Guides

Share a dashboard

A dashboard is private until you publish it. With this guide, you put a dashboard on the internet, send it without a share, and tell readers how much to trust it.

On arkush.app, a dashboard is private or published. You cannot share it with a named person or open it to everyone signed in: on a server where anyone can sign in, a share would show each person the email addresses of strangers. On an org install, you also share with people and groups. Those sections carry the note Org installs only.

Before you start

To publish a dashboard, it must be saved to your account. When you are signed in, every dashboard saves itself. When you are not signed in, the Share dialog and Dashboard settings show a Sign in step in place of the sharing controls.

You share from the editing view. A window the size of a phone shows the dashboard in view mode only, so use a window large enough to show the Edit switch.

Publish it to the internet

Publishing puts a copy of the dashboard at its own address, where anyone can read it without an account. Search engines can list the page, so people can find it without the link. You need two things first: you own the dashboard, and your changes are saved. On a server that does not publish, the Share dialog has no Published to the internet section.

A dashboard saves itself. The label beside the dashboard title in the header reads Saved when every change is on the server. To save at once, press ⌘S (Ctrl+S on Windows and Linux).

1. Open the dashboard, and select Share in the header. The Published to the internet section shows in View and in Edit. Before the first publish, select the (i) beside the section's heading to read what publishing does.
2. Under Published to the internet, select Publish. A dialog opens.
3. The first time you publish, you choose a username in the dialog: the name on the page in place of your email address. The same username names you on every dashboard you publish. A username is 3 to 30 lowercase letters, digits and single hyphens, and nobody else on the server holds it. Type one, such as quiet-otter-42, or leave the field empty to get a generated name. To change it later, open the Settings page and use Username in the Profile section. Every page you published changes to the new name.
4. Tick the box that says you understand that anyone can read the dashboard and every row of its data, and that search engines can list it. If you select Publish with the box empty, the dialog says Tick the box to publish this dashboard. and publishes nothing.
5. In the dialog, select Publish.

To tell readers where the data comes from, fill Where the data comes from in the same section before you publish: an organization, a survey, a year. The field shows in Edit. The page shows it beside the day the data was refreshed, as in "Data refreshed 22 Jun 2026, from Household survey, 2025".

The notice reads Published., and the section shows the published address and Copy address. The page at that address holds the dashboard, every row of every datasource, the day the data was refreshed, and your username. A column that no chart draws is published too. Under that day, About the data has the time each datasource was refreshed. It never shows an email address, a comment, who the dashboard is shared with, or the warehouse queries behind the data. The SQL of a derived view, a datasource computed from the other datasources of the dashboard, goes with the copy, because the reader's browser runs it.

Each chart also has a page of its own: add / and the block's id to the address. The block's id is the id field of the block in the Source panel, which opens from Source in the icon rail at the right edge, or with ⌘/Ctrl J.

A dashboard with frames, the areas that split a canvas into pages (see Build on the canvas), is published with its Pages switch. A reader starts on the first page, and a link with ?view=pages&frame= and a frame's id opens that page.

Each article of the dashboard, a page of text with charts placed in it, is published with it, except an article marked Draft (see Write up a finding in an article). An article is published at the address followed by /article/ and the article's id: a1 for the first article. A published article never shows the notice that its data changed, because the published copy does not change. Open in dashboard under a chart opens the published dashboard with that chart's filters set.

Put a chart in a message, a README or a slide

Each chart of a published dashboard has an image link: a PNG of the chart at an address that stays the same when you update the published copy. You need the dashboard published first (see Publish it to the internet).

1. Point at the chart, and select the download button in its header.
2. Select Copy image link.
3. Paste the link where you write. In Slack, GitHub and most email programs, the image appears in place of the link.

The image is the chart as it was published: its size on the canvas, the default values of the filters, and the first look of the dashboard's theme. It changes when you update the published copy, never when the data refreshes. Copies of the image in Slack and GitHub can stay old for a while, so an update can take time to appear there. A chart you added after the last publish has no image until you update the published copy.

