How the “Combine new with old results” advanced option works in Dataslayer?

You can find this option in the Dataslayer extension, below the OPTIONS tab.



It works by automatically accumulating the information of your old data with the new one when you modify, refresh or schedule your queries. It is very useful since old data is no longer overwritten, it is accumulated.

How to use it

A temporal dimension is always needed when you want to use this option

To use this option is very simple. You just have to follow these steps:

The first thing to do is to create the query WITHOUT the Combine new with old result option and select the date range and parameters (metrics, dimensions, options, ...) you want.

Remember to add a temporal dimension to the query.

Modify the query you just created by changing the date range to the day you want to be added below the table and add the Combine new with old results option.
For example, if you want new data to be added every day you would have to change both the start date and end date to "Yesterday" (we do not recommend using "Today" as it may bring incomplete data).

Dataslayer tip: You can type in date ranges. Learn more tricks for dates here.

You are done! You only have to schedule the update so that each time the query is refreshed the new data is added.

Limitations

You cannot combine the "combine new with old results option" with the "exclude header row" option.

When the combine option is on, we look through the dimension and metric headers to see if that value has already been inserted before to replace it, insert it at the end of the table, or skip it. If you exclude the header row, the table does not return the metrics or dimensions names, so we only have the values of the metrics and since they are equal to previous values, they are being replaced instead of being inserted at the end. So the results may come out with discrepancies.

For example, if you select "Month" as a dimension and you have both options selected, since the header has been omitted and the table does not return the "Month" field, we only have the value of the metrics and the new value it's going to replace the old one, instead of being accumulated.

The solution to this is to select only one of the two options, but not both together.

Click here to know more about the other advanced options Dataslayer has.

If you still have doubts, contact us through our live chat on our website or via email.

Updated on: 09/01/2024