In the Syntasa platform, an 'App' is a comprehensive environment designed for data integration, processing, and analysis. Apps in Syntasa facilitate the creation of automated workflows that handle data ingestion from various sources, apply transformations, and enrich the data for deeper insights. They include tools for building and deploying machine learning models, enabling users to perform predictive analytics and data-driven decision-making.
This article covers the following topics:
- Prerequisites for creating a new App
- How to create a new App?
- How to copy an existing App?
- How to update the basic details of an existing App?
- How to search Apps in the workspace
Prerequisites
Before diving into app creation, it's crucial to have a few key elements in place. Let's explore two essential prerequisites: Templates & DataStores.
Templates
Syntasa streamlines app creation with pre-built templates. These templates offer pre-configured structures and settings that can be easily customized to fit your specific needs. Here's a look at some key Syntasa app creation templates:
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Synthesizer
- Adobe Analytics adapter
- Generic input adapter
- Google Analytics adapter
- Id graph
- Synthesizer Free Form
- Unified Adapter
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Composure
- Composer Free Form
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Propensity Scoring
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Orchestrator
- Orchestrator Free Form
Datastore
Every application needs a central location to store, manage, and retrieve its data. This is where data stores come in. They act as the backbone of your Syntasa application, ensuring smooth operation and data accessibility. You can read more about DataStores here.
Syntasa offers three types of data stores, each with a specific purpose:
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Event Store: This is the workhorse, storing a comprehensive history of events generated by your application. It facilitates efficient data retrieval and analysis, allowing your app to function seamlessly.
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ID Store: This store focuses on managing unique identifiers, critical for user authentication and data security within your application.
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Intelligence Hub: This serves as a centralized repository for insights and analytics data. It helps you gain a valuable understanding of your app's performance and user behavior.
The specific data store(s) your app utilizes depends on the chosen template. For instance, the Adobe Analytics Adapter template primarily uses the Event Store, while the ID Graph template leverages the ID Store.
Creating a New App
- Click the 'Menu' icon (
) in the top left corner.
- Select 'Workspace' from the options under the 'Platform' section.
- Click the 'Create New' drop-down menu in the top right corner.
- Select 'App' from the list (highlighted in the screenshot below)
- Fill in all the mandatory details on the 'Create New App' page & click on the 'Save' button.
- After clicking on the "Save" button, the user will be automatically redirected to the development workflow page, where the app will be ready for data processing.
Let's explore all the fields displayed on the 'Create New App' screen:
- Name: This field allows you to assign a name to the app. Each name must be unique among all apps.
- Key: Automatically generated from the app name, recommended to retain its default value.
- App Prefix: Automatically generated from the app name.
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Copy/Import App: Enabling 'Copy/Import App' allows you to create a new app based on an existing one, rather than starting from scratch. The source app can be from within the same Syntasa application for copying or from an external source when importing.
- Copy App: It allows you to copy an existing app. To know more about this, please click here.
- Import App: Import Feature allows the import of an app i.e. exported from an external Syntasa application.
- Description: Provide information explaining the purpose of the app. This is especially useful if the app is to be shared with other users.
- Tags: All objects throughout the Syntasa application support tags to help organize and search for related objects. To know more about this, please refer to the Tags article.
- Folder: The folder path determines where your app will reside within Syntasa's organized structure. By default, it inherits the location where you clicked "Create New App." However, you can customize this path before creating the app or even move it to a different folder later.
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Template: This drop-down is divided into three different categories, which are as follows:
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Synthesizer: This category has 6 templates, which are as follows:
- Adobe Analytics Adapter: The Adobe Analytics Adapter by Syntasa allows for the integration and processing of data from Adobe Analytics. This adapter facilitates the extraction of detailed clickstream data, making it possible to combine and analyze this data with other enterprise data sources for comprehensive insights and better decision-making.
- Generic Input Adapter: The Generic Input Adapter is designed to handle various types of data inputs. It serves as a flexible tool for ingesting different data formats and structures into the Syntasa platform, enabling users to standardize and process data from multiple sources efficiently.
- Google Analytics Adapter: The Google Analytics Adapter enables the integration of Google Analytics data into the Syntasa platform. This adapter helps in leveraging the detailed user interaction data collected by Google Analytics, allowing for more in-depth analysis and better integration with other data sets within the Syntasa environment.
- ID Graph: The ID Graph feature in Syntasa combines all digital identifiers from various data sources to create a unified profile for each user. This process involves selecting the best identifier for matching purposes across different platforms, ensuring more accurate audience targeting and data analysis. By synthesizing data at granular levels into sessions and individuals, the ID Graph helps in building a comprehensive view of customer behavior across multiple interactions and devices
- Synthesizer Free Form: Synthesizer Free Form is a Synthesizer app that provides a blank workflow for the ability to create custom by using prebuilt processes like Transform or Spark process. To know more about this, please refer to the Synthesizer Free From article.
- Unified Adapter: Unified Adapter is a template that provides the ability to unify data from multiple sources, e.g. Adobe Analytics, Transactional, Product, customer, CRM, ID Graph, etc. Unifying multiple sources, leveraging our ID Graph capability, provides a single source of truth and stitches a customer's journey. To know more about this, please refer Unified Adapter article.
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Composer: This category has two different templates, which are as follows:
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Composer Free Form: The "Composer Free Form" in Syntasa refers to a component within the Composer module. Composer is used to apply AI and ML models to extract actionable intelligence from customer data. The Free Form component allows users to define custom processes and workflows without being restricted to predefined templates, providing flexibility in data manipulation and analysis.
