Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics

Qlik Sense®
November 2020
Copyright © 1993-2020 QlikTech International AB. All rights reserved.

HELP.QLIK.COM
© 2020 QlikTech International AB. All rights reserved. Qlik®, Qlik Sense®, QlikView®, QlikTech®, Qlik
Cloud®, Qlik DataMarket ®, Qlik Analytics Platform®, Qlik NPrinting®, Qlik Connectors®, Qlik GeoAnalytics®,
Qlik Core®, Associative Difference®, Lead with Data™, Qlik Data Catalyst ™, Qlik Big Data Index™ and the
QlikTech logos are trademarks of QlikTech International AB that have been registered in one or more
countries. Other marks and logos mentioned herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of their
respective owners.
 Contents

1 Welcome to this tutorial! 5

1.1 About this tutorial 5
1.2 Prerequisites 5
1.3 Further reading and resources 5
2 What is Qlik Sense? 6
2.1 What can you do in Qlik Sense? 6
2.2 How does Qlik Sense work? 6
Qlik Sense Enterprise 6
Qlik Sense Desktop 6
2.3 The app model 6
2.4 The associative selection model (green/white/gray) 7
3 Getting started 8
3.1 Qlik Sense Enterprise 8
Placing the tutorial app in a Qlik Sense Enterprise installation 8
Opening Qlik Sense Enterprise 8
3.2 Qlik Sense Desktop 8
Placing the tutorial app in the Apps folder in Qlik Sense Desktop 8
Opening Qlik Sense Desktop 8
4 Opening the app 9
5 Sheet view 10
5.1 Options menu 11
6 Visualizations in the app 12
6.1 Measures and dimensions 12
6.2 Dashboard visualizations 12
Filter panes 13
Pie chart 13
Bar chart 13
Combo chart 14
KPI 14
Gauge 14
Line chart 14
6.3 Product Details visualizations 14
Treemap 15
6.4 Customer Details visualizations 15
Scatter plot 16
Pivot table 16
6.5 Customer Location visualizations 16
Map 17
7 Making selections 18
7.1 Click selection 18
7.2 Draw selection 18
7.3 Range selection 19
7.4 Lasso selection 20

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 3

 Contents

7.5 Legend selection 20

7.6 Label selection 21
8 Selection states 22
8.1 Green, white, and gray 22
8.2 Making the first selections 22
8.3 Selecting regions and product types 24
8.4 The excluded values 25
8.5 Selected excluded values become selected 26
8.6 Stepping back in the selection history 26
8.7 Thank you! 26

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 4

 1   Welcome to this tutorial!

1 Welcome to this tutorial!

Welcome to this beginner’s tutorial, which will introduce you to Qlik Sense. Qlik Sense is a software product
that is used to extract and present data in an intuitive and easy-to-use interface. You extract data by making
selections. When you make a selection, Qlik Sense immediately filters the data and presents all associated
items. In this tutorial, you will learn how to work with Qlik Sense as a business user, rather than as a
developer. No previous Qlik Sense experience or database knowledge is required. You will be guided through
an existing app, focusing on how Qlik Sense works and how to use Qlik Sense.

1.1 About this tutorial

These are some of the subjects in this tutorial:

l How does Qlik Sense work?

l App views
l Measures and dimensions
l Selections

When you have completed the tutorial, you should have a fair understanding of the basics of Qlik Sense and
be able to use Qlik Sense to gain insight in your data.

Depending on the Qlik Sense platform that you are using, the screenshots in this tutorial may differ slightly
from what you see in Qlik Sense.

1.2 Prerequisites
Before you can start working with Qlik Sense, you need one of the following:

l Access to Qlik Sense Enterprise.

l Qlik Sense Desktop installed on your computer.

You can download Qlik Sense Desktop from www.qlik.com. If you need help with the installation, you can
find instructions at help.qlik.com.

