MasterConfig: Managing Master Items in Qlik Sense

One of the best features of Qlik Sense is its ability to reuse visualization components through Master Items (or Master Library). The Master Items collection can contain dimension fields, expression definitions or even complete visualizations that are curated and standardized for the users.

Library_Bynfo

At BDS Bynfo we frequently encounter the need to reuse Master Items in other applications. As we create many master items that can have complex  logic, we do not want to create duplicates of the Master items from scratch or copy them manually.

We follow Qlik recommended practice to reuse assets within an application, but we have gone further in having developed a centralized repository for our master items, so we do not need to rewrite long expressions, do extensive copy-pasting or rewrite titles, names and descriptions. Still there remains the frequent question how to reuse them in other applications.

The answer is MasterConfig.

MasterConfig is a great open source Qlik Sense extension that can populate many master items to many other apps at once. With MasterConfig, it is possible to handle both dimensions and measures, and create hierarchical master items as well.

It has a dynamic and user-friendly interface that also creates warnings if master items are already present in the target applications. 

This really saves a lot of time for developers from redundant rewriting when preparing new Qlik Sense applications.

Screenshot_Ade

The code for MasterConfig is available under the MIT license on Github and the extension can be obtained from Qlik Branch. Read more about it in the repository readme.

Qlik has come a very long way in terms of end-user experience from days of Qlik View. With Qlik Sense, Qlik has embraced the power of the Open Source and increasingly focused on developer experience. This has translated into a flourishing ecosystem (nowadays called the Garden on Qlik Branch) composed of over 600 contributions from the public and companies. In addition to this Qlik has also open access to dozens of their own libraries. The benefits of Open Source are real, for both end users, developers and businesses, as well as for Qlik; and goes beyond what is possible to achieve with their excellent Qlik Community.

We recommend you to join us in Qlik Community. Also, it would be great to hear your feedback if this extension has helped you!