MaDaM changelog

 
In the pursuit of an even more easily accessible data set, we have introduced components for visually searching through data. The Haystack represents the data based on facetted values and allows users to click through these values to visually create a search for measurements that they are looking for right now. 

 
While following the goal of a more visually accessible data set, we have implemented a complete overhaul of the searching Facet Tree. The type-based facet is hierarchically structured to represent the data model specifics and to allow users to easier find the type they want to work with at any given moment. At the same time, we have included the actual count of results to all facets, giving a clearer idea of data hotspots.

While the functionality to add a subset of measurements from the search result has been available for some time via “Add Selected”, we have added the option to add the complete search result with a single click. 

Certain file formats contain measurement data without standardized structure. Excel and ASCII file formats, among others, can contain signal data and metadata in a vast number of ways. For reading such files, profiles are necessary that define how data is extracted. To improve the experience when working with such formats, MaDaM introduces the online Profile Pool feature. With this, users can store their profiles remotely. The profiled from the pool can then be used for imports on all clients, eliminating the need for redundant local copies of the individual profiles.

 
The capabilities of Wildcard Searching have been extended to include leading wildcards. This allows users to search for contents that are encapsulated, like “*lin” in “Berlin”. Users can decide on a per-field basis whether they want to enable wildcard search or not. Since many fields are commonly searched via the structured search, enabling only specific fields for wildcard searching reduces the performance impact to a minimum.

 
While users generally should be restricted to the bounds of the sandbox that ensures safe operation, sometimes extraordinary goals require that these bounds must be left. For such cases, we’ve introduced the concept of Support Scripts. For these scripts, the sandbox does not apply. However, only scripts that have been specifically signed by the AMS can be executed – to ensure that all operations are safe for the overall system.

 
Since the installation of a new MaDaM system is a multi-step process that requires multiple configurations to be done in concert. We have created an installer tool that can be used to perform the configurations in an assisted way. 

 
MaDaM 2.2 allows users to control multiple importers in a single jBEAM template. Users can define different search queries. The result of each search query can be assigned to a specific data source for the jBEAM template, whether it’s an importer, multi-file-imports or data source manager.

 
The Persistent Audit Log is a central place that shows all changes that are done throughout the MaDaM system. The detailed information includes who made changes, what the type of the change was, and when the change was performed.

When creating automated reports for multiple measurements, it is now possible to group the results by an identifier, for example the ID of a vehicle or the name of an engineer. User will receive one report for each value of the selected identifier.

 
When defining Saved Searches, users can now also define a “Sort By” field name. The results found by using the saved search will then be sorted by the given field. Users can decide whether they want to have the sorting be ascending or descending.

Users can now download any given jBEAM template used in the importer as a data augmentation with a single click in the configuration dialog, making the sharing of the actual file much easier.

 
MaDaM 2.2 offers the option to watch for certain events in user activity and subscribe to E-Mails when the event occurs. An exemplary configuration could notify administrators when any individual user performs more than a given threshold of online reports.

 
The MaDaM system now supports Arabic characters in all user inputs and features a complete Arabic localization.

Automated tasks for importing and reporting can be configured to notify users via E-Mail. For importing tasks, users will receive an overview of the imports and errors during importing, such as duplication or missing files. For reporting tasks, users will receive the result of the report generation as an E-Mail attachment.

For environments in which a full LDAP integration for user management is not possible, MaDaM offers a User Role Management, which can manage users and their roles. The User Role Management allows users to create groups based on an individual tag, such as “Department”, and then assign users the resulting roles. An exemplary use case would be managing engineers of different departments, who should be treated differently in regard to their permissions for individual tests. The User Role Management is integrated into the Settings page and can be accessed from the main MaDaM web-frontend.

With MaDaM 2.1 the relative time range search was introduced and expands the current bounded time range search for static intervals. It enables users to search in relation to their current time or the last full day. Intervals can be specified in years, months, weeks, days hours, minutes, and seconds.