The image has the chart's title above it, unless the title is hidden. To put the chart alone on the image, for a slide with its own heading:

1. In Edit, select the chart.
2. Open the chart's Title block. On a sankey, open Description in its folded Block card.
3. Turn off Show the title on the image link.
4. Update the published copy.

Update the published copy

The published copy does not follow your edits. To show a later version:

1. Wait until the header reads Saved.
2. In the Share dialog, under Published to the internet, select Update published copy, then Update in the dialog.

The notice reads The published copy is updated. Readers keep the same address.

Take it down

In the same section, select Unpublish and confirm. The address stops answering at once, and the dashboard is private again. On an org install, the people and groups on the share list keep their access. The section shows Publish again. Anyone with edit access can unpublish. Publishing again later brings back the same address.

Three other acts take a published dashboard down the same way: moving it to the trash, an admin closing it to private, and an admin deleting its owner's profile. A dashboard restored from the trash stays unpublished until its owner publishes it again. A dashboard given to a new owner stays published at the same address.

If Publish is missing

A line in the section says why:

• On this server, only admins publish. An org install sets this. Share the dashboard with the people who need it instead.
• You are not the owner. Ask the owner to publish it.
• The dashboard has unsaved changes. Wait until the header reads Saved.

A username someone else holds, a reserved one, or one with characters other than lowercase letters, digits and hyphens is refused with a sentence that says so. Choose another and publish again.

Send a dashboard without a share

On arkush.app, only the people who run it add shares, and there is no way to ask them for one. The sharing form shows no field to add people and no Everyone signed in option, and it says why. Your dashboards stay private to you, and only the people who run arkush.app see your email address on them. A person who opens the app link of your dashboard sees a refusal, because that link needs a share. Only an admin can give a dashboard to a new owner, so Transfer ownership… under More in the Dashboards page's Select bar is greyed, and its tooltip gives the reason.

To let other people read your work:

• Publish it to the internet. Anyone can read it without an account, and search engines can list it. See Publish it to the internet.
• Download a chart as a picture, or the data behind a block as a CSV, and send the file. Point at the block, and select the download button in its header. See Read a dashboard → Take a chart with you.
• Export the whole dashboard as a file. Open the dashboard, then open the Dashboards page. At the foot of the page, select Export open dashboard…. The person who gets the file opens arkush, with or without an account, opens the Dashboards page, and selects Import file… at the foot of the page. They get their own copy. The copy is private to that person. It keeps the charts and the data, and it leaves out the sharing, the scheduled sends and the comments.

A server can limit who can take data away. Then the CSV entry is missing, and an exported file leaves out the rows.

Say how much to trust it

Dashboard settings is the gear on the icon rail at the right edge. It has the trust fields: Tags, Contact and Maturity. Tags sort the dashboard, and the Tag filter in the dashboard list finds them. In Contact, the author names whom to ask about the dashboard: a name, an email address or a channel.

The maturity stamp is a claim, signed with a name, about the whole dashboard. Select a level in the Maturity row:

• With Draft, you warn readers that the work is in progress.
• With Ready, you mark the dashboard as fit to read.
• With Official, a person with the analyst right vouches for the dashboard.
• With Retired, you tell readers not to build on this dashboard.

A dialog names the level and who vouches. Write a Note there and select Stamp. In the app, readers see the level as a mark beside the title. When they point at the mark, they read the level, who vouched and when. The published copy shows no stamp.

A dashboard open to everyone signed in shows in other people's For you list on the Dashboards page only when it carries a Ready or Official stamp. Without one, they find it under All you can open.

Under the Maturity row, the stamp line shows the mark, the day of the stamp, and the note. When someone else vouched, their initials follow the day: point at them to read the address. Point at the mark to read the level.

When the content changes after the stamp, the claim is older than the content. The mark beside the title dims. In the stamp line, the mark's tooltip adds ", earlier version", and one more line says that the content changed. Stamp again vouches for the current version, and Remove takes the claim back.

