A Game-Changer for Collaborative Work: Confluence Table Extensibility Review

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In the realm of collaborative work, data visualization plays a crucial role in understanding and interpreting information. As an avid user of Atlassian's Confluence, I had the opportunity to explore Confluence's table extensibility feature, which has introduced remarkable advancements in data visualization capabilities.

In this review, I will highlight the positive aspects of Confluence's table extensibility as well as its limitations, specifically focusing on its transformative impact on visualizing data effectively.

Data visualization from multiple data sources

In their post announcing the roll out of the table extensibility feature, Atlassian elaborates on the fact that users can “create transformer macros (such as pivot tables) […] and chain multiple macros together to create a more complex relationship between multiple sets of data”. Unfortunately, I was unable to find any so-called transformer macros anywhere, but I am hoping this will be available quickly as this will unlock interesting opportunities.

When it comes to chaining multiple macros together, I was able to go as far as two: I tied a Confluence table to a Confluence chart.

Something I appreciate is the ability for users to generate as many charts as required from a single source macro. You can easily build compelling dashboard-like visualizations using multiple column layouts inside your Confluence pages.

Real-time data updates

In collaborative work environments, real-time data updates are essential for accurate decision-making. The table extensibility feature is great for that, whatever changes that are made to the source macro can be viewed real time in the target chart macro, quite neat and time saving!

Data display options

Currently, only three types of chart are supported:

• Bar

• Line

• Pie

That’s a good start and one can hope that more types will be available soon.

Chart customization options are quite comprehensive, allowing users to name their charts as well as X and Y axes leading to a user-friendly result.

However, I have noted some limitations which I will list below:

• Some currencies are not supported (e.g. € and £ signs in your tables will not render in the chart)

• Chart macros cannot render data from complex table structures (data from tables with columns containing sub-columns won’t render at all and column parsing is completely off)

• Chart macros are not exported to PDF and Word

Integration possibilities

 As far as I am concerned, this feature is a fantastic enabler for many integrations. I can easily envision a wide range of possible targets beside charts:

• Pivot tables

• Advanced charts provided by third party apps

• Gantt and timeline views

• Etc.

Big shout out to fellow Marketplace partners who are eager to share their experience building integrations using this feature! I'm really curious to find out all use cases unlocked as a result of this feature!

Charting new horizons

At Elements Apps, we liked this feature so much that we decided to make our best-selling app Elements Spreadsheet compatible with it. By configuring a Spreadsheet macro as a source, teams can leverage complex formulas and data manipulation capabilities from Elements Spreadsheet combined with the power and configurability of Confluence charts.

The result is really great and quite promising! You can find more information about this here.

With this first release, we faced a number of limitations when implementing this compatibility, the first one being the fact that only one sheet of a Spreadsheet macro can be used as a source for a chart macro. Allowing several sources for a same target would unlock many use cases.

I genuinely hope that Atlassian will continue fleshing out this amazing feature going forward, providing users with a comprehensive suite of tools to visualize, analyse, and collaborate on data within their Confluence pages and offering Marketplace partners promising integration opportunities.

Kudos to @Laura Mehrkens and Atlassian teams for bringing this brilliant feature into the world!

[David at David Simpson Apps]

Hey @Juliette Lallement _Elements Apps_ 

Here's a quick video overview of how we've added support for table extensibility works on our Table from CSV app:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=oUZRb0Obh8I  

Just like in Elements Spreadsheets, it's really great to be able to view realtime changes in the source data being displayed in connected charts.

– Cheers, David