“ImportDate = -2d” = range from now minus two days until now minus

“ImportDate = -1df” = last full day floored (from 0:00 to 24:00)

“ImportDate = [-2Mf; -0Mf]” = a range of the complete current month March and the two months before

We’ve created an updated help for the search syntax to match the new features. The help can be accessed by clicking the question mark next to the search bar and contains detailed information as well as examples for specific searches.

With MaDaM 2.1 we’ve introduced the option to introduce modular components that can perform certain tasks that are not directly related to storing or searching data. This can be used to represent the life cycle processes that a company undertakes.

In an exemplary case, users are allowed to upload measurements, but they have to report to their supervisors to receive the OK to publish measurements to “all” users. The MaDaM frontend offers a way to upload reports to supervisors directly and check for their approval, automatically adjusting the access rights of measurements if approval is given.

MaDaM 2.1. introduces more customization for User Profiles. Users can enter a custom display name and store an E-Mail address, a telephone number and a SkypeID to their individual profiles. Users can also select their default language. Finally, the MaDaM system automatically stores the width of the columns that a user configured in his session and reapplies this configuration when the user logs in again.

To improve administrative overview of the system, we introduced the Task Overview. The overview contains vital information such as the name, start and stop time and the attributes of a task.

MaDaM 2.1 introduces the “No Value” facet, that matches all objects that have no value for a given facet.

To easier distinguish default settings from custom additions or changes to the permissions of objects, non-default rights are displayed with a grey background.

The goal of scripting within MaDaM is to work with the data – without changing the state of the overall system. To ensure that users operate within these bounds, we have introduced a Scripting Sandbox. The sandbox restricts users to very basic language defaults like primitive types and the public scripting API of MaDaM.

Typically, searches are made on a “Tree” that check all children of a given type as well. Users checking for “Test” will also find subtypes of “Test”. The Non-Recursive Search syntax using “$concreteType” is meant for cases where the search should be restricted to exactly the given type, without checking the subtypes.

We’ve improved the handling of access management throughout the system. Most of the time, users want to share a specific measurement with an additional user or an additional group, instead of further restricting access or changing the core of the Default Rights. To improve the default rights handling, all changes on the defaults for a given type now also affect all objects of the type where the default rights themselves have not been changed. Giving all administrators the default right to delete all crash test, for example, will no longer only affect new tests of that type, but also all existing measurements that have not explicitly changed their default handling.

Users that perform an interactive analysis can retrieve the state of their client jBEAM and store it in a jBEAM template file that can be applied to later reports and interactive analyses. By setting the “Fetch file from jBEAM” option in the Template Manager. The state of the client jBEAM will be retrieved at the time when the MaDaM template is saved.

User feedback for error cases, such as authorization errors or server-side issues, has been improved. Users receive color-coded feedback for their actions and for errors in small popup dialogs.

MaDaM 2.0 introduces the option to export the configured data model with all types and fields to a json file. At the same time, it is possible to import json files to reintroduce data models. This allows for easy administrative tasks and syncing between different MaDaM environments.

If users try to create fields with names that contain characters that are invalid or reserved for system use, there is a visual feedback informing the user that the field name is not correct.

An LDAP integration to authenticate and authorize users can be configured for the MaDaM system. Users can have their LDAP groups be mapped to specific roles within the system for easier maintenance. Multiple LDAP dialects are supported, like Windows AD, IBM TDS or standard LDAP.

Besides the default administrative roles, systems now have a defined “Super User” who has access to all components of the MaDaM system. The rights of a super user can never be revoked, and this special user is meant to create the data model and grant rights to other users.

The new “Settings” page can be used to access and perform the various administrative tasks. Administrators can repair the documents of the system, restore model updates or re-index the data from the persistent database.

The MaDaM system now supports Chinese characters in all user inputs and features a complete Chinese localization.