Only a person with the analyst right can set, overwrite or remove Official, whoever made the dashboard. The analyst right is a right to vouch for work and to curate what everyone on the server reuses. On arkush.app, only the people who run arkush.app hold it. On an org install, the people who run it give the right to named people. The app shows no list of your rights. Without the right, Official is greyed, and its tooltip gives the reason. To vouch for a dashboard yourself, use Ready.

Share with a person

Org installs only

1. Open the dashboard.
2. If the header switch is on View, select Edit.
3. In the header, select Share. The Share dialog opens with the sharing form.
4. Type the person's email into the Add people field and press Enter. Where the org install has groups, the field is Add people or groups. If the app refuses the address, the address stays in the field with the reason under it. Correct the address and press Enter again.
5. Read the dialog. Its Notify checkbox is on, so the person gets an entry in their inbox that names the dashboard. To share without telling them, clear Notify. Then select Share.

The new row shows at the top of the list and reads Can view: the person can open the dashboard and read all of its data. To let the person change the dashboard, open the row's Can view list, select Can edit, and confirm the second dialog. From 8 people, a search field above the list finds a row by address or group name.

Each row starts with a glyph: one person for a person, several people for a group. The heading over the list shows the same two glyphs, each with a count of the rows of that kind. Point at the heading to read the counts in words. The form names the owner once, at its top: Owner, the owner's initials, and you beside them when the dashboard is yours.

You confirm each change that gives more access. Before you add a person, give edit access, or open the dashboard to everyone signed in, you confirm in a dialog who gets what. You do not confirm a change that takes access away. Remove, the last item of a row's list, is one click, and a row switched back to Can view changes at once.

The link to send is the dashboard's own address. Select Share in the header, then Copy link. A viewer has the same button. The address gives no access by itself. A person who opens it needs a share, and a person without one sees a refusal. A person who is not signed in sees a sign-in page first. After they sign in, your dashboard opens with the filters that the link carries.

Share several dashboards at once

Org installs only

1. Open the Dashboards page: select the name at the top left of the header. Then select Select in the page head.
2. Tick the dashboards to change. A greyed box names why you cannot change that dashboard.
3. Select Share… in the bar, type or paste the addresses and groups, and pick View or Edit.
4. Select Share with N…, read the dialog, and select Share.

In the bar, you see which dashboards changed. A dashboard that refused the change stays selected, with a Retry button. From the bar, you can also remove access, set who can view, add tags, transfer ownership, and move dashboards to the trash. The Add people field in the Share dialog also takes a pasted list, and one dialog names everyone on it.

Share with a group

Org installs only

Some org installs have groups, and some have none. Where the org install has groups, the Add people or groups field lists them. Pick a group and confirm. In the dialog, you confirm who gets access: every member, and anyone who joins the group later. A group row starts with the group glyph, several people, in place of the person glyph. It has the same Can view or Can edit list as a person's row.

For a group, the dialog's checkbox reads Notify every member, and it is off. Select it before you select Share to give every member an entry in their inbox. Leave it off to share quietly.

A group is the same on every dashboard, and an admin of the org install manages it. The groups come from one of two places: a list whose members admins edit in the app, or Google groups, whose members are managed in Google. A share with a group that the org install does not have gives access to nobody. The row stays on the list and matches no one.

Open it to everyone signed in

Org installs only

The Who can view switch at the top of the sharing form has two positions. Private is the default: the owner and the people and groups on the list. Everyone signed in lets anyone who can sign in to the org install view the dashboard. They can view it and comment on it, but they cannot edit it. You read this in a dialog before the switch changes, and to switch back to Private is one click.

On some org installs, only an admin can open a dashboard to everyone signed in. There, the switch offers Private only, and a line under it says so. A dashboard that is already open stays open, and you can still switch it back to Private.

Members and guests

On an org install where the admins named the organization's domains, the switch reads Everyone at and the organization's name. It opens the dashboard to the members: the people at those domains, and the people and groups the admins added. To read the domains, select the (i) beside Who counts as.