1.3 Further reading and resources

l Qlik offers a wide variety of resources when you want to learn more.
l Qlik Sense online help is available.
l Training, including free online courses, is available in the Qlik Continuous Classroom.
l Discussion forums, blogs, and more can be found in Qlik Community.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 5

 2   What is Qlik Sense?

2 What is Qlik Sense?

Qlik Sense is a data visualization and discovery product that allows you to create flexible, interactive
visualizations that lead to meaningful decisions.

2.1 What can you do in Qlik Sense?

Most Business Intelligence (BI) products can help you answer questions that are understood in advance. But
what about your follow-up questions? The ones that come after someone reads your report or sees your
visualization? With the Qlik Sense associative model, you can answer question after question, moving along
your own path to insight. With Qlik Sense you can explore your data freely, learning at each step along the
way and coming up with next steps based on earlier findings.

2.2 How does Qlik Sense work?

Qlik Sense responds instantly as you work. Qlik Sense does not require predefined and static reports, and
you do not need to depend on others. Just click and learn, while Qlik Sense updates every visualization and
view in the app with a newly calculated set of data and visualizations specific to your selections.

Qlik Sense Enterprise

Qlik Sense Enterprise and its underlying platform supports a wide variety of use cases. This includes self-
service data visualization to empower users to explore data, guided analytics to align users to a standard
business process or workflow, embedded analytics to enhance websites and applications, and custom
analytic applications to support specific business processes or use cases. Qlik Sense Enterprise includes the
Qlik Analytics Platform.

Qlik Sense Desktop

Qlik Sense Desktop is a Windows application that gives individuals the opportunity to use Qlik Sense and
create personalized, interactive data visualizations, reports, and dashboards from multiple data sources with
drag-and-drop ease. Its use requires a Qlik Account, you can register at https://qlikid.qlik.com/register

2.3 The app model

The app is at the core of Qlik Sense.

Instead of deploying and managing huge business applications, you can create your own Qlik Sense apps
that you can reuse, modify and share with others. The app model helps you ask and answer the next question
on your own, without having to go back to an expert for a new report or visualization.

An app consists of one or more sheets containing visualizations. Visualizations are charts, tables and similar
representations of your data together with other information. By making selections in your visualizations you
can analyze the information to make your own discoveries and gain insights about your data.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 6

 2   What is Qlik Sense?

2.4 The associative selection model (green/white/gray)

Discovering connections between data sets is one of the fundamental concepts in Qlik Sense. As you click,
associated data values are highlighted. Selections are highlighted in green, associated data is represented in
white, and excluded (unassociated) data appears in gray. This instant feedback enables you to think of new
questions and continue to explore and discover.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 7

 3   Getting started

3 Getting started

3.1 Qlik Sense Enterprise

Placing the tutorial app in a Qlik Sense Enterprise installation
If you are using Qlik Sense Enterprise, you need to ask your system administrator to import the Beginner’s
tutorial app via the QMC and publish it to a stream that you have access to. For example, the default stream,
Everyone, that is available to all users.

Opening Qlik Sense Enterprise

If the Beginner’s tutorial app is published by your system administrator to a stream, for example, Everyone,
you are ready to start.

You start Qlik Sense Enterprise by entering the web address of your Qlik Sense Enterprise server in your
browser, such as https://<server name>/hub. The exact address depends on how Qlik Sense Enterprise has
been deployed in your organization.

When Qlik Sense Enterprise has started, you arrive at the hub.

The hub is where you find all your apps. If your system administrator has published the app Beginner’s
tutorial to a stream, you should see it in your hub.

3.2 Qlik Sense Desktop

Placing the tutorial app in the Apps folder in Qlik Sense Desktop
If you are using Qlik Sense Desktop, you need to place the Beginner’s tutorial app in the Apps folder before
you can begin this tutorial. Open the folder Documents (it is sometimes called My Documents.) From there
the path to the Apps folder is Qlik\Sense\Apps.

Opening Qlik Sense Desktop

If Qlik Sense Desktop is installed and the Beginner’s tutorial app is in the Apps folder, you are ready to start.

Start Qlik Sense Desktop from the shortcut on your desktop or through the Start menu.