- Propensity Scoring: Propensity Scoring is a method used by Syntasa to predict customer behaviors, such as the likelihood of making a purchase or taking a specific action. It uses machine learning algorithms to analyze customer data and identify patterns that indicate a higher probability of desired outcomes. This allows businesses to target and engage customers more effectively by focusing on those most likely to convert or take other valuable actions.
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Composer Free Form: The "Composer Free Form" in Syntasa refers to a component within the Composer module. Composer is used to apply AI and ML models to extract actionable intelligence from customer data. The Free Form component allows users to define custom processes and workflows without being restricted to predefined templates, providing flexibility in data manipulation and analysis.
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Orchestrator: This category has one part only which is as follows:
- Orchestrator Free Form: Orchestrator Free Form in SYNTASA™ refers to a type of orchestrator application that allows users to create custom workflows by leveraging pre-built processes. It provides a blank canvas for users to design integrations with enterprise systems to deliver data points. Users can drag and drop different data connection sources and processes, such as "From File", to create customized workflows tailored to their specific needs. The workflow configuration includes setting up infrastructure, event stores, and connections to ensure seamless data ingestion and processing. To know more about this, please refer Orchestrator Free From article
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Synthesizer: This category has 6 templates, which are as follows:
- Data Store: Syntasa applications rely on data stores to manage the information they process. These act as central hubs for storing and retrieving data, ensuring its accessibility within the processing environment. Syntasa offers three primary data store types, each serving a distinct purpose Event Store, ID Store, and Intelligence Hub. To know more about this, please refer to the Data Store article
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Default Partition Scheme: This refers to a data partitioning strategy used in data storage architectures.
- Daily/Hourly: Depending on the frequency of data being received, data can be partitioned based on time intervals, typically either daily or hourly. This partitioning helps in organizing data into smaller, manageable chunks based on time, which can improve query performance, data retrieval, and overall system efficiency.
Override Icon - The override icon toggle allows the default icon shown on a component's card to be altered. The default icon is dependent on the type of component. When the toggle is turned on there are two options to associate a new icon with the component, depending on the position of the existing Icon toggle:
- On - This allows the user to search icons that have already been uploaded to the environment and associate one with the current component.
- Off - This allows the user to upload a new icon for the component. When uploading a new icon it must be given a name so that it can be referenced and searched for and thus is available to be reused on different components.
Sharing Options:
When creating a new app or resource, the sharing option selection will be available to make the component available as Private, Public, or Group. Regardless of the selection, a user with the role of System Admin will always have access to all apps and resources.
The sharing option selected at the time of creating the component can be changed by the owner or a system administrator. The owner of the app or resource is by default the user that is creating the component. This can be changed, if needed, by the owner or the system administrator, after the component is created.
When editing a component, the owner and sharing option is visible and can be changed by the owner or system administrator. For other users, when editing a component, the sharing option and owner settings are hidden.
- Private - Private can be set by the owner (or the system administrator) to limit access to the component only to the owner. System administrators can also access components set to private.
- Public - Public is the default setting and is the behavior of all components before Syntasa 5.2, i.e. before the sharing functionality was available, as all users have access to the component (except apps that are in a module, Synthesizer, Composer, Orchestrator, and the user's role is such that they do not have access to that module).
- Group - Group can be set by the owner (or the system administrator) to limit the access to the component to the user group(s) assigned to the component. As with private, the system administrator can view components with the sharing option set to group regardless if they are a member of the group.
Create an App by Copying Another App
Copying an app from another app generally involves duplicating the functionality, and design of an existing application to create a new one. Here are the key steps involved in this process:
- Go to the 'Create New App' page.
- Enable the toggle of 'Copy/Import App' & 'Copy App' being enabled by default.
- After enabling the toggle for 'Copy/Import App', fill in all the mandatory details along with the source app you want to copy. The details of each field displayed on this page are provided below.
- Click on the 'Save' button.
- After clicking on the 'Save' button, the user will be automatically redirected to the development workflow page, where the app will be ready for data processing.
Let's explore the "Copy App" feature and its options to help you easily create new apps based on existing ones.
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Enabling the Copy Functionality
- Activate the toggle Copy/Import App to unlock the app copying functionality. By default, the "Copy App" option will be pre-selected.
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Selecting the Source App
- Once you activate the "Copy/Import App" toggle with the 'Copy App' option, a new dropdown field named "Source App" appears.
- This field("Source App") allows you to select the specific app you want to replicate.
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Selecting the Source Workflow
- By default, "Development" is selected. This copies the development workflow of the selected source app.
- If your selected app is already deployed in production, an additional option for "Production" will be enabled. This allows you to copy the production workflow instead.
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Copying Existing Notes (Optional)
- This optional toggle lets you decide whether to include existing notes (both app and process notes) from the source app in the newly created app.
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Customizing Prerequisite for the New App
- Lookups/Tables/Views: You can rename these for the new app.
- Template: This field is non-editable.
- Event Store: You can edit this field to change the event store for the new app.
Updating the Details of an Existing App.
You can edit the basic app details like the App name, app prefix, description, folder name, etc of an existing app by navigating to the 'Overview' screen of the app. You can navigate to this screen in two ways:
- Launching an app and then navigating to the 'Overview' Screen.
- Selecting the 'Overview' option from the App Card as shown below).
Note: On the Overview screen, the app prefix will not be updated simultaneously with the app name. It needs to be changed manually.
Searching an App on the Workspace page
You can search for an existing app from the Workspace page. You can follow these steps to search for an app.
- Go to 'Workspace' from the options under the 'Platform' section.
- Select 'All Apps' from the options under the 'Filters' tab. This will display all the apps available for you.
- Now enter the app name, such as 'Syntasa Demo App'. It will display the app(s) as per the name entered.
You can also search for apps within a specific folder. More will be covered on that in the next article 'Launching an app'