Everyone else who can sign in is a guest, such as a person at a partner company. A guest sees a dashboard only when it is shared with them, directly or through a group, or when its editor includes their domain.

To let the people at a partner domain view a dashboard that is open to everyone:

1. In the sharing form, make sure that Who can view is set to Everyone at the organization.
2. Open Advanced, under Who can view.
3. Turn on Include people at the partner's domain.
4. In the dialog, select Include and the domain.

The partner's people can then view the dashboard and comment on it. While Advanced is closed, its row has the number of guest domains that the dashboard includes. To take that access away, turn the switch off. When you switch the dashboard back to Private, the included domains go too, and opening it again includes none.

A guest can share the dashboards the guest owns with named people and groups. On a dashboard that another person owns, a guest with edit access can edit the blocks and queries but cannot change who can view it. A guest cannot open a dashboard to everyone or publish it.

What a viewer can do

Org installs only

A person with View access can:

• Read every chart and table. The data is saved with the dashboard, so opening it runs no query on any account.
• Filter with the controls and the click filters. The viewer's selections stay in the viewer's own page address and never change the dashboard.
• Download a chart as a PNG or SVG picture, and the data behind a block as a CSV. Where an admin limits who can download data, the CSV entry is missing, and the pictures stay.
• Comment: start a thread, reply, and delete their own comments.
• Change one chart for themselves with its Chart options button. The dashboard stays as you made it.

A viewer cannot change the dashboard, open its version history, or run a query. Version history is for editors only, because an old version can hold notes, SQL and titles that the current dashboard no longer shows. The guide for viewers is Read a dashboard.

What an editor can do

Org installs only

Edit access covers the whole dashboard. An editor can change every block and query, refresh the data, move the dashboard to the trash or restore it, and change the sharing.

Every editor can manage the sharing as you do. An editor can add people, remove them, answer access requests, and open the dashboard to everyone signed in, where the org install lets editors do that. A guest with edit access cannot change the sharing (Members and guests). Give edit access only to people you trust with all of this.

A scheduled refresh runs as the person whose run last refreshed each datasource. When you take that person's edit access away, the schedule of their datasources stops. The Scheduled refresh section of the Data workspace names each one. To start it again, refresh each of those datasources once, or ask an editor who can run them to do it. The schedule then runs as that person.

One stamp is the exception. An editor sets Draft, Ready and Retired, but Official needs the analyst right. To learn about that right, read Say how much to trust it.

Ask for access

Org installs only

On arkush.app, only the people who run it share, so nobody can grant a request, and the app offers none. On an org install, you ask for access to a dashboard, a shared datasource or an uploaded file from inside the app. You never learn who the owner is: the server passes the request on.

Ask to view

1. Open the link. If it is not shared with you, the page says so and names the account you are signed in with. If that is the wrong account, open the account menu at the top right and select Sign out. Sign in with the other account, then open the link again. If the menu has no Sign out, your organization's sign-in page signs you in, and your admin knows how to switch accounts there.
2. Optional: in Note to the owner, write why you need it, in 300 characters or fewer.
3. Select Ask for access. This asks for view access.

The page then shows the day you asked. When someone answers, you get an entry in your inbox, which opens from the Inbox button in the header (see Your inbox). After a grant, the same link opens the dashboard. On an org install where only an admin shares, the page offers no request and says that only the owner and an admin can open the dashboard. There, ask the person who sent you the link.

Ask to edit

If you can view a dashboard and want to change it, open it, select Share in the header, write an optional note, and select Ask for edit access. The details page of the dashboard has the same form. For a shared datasource or an uploaded file, use its details page. On a shared datasource, only a person with the analyst right can ask to edit, because only that right curates the datasource library.

Answer a request

The owner gets an inbox entry. If the server sends email, the owner also gets an email about the entry, unless they turned it off (see Get your inbox by email or in Slack). If the owner cannot act, for example because their account is suspended, the editors get the entry. If no editor can act, the admins get it. An admin answers after they select Grant me edit access… on the dashboard (see Transfer a dashboard or recover access).