When you start Qlik Sense Desktop, you arrive at the hub. You can close the greeting message.

The hub is where you find all your apps. If you have placed the app Beginner’s tutorial in the Apps folder, you
should see it in your hub.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 8

 4   Opening the app

4 Opening the app

Click the app Beginner’s tutorial. The app overview is opened, and you can see the content of the app

By default, the app overview shows the sheets of the app. In the Beginner’s tutorial app there are four
sheets, Dashboard, Product Details, Customer Details, and Customer Location. You do most of the work in
the sheets, especially if you are primarily a business user and not a developer. Click Dashboard to open that
sheet.

App overview displaying the sheets of the app.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 9

 5   Sheet view

5 Sheet view
You explore, analyze, and discover the data in the sheets. This is also where you create,
design, and structure the visualizations when you build apps.

The sheet view has three sections: the toolbar, the selections tool, and the sheet. When you are editing a
sheet there are panels on both sides of the sheet, but they will not be used in this tutorial.

Sheet view in an app

The following table presents the main parts of the sheet.

Main areas of sheet view

UI item Description

A: The toolbar The toolbar contains options to navigate in your sheet and app.

B: The selections bar The selections bar contains options to make selections in your data and
to clear those selections, and to search for data.

The selections tool also displays all selections that have been made.

C: The sheet The sheet is where you interact with the visualizations.

D: Take snapshot, Take a snapshot of your chart, change certain chart properties in the
exploration menu, full exploration menu, or view your chart in full screen mode. Hover over a
screen chart to view the menu.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 10

 5   Sheet view

There is no autosave function in Qlik Sense Desktop. You need to save your work manually by
clicking Save in the toolbar.

5.1 Options menu

You can open the options menu by:

l Right-clicking on a chart.
l Clicking the hover menu .

Menu options will be different depending on:

l Whether you are editing or analyzing (viewing) charts in an app.

l The chart type.
l The privileges that have been assigned to you by your administrator.

Options menu

The menu will look different if you have touch screen mode enabled on a supported device. You can disable
touch screen mode in the global menu.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 11

 6   Visualizations in the app

6 Visualizations in the app

Before you start working with Qlik Sense, it is a good idea to get an understanding of the basics of
visualizations.

6.1 Measures and dimensions

A visualization consists of at least one measure or one dimension. In most cases a visualization has both,
and sometimes more than one dimension or measure.

Dimensions determine how the data in a visualization is grouped. Dimension values often refer to time,
place, or category.

Measures are the result of some sort of calculation, often aggregations, such as Sum, Count, or Avg
(average).

When dimensions and measures are combined in a visualization, it is possible to see, for example, how many
bikes of a certain category were sold in a certain area during a certain period of time.

6.2 Dashboard visualizations

Different visualizations serve different purposes. The point of a visualization in general is to communicate its
data in a quick and meaningful way while remaining 100% accurate.

Let us have a look at the visualizations in the app.

Dashboard sheet with different visualizations.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 12

 6   Visualizations in the app

Filter panes
In the sheet Dashboard, there are two filter panes to the left: the time filter pane without title and Region.
They are both filter panes, although they do not look the same. Region contains only one dimension, and
shows the dimension values in a list. The time filter pane contains four dimensions, and because the space is
limited, the lists are all compressed to panes. The purpose of the filter panes is to filter out a limited data set,
which you can analyze and explore.

Pie chart
To the right of the time filter pane is a pie chart, Sales per Region. Pie charts show the relationship between
values, as well as the relation of a single value to the total. Each sector represents a value, and as long as
there are a limited number of values (less than 10), you get a good overview of the relative size of the sectors.
The values are ordered by size.

Bar chart
Below the pie chart is a bar chart, Top 5 Customers. Bar charts are useful when you want to compare
multiple values. The bars give information about the relationship between different values. Bars can be
grouped or stacked, and be displayed horizontally or vertically.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 13

 6   Visualizations in the app

Combo chart
Beneath the bar chart is a combo chart, Sales Trend. Combo charts are usually used for displaying trends
with bars and lines in the same visualization. A combo chart is especially useful when you want to combine
values that normally are hard to combine, because they have totally different scales. The solution in the
combo chart is to have two axes for the measures. In Sales Trend, the combo chart combines sales figures
(millions of dollars, on the left axis) with margin (percent, on the right axis).

