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New in CloudTables: File and image upload
I'm delighted to announce the availability of the latest feature in CloudTables - upload of files and images. This feature is available in all plans for CloudTables, with the amount of storage differing for the various plans. Additionally, the Enterprise plan has the option of specifying your own S3 storage service.
To use the new upload ability of CloudTables, on the Data tab for your data set, click the button to add a new data point and select Image or File. The behavior of both is very similar, although the image type has additional display options. For files you can display a link that allows the file to be downloaded, or just information about the file, while for images there is also the option to display a thumbnail of the image and to show the image in a lightbox when clicked.
In the example below, we have a list of the countries where we currently provide automatic language support for in CloudTables (get in touch if you are interested in others being added), showing the country name, continent (which is a linked table), code and flag. The flag can be clicked to show in a lightbox.
Large data sets with CloudTables
CloudTables is all about making it easy for you to work with your data. You shouldn't need to worry about how performance with large data sets - even with millions of records, it should just work while still maintaining performance.
To date we've recommended that you not store more than 50'000 records in CloudTables. This wasn't a fixed limit, but rather a soft one imposed by how CloudTables operates. It would download the data to the client-side which would then apply ordering, filtering, etc, so there was a natural delay for larger data sets as the data was transferred over the network.
In order to address this, we've introduced a new server-side processing mode in CloudTables. If you have used DataTables previously, you might recognize this terminology - essentially the data processing is moved from the client to the server, so the database, which is highly optimized for actions such as ordering and filtering data, performs those actions and only the data needed for the current display is transmitted to the web-browser. Thus rather than downloading the full data set upfront, the data from it is loaded as required for display, resulting in a much more responsive end user experience.
Using CloudTables with Python
We have recently added a Python client for the CloudTables API. This blog post, along with this video, will walk you through the steps on how to install and use it. The Python API is fully documented, with all methods and parameters listed. Read on for more details, or if you prefer a video format, see below:
Customs Buttons - a button to trigger your code
In a recent blog post, I gave an example of how the DataTables API can be used to enhance your table. In that example, the code triggered on page load, but often you'll want to trigger an action based on a user action.
Custom buttons provide a control, styled like the other buttons for your table, that can trigger your code when pressed. This simple example triggers the selection of the "London" rows in the table, but the ability to run your own function means the table can be more fully integrated with other components on your site.
If you like to follow along with a video, see below, otherwise, keep reading!
Install CloudTables self-hosted
With SaaS (Software as a Service) solutions, your data is stored somewhere out there in the cloud. Some people love this, as it gives freedom from the underlying architecture - you don't need to worry about backups, system updates, or even your whereabouts, that data will always be available.
This freedom though does have a cost, and that is lack of ownership of your data. If your data is super-sensitive, you may not want that data outside of your premises and outside of your total control.
For that reason, CloudTables can be installed locally, what we refer to as a self-hosted installation. You'll get the same UI, the same experience, but you control the data and the configuration.
In this post, and its accompanying video, I'll show how to install CloudTables on your own server.
Using CloudTables in a Node.js
In this blog post I'll demonstrate how quick and easy it is to securely embed a CloudTable into your Node.js application with the CloudTables API for Node.js. We also have a video showing how to do this if you prefer to follow along with a video.
Using CloudTables in a .NET project (transcription)
This blog is a transcription of the Embedding - .NET video. We hope that this written version will help our non-English speaking users follow along and also those of you who prefer written instructions!
Older blog posts
- How Easy Was that?! (transcription)
- New in CloudTables: Custom Button Collections
- Summing Column Data - part 2: DataTables display
- Summing Column Data - part 1: DataTables API
- New in CloudTables: Record colors
- Using the DataTables and Editor API with CloudTables
- How easy was that?!
- CloudTables ❤️ Bootstrap 5 and Bulma
- Full CRUD API
- New in CloudTables: Nested data
- New in CloudTables: Bar display and easier nesting of data
- Introducing the CloudTables blog
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