To answer a request, you need edit access to the dashboard, the shared datasource or the file. On a shared datasource, you also need the analyst right.

1. Open the dashboard and select Share in the header. The inbox entry opens the dashboard, not the dialog. For a shared datasource or a file, open the Sharing section of its details page. The Access requests list is above the sharing form. Each request names the person, the access asked for, and the note.
2. Select Grant view access or Grant edit access to add the person to the share list. Select Decline to refuse.

The request then leaves the list. After a grant, the person is on the share list.

On a server whose inbox messages go to Slack, the Slack message about a request can also have Grant view access or Grant edit access, and Decline. With a click there, you answer the request the same way, and you confirm a grant in Slack. Then the message has the name of the person who answered. The buttons work only when your Slack address is the address you sign in with. If it is not, the message has a link to the dashboard, and you answer in Share.

The first answer settles the request for everyone who got it. A grant never lowers access that the person already has. A person you decline gets an inbox entry that names nobody, with the day they can ask again: 7 days later. One person has one open request per dashboard, datasource or file, and sends at most 20 requests a day. The server deletes a request 90 days after its last change.

Leave a dashboard shared with you

On arkush.app, a dashboard reaches you only through a share that the people who run arkush.app added. Groups and everyone signed in, named in this section, are org install cases.

You can remove your own share from a dashboard, a shared datasource or an uploaded file that someone shared with you. Leave shows only where a share names your own email address. To see how you reach a dashboard, open it and select Share in the header. A viewer can open the Share dialog too. It lists whom to ask first: the owner, the dashboard's contact, and the people who can change sharing. Its Your access row says how you reach the dashboard. When a share names you, the row shows an eye and Viewer, or a pencil and Editor. Point at it to read the full sentence. When you reach the dashboard through a group you belong to, or because it is open to everyone signed in, the row says so in a sentence. The owner gets no Your access row, because the dialog already names the owner with you.

Under Who can view, the other people and groups it is shared with sit behind a disclosure: the group glyph and a count, such as +4. Point at it to read how many more people and groups there are, and select it to see them.

1. Pick one of the two places:
   • On an open dashboard, select Share in the header, then Leave at the end of the Your access row.
   • On the Dashboards page (select the name at the top left of the header), open the actions menu at the end of the dashboard's row, and select Leave.
2. Read the dialog, and select Leave.

A notice says that you left, and the dashboard leaves your list. If the dashboard was open, the app goes back to the Dashboards page. The owner gets no message, and the change is in the version history under your name. On an org install, to get the dashboard back, open its link and ask for access (see Ask for access). On arkush.app, a dashboard you leave does not come back, because there is no way to ask for a share.

For a shared datasource or an uploaded file, open its details page from the Datasources page, and select Leave at the end of the line that says it is shared with you. The app goes back to the Datasources page, and the item leaves it.

If you reach the dashboard through a group, or because it is open to everyone signed in, there is no Leave for that reach, and nothing you do removes the dashboard from your list. Ask an editor of the dashboard to remove the group or to make it private. If a share names you and a group also reaches the dashboard, Leave removes the share, and the dashboard stays in your list through the group.

Move a dashboard to the trash

If you own a dashboard that you no longer need, move it to the trash: on the Dashboards page, open the actions menu at the end of its row, and select Move to trash. A dashboard in the trash can be restored for 30 days, and then it is deleted permanently. A published dashboard is unpublished when it goes to the trash, and a restore does not publish it again.

If you are locked out

On an org install, if someone removed your share, open the dashboard's link and ask for access (see Ask for access). On arkush.app, only the people who run it add shares, and there is no way to ask them for one. Only the current owner or an admin can give the dashboard to a new owner, and on arkush.app, only an admin can. No save can leave a dashboard with no owner, so an editor cannot lock the owner out. If nobody with access is left, an admin can move the dashboard to a new owner or give themself access. The admin's own access then shows in the dashboard's sharing list.