KPI
To the right of the pie chart is a KPI visualization, Total Sales and Margin. It can be very useful to track
performance. In a KPI visualization, you can show one or two measure values with text labels. You can add
conditional colors and symbols to the values.

Gauge
To the right of the KPI visualization is a gauge, Profit Margin. A gauge is used to display a single key
measure value. In this case it is the profit margin. The colors reinforce the interpretation of the value.

Line chart
The final visualization is a line chart, Quarterly Trend. Line charts are often used to show trends, and this
chart uses two dimensions, year and quarter that displays the trends for each quarter of the years 2012-2014.

6.3 Product Details visualizations

Do the following:

l In the top right corner, click ë to go to the sheet Product Details.

Product Details sheet with different visualizations.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 14

 6   Visualizations in the app

Treemap
The second sheet, Product Details, contains one new visualization type compared to the sheet Dashboard,
and that is the treemap. Treemaps are ideal when you want to display hierarchical data in a limited space. In
this treemap the hierarchy consists of the dimensions Product Group, Product Type, and Item Desc. You
start at the top level (Product Group), and when you make and confirm selections in the treemap you drill
down to the next level (Product Type) to analyze the more detailed data. The items in the treemap are
colored by measure. The darker the color, the higher the measure value.

The screenshot was taken in an app with reduced sheet width. As a consequence, the bar chart does not
display all values at the same time. Therefore, it has a mini chart below the bar chart, which shows a
miniature of the full chart. The mini chart has a scroll bar that can be used for navigation.

6.4 Customer Details visualizations

Do the following:

l In the top right corner, click ë to go to the sheet Customer Details.

Customer Details sheet with different visualizations.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 15

 6   Visualizations in the app

The Customer Details sheet has two new visualizations, a scatter plot, Customer Sales and Quantity, and a
pivot table, Customer KPIs.

Scatter plot
With a scatter plot you can find potential relationships between values, and identify values that deviate from a
group. The size of the bubbles can be used to show differences in values. In this scatter plot the bubbles
show the relationship between sales and quantity, and each bubble is a dimension value: the customer.

Pivot table
The pivot table Customer KPIs shows key customer figures. You can rearrange how the data is displayed,
and analyze data by multiple dimensions and measures at the same time to get different views of the data.

6.5 Customer Location visualizations

Do the following:

l In the top right corner, click ë to go to the sheet Customer Location.

Customer Location sheet with different visualizations.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 16

 6   Visualizations in the app

Map
The fourth sheet, Customer Location, contains three filter panes and one new visualization: a map. In Qlik
Sense you can create maps that display data in point layers and area layers. The map we are using in this
tutorial contains a point layer. A point layer is created using point coordinates (latitude and longitude) or
location names to mark places of interest, for example cities.

Maps can, for example, be used for plotting sales data per region or per location. The map in this tutorial is
used to show customer locations. You can filter by Region, City, or Customer. You can also make selections
directly in the map by clicking on a point. If you hold down Shift before you make a selection you can select
several areas to analyze.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 17

 7   Making selections

7 Making selections
When you use an app, you make selections to reduce the data set, so that you can focus on
particular values. You can make selections in almost all visualizations, and in most cases in
many different ways.

Basically, you either click or draw to make a selection. When you click, you select one value at a time, when
you draw, you select many values at a time. All selection methods are not available for all visualizations, but
the variety of options ensures that you always find a smooth way of making selections.

7.1 Click selection

In the following pie chart, the sector Nordic has been clicked and is thereby selected. The other values are
dimmed. You can confirm the selection by clicking or by clicking outside the visualization.

