Inside that file, paste the following code (the section following this one explains what the code is doing):

import React from "react";
import { ComponentsProvider, Tabs2, Tab2 } from "@looker/components";
import { EmbeddedDashboard1, EmbeddedDashboard2, EmbeddedDashboard3,
} from "./Dashboards";

export const Tabs = () => (
 <ComponentsProvider>
   <Tabs2>
     <Tab2 id="5" label="Order Analysis Dashboard">
      Order data from the last 12 months
       <EmbeddedDashboard1 id={5} />
     </Tab2>
     <Tab2 id="2" label="Inventory Dashboard">
       Current global inventory
       <EmbeddedDashboard2 id={2} />
     </Tab2>
     <Tab2 id="7" label="Customer Dashboard">
       Anonymized customer data
       <EmbeddedDashboard3 id={7} />
     </Tab2>
   </Tabs2>
 </ComponentsProvider>
)

In the previous code example, the following things are happening:

  • The import statements are bringing in the needed dependencies and components, as well as the EmbeddedDashboard objects that were created in the Dashboards.tsx file.

    import React from "react";
import { ComponentsProvider, Tabs2, Tab2 } from "@looker/components";
import { EmbeddedDashboard1, EmbeddedDashboard2, EmbeddedDashboard3,
} from "./Dashboard";

  • The export statement makes the Tabs object available to be imported into other components.

    export const Tabs = () => (

  • The ComponentsProvider wraps around individual components to help with theming.

    <ComponentsProvider>
</ComponentsProvider>

  • The Tabs2 component and its child component, Tab2, create three tabs and link them to the Looker dashboards.

     <Tabs2>
 <Tab2 id="5" label="Order Analysis Dashboard">
  Order data from the last 12 months
   <EmbeddedDashboard1 id={5} />
 </Tab2>
 <Tab2 id="2" label="Inventory Dashboard">
   Current global inventory
   <EmbeddedDashboard2 id={2} />
 </Tab2>
 <Tab2 id="7" label="Customer Dashboard">
   Anonymized customer data
   <EmbeddedDashboard3 id={7} />
 </Tab2>
</Tabs2>
    • The id prop of Tab2 accepts a unique tab ID. Update the ID as necessary for your environment.
    • The label prop accepts the label that will appear on each tab. Update the ID as appropriate for the dashboard you are using.
    • A string that is placed inside the Tab2 tags will appear at the top of the content area for that tab. Update or remove the string as needed.
    • The EmbeddedDashboard1, EmbeddedDashboard1, and EmbeddedDashboard1 objects are placed within the tab. Their id properties accept the dashboard ID of the dashboard to be embedded inside that tab. When you're building your own tabbed dashboard, replace this value with the dashboard ID for the dashboard you want to use. You can find the numeric dashboard ID in the URL after dashboards/. For example, if the URL is https://example.looker.com/dashboards/61?Recording+Date=10+weeks&Country=US then the dashboard ID would be 61.

Step 4: Replace the HelloWorld reference in src/App.tsx

Navigate to your App.tsx file in the src directory. Remove the HelloWorld import statement:

import { HelloWorld } from './HelloWorld'

and replace it with:

import { Tabs } from './Tabs'

Optionally, you can also delete the HelloWorld.tsx file from this directory since you will no longer be using it.

Step 5: Update the manifest.lkml file with embed entitlement

Add the following entitlement to the entitlements section of the manifest.lkml file in your LookML project:

use_embeds: yes

The manifest.lkml file should look like this:

application: name {
  label: "label"
  url: "http://localhost:8080/bundle.js"
  # file: "bundle.js
  entitlements: {
    core_api_methods: ["me"] #Add more entitlements here as you develop new functionality
    use_embeds: yes
  }
}

Now you can navigate to your extension, which appears in the Applications folder in the left navigation panel. If you've started your local development server with yarn develop, you can see the embedded, tabbed dashboards.

Step 6: Publish the extension to your Looker instance

To show the extension to other Looker users, publish the extension to your Looker instance using these steps:

  1. With your development server running, navigate to localhost:8080/bundle.js.
  2. Save the content of the browser window locally on your computer as a .js file.
  3. Make sure you are in development mode, and then drag and drop the .js file into your extension project. Save your changes.
  4. In the manifest.lkml file, comment out the line url: "http://localhost:8080/bundle.js".
  5. In the manifest.lkml file, uncomment the line # file: "bundle.js" and make sure the filename matches the filename of the .js file you uploaded to your project. Save your changes.
  6. Commit and deploy your changes.

Once deployed, you will no longer need to start your local development server to see the extension, and users on your Looker instance should be able to see the extension if they navigate to it inside the Applications folder in the left navigation panel.