The sector Nordic has been selected

7.2 Draw selection

You can draw a freehand line to select several values at a time. To deselect values, you click them one at a
time. To activate draw selection, either click inside the visualization and then click , or hold down Shift while
you make your selection.

Bar chart with Nordic, USA and Japan selected

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 18

 7   Making selections

In lists and tables, you can draw across several values to select them.

Region filter pane with Germany, Japan and Nordic selected

7.3 Range selection

You can make a selection by drawing along the y-axis or the x-axis, just outside the chart. For an axis showing
measure values, you are also able to click on the range bubble to enter a specific numeric value.

Combo chart with selections made with range selection

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 19

 7   Making selections

Line chart with selections made with range selection

7.4 Lasso selection

You can draw a freehand circle to capture and select data points. To deselect values, you click them one at a
time. To activate the lasso selection, either click inside the visualization and then click , or hold down Shift
while you make your selection.

Selection of values made in a scatter plot using lasso selection

7.5 Legend selection

You can click the legend items to select the values.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 20

 7   Making selections

Pie chart with sectors Nordic, Germany and UK selected

7.6 Label selection

You can click the dimension labels (in this example, 2012, 2013, and 2014) to select the corresponding value.
In the example, the dimension values are grouped so that clicking one of the years for a country automatically
selects all the values for that country.

Bar chart with label selection of 2011, 2012, and 2013. Clicking any of the years selects the whole group.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 21

 8   Selection states

8 Selection states
Now you know how to make selections, but what happens when you make a selection?
Selections filter out a subset of the data that is loaded into Qlik Sense. You use selections to
focus on something you want to know more about.

8.1 Green, white, and gray

When you make selections in filter panes, the colors of the values change accordingly. The characteristic Qlik
Sense colors are green, white, and gray, and they represent the basic states: selected, possible, and
excluded. The excluded values exist in three different variants. In addition to the normal excluded state, there
are also the alternative state and the selected excluded state. These will be described later.

Colors that are used for different states

State Color

Selected Green, with a check mark as a selection indicator

Possible White

Alternative Light gray

Excluded Dark gray

Selected excluded Dark gray with a check mark as a selection indicator

The whole point behind color coding is to bring you additional information. Green indicates what has been
selected, white indicates the values that are possible to select, and gray indicates the values that have not
been included in your selection. In particular, the gray values can bring you new information about
relationships that were not known before. When a value unexpectedly turns gray after a selection it can lead
to new insights, for example, that a certain region does not have any sales representatives, or that a product
did not sell at all during a whole quarter.

8.2 Making the first selections

Let us make some selections in the app to get an understanding of the different states. But first, go to the
sheet Product Details. In the top right corner, click and select the sheet Product Details.

You will compare the sales of a few different product types in Germany and Japan during 2012.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 22

 8   Selection states

Do the following:

l In the top left filter pane, click Year and select 2012 but do not confirm the selection.

When you click 2012 the value turns green to indicate that it is selected. The two other values, 2013 and
2014, turn light gray to indicate that they are alternative, which means that they are excluded from the
selection. You can select either of the two if you want to change the scope, but by selecting 2012 you want
the other years to be excluded, because you only want to see values for 2012.

As soon as you make a selection, the other visualizations are updated. You do not even have to confirm the
selection to see the outcome, a preview is shown immediately. You can undo a selection by clicking .

After the selection of 2012, the filter pane Region does not change. It is still white, indicating that the values
are associated and can be selected. The bar chart Total Sales is updated to display only the sales for 2012,
and, likewise, Product Treemap shows the product groups that were sold in 2012. You can see the difference
if you click 2012 again to deselect it. When no selection is made, the bar chart and treemap both display the
values for all three years, but when 2012 is selected, only the values related to that year are displayed.

Do the following:

1. Make sure 2012 is selected.

The selections bar above the sheet shows the new selection. More about that later.
2. Still in the time filter pane, click Quarter and select Q1. Confirm the selection.
The new selection is added to the selections bar, and the bar chart and treemap are updated.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 23

 8   Selection states

3. So far, you have selected 2012 and Q1. Click Month.

You can see that Jan, Feb, and Mar are possible values (white), whereas the other months are
excluded. This makes sense, because the possible values are months in the first quarter, which you
selected, and you could refine your selection further by selecting one or two of the possible months.
Selecting all three would not constitute a new selection, because that is equal to selecting Q1, which
has already been selected.

4. Click to leave Month without making any selections.

5. In the selections bar, click to clear the selection of Q1.
The selection 2012 should now be the only selection.

8.3 Selecting regions and product types

Let us compare the sales of fresh vegetables in Germany and Japan.

Do the following:

1. In the Region filter pane, select Germany and Japan and confirm.
2. In the Product Treemap, select Produce and confirm.
3. In the treemap, select the product type Vegetables.
By selecting Vegetables you exclude the other product types, Fruit, Specialty, and Packaged
Vegetables, which are part of the same product group Produce, but are not fresh vegetables.

To be able to see the relationship between the two countries, you need to change sheets.

4. In the top right corner, click to go to the sheet Dashboard.

In the pie chart, Sales per Region, you can see that the sales for 2012 is almost exactly twice as big in
Japan as in Germany.

To instead see the figures for Specialty, which is nuts and almonds, do the following:

5. In the selections bar, click Product Type to open the list.

6. Deselect Vegetables and select Specialty instead. Confirm.
With this selection, Germany has the highest sales, and therefore that value is presented first in the
pie chart (counting clockwise from 12 o' clock).

Now that you have changed sheets, there are some other things to notice. The selections in this sheet
are exactly the same as the ones in the Product Details sheet. Selections are global. This means that
when you make a selection in a visualization, the selection is reflected in all related visualizations, no

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 24

 8   Selection states

matter what sheet they are on. Consequently, the selections bar looks the same when you move
between the different sheets. The selections bar shows all selections regardless of which sheet they
were made on.

7. Go to the sheet Customer Location.

You can see that the regions Germany and Japan are still selected, and that these are the only areas
showing data in the map Location.

8.4 The excluded values

When you deselected Vegetables to instead select Specialty, the first four values are possible values that
can be selected.

When Specialty is selected, some values are alternative (light grey) and some are excluded (dark grey).

Specialty is selected and the following three values are alternative, that is, they are excluded, but only by the
selection of Specialty. The values after Vegetables, on the other hand, are already excluded by a selection in
another list, and are therefore dark gray.

What would happen if you selected the excluded value Bread?

Do the following:

l In the selections list for Product Type, select Bread.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 25

 8   Selection states

The value is selected (with a check mark) but remains dark gray, that is, it is selected excluded. The selection
of Bread is not compatible with the already existing selections. But the value is still selected and will become
green if the selection that excludes it is cleared or if the product group to which it belongs, is included in the
selection.

8.5 Selected excluded values become selected

You can make the excluded value Bread become selected by doing one of the following.

l In Product Group, select the value Baking Goods, which is light gray, alternative.
l In Product Group, clear the selection Produce.
l In Product Type, clear the selection Specialty.

8.6 Stepping back in the selection history

What if you want to return to the selection with Vegetables? If you remember all the selections, the quickest
way is perhaps to make the selections again. But with more complex selections it may be difficult to
remember all the selections, and you could easily overlook something. A safer option in that case would be to
step back in the selection history.

Selection history options in the selections bar

In the selections bar, there are options for stepping back and forward in the selection history. All the
selections you have made during this session are stored and you can return to them by using the step back (>)
and step forward () options. It is not until you have stepped back that you can step forward. By default, you
are at the last step in the selection history and therefore you cannot step forward, because there is no later
step.

8.7 Thank you!

You have reached the end of this tutorial. You now know the basics of Qlik Sense: how to make selections
and interpret the results. When you want to learn more, remember to use the excellent resources mentioned
on the welcoming page. If you want to learn how to build an app, download Qlik Sense Tutorial - Building an
app and get an understanding of all the steps involved in app building.

Tutorial - Beginning with the Basics - Qlik Sense, November 2020 26