Create and manage bookmarks

Sigma supports personal bookmarks for individual use.

Personal bookmarks

Personal bookmarks allow you to save the state of a published workbook in Explore or View mode. In a published workbook, you can make changes to the filters, controls, and other elements, and save the changes as a personal bookmark.

All user interactions persist in the bookmark. Some common things you might want to bookmark include:

• Saving a control or filter value
• Adjusting the formula for a column (such as a mapping column)
• Adding a new visualization
• Adding descriptive information in a text element
• Renaming elements or pages

For example, say your team uses a standard workbook that you regularly modify for your own purposes. Instead of making a copy, you set the filters or controls that you want and save it as a personal bookmark. Then you can set your bookmark as your default view of the workbook. When the underlying data updates, your personal bookmark updates as well. This saves you a lot of time compared to copying, and keeps the context of the standard workbook.

In short, you don’t need to make your changes to a static copy of a workbook. The bookmark keeps its connection to the original published workbook, so if the original published workbook changes, the changes become available in the bookmark. This also applies to a URL you may copy from a saved bookmark; the URL won’t become stale.

Create a personal bookmark

Requirements

• Your user account must have Viewer, Creator, or Admin privileges. For more information see User account types.
• Access to the published workbook. Workbook owners can share published workbooks. For more information see Share a workbook.

Steps to create a personal bookmark

1. Go to the workbook and make changes, such as selecting a filter value or adding a new element. What you can change in a workbook depends upon your user account and the workbook's permissions. For more information see Workbook modes overview: View, Explore, Edit.

2. From the Published menu, select Bookmark your changes.

   
   The Save Bookmark modal opens. 

3. Name your bookmark.

4. (Optional) If you want the bookmark to be your default view of the workbook, check Always view bookmark by default.

   

5. Click Save.

Access and manage a personal bookmark

After you add a bookmark, the Personal bookmarks menu becomes active. Use it to select your saved bookmarks.

To rename, set as default view, or delete a bookmark use the Manage bookmarks menu and modal.

Tip: If you forget to save a bookmark, use the Published > Recent explores menu to display your recent explorations, find the one you want, and bookmark it.

Workbook changes that affect bookmarks

Sometimes a workbook changes in such a way as to make its bookmarks out-of-date or even irrelevant. This can happen when the bookmark includes:

• A filter whose value was changed, and the workbook deletes or updates the filter. 
• A filter on an element that was later deleted in the workbook. 
• An element that was later deleted in the workbook.

In cases like these, Sigma alerts you with a modal prompting you to either delete the bookmark or update it.

Simple changes to the workbook that do not relate to edits you make for a bookmark do not prompt an alert. Simple changes, such as updated titles, appear when you open the bookmark. 

The following example shows changes to a workbook and creating a personal bookmark, as well as the Manage Bookmarks modal. 

Bookmarks in embedded workbooks

📘

Sigma supports bookmarks in embedded analytics when the entire workbook is embedded. This feature isn't available in individual page or element embeds.

In embedded workbooks, you can access bookmark options in the header or footer (depending on the embed configuration).

• Click the bookmark icon, then select an option from the menu:

  Save as new bookmark	Saves the current explored state as a new personal bookmark. Available when viewing an explored state that isn't saved as a bookmark.
  Manage bookmarks	Opens the Bookmarks tab in the side panel, where you can view and edit saved personal bookmarks.
  Personal bookmarks	Opens a submenu that allows you to select and view any saved personal bookmark. Available when you have one or more saved personal bookmarks.
  Clear bookmark	Resets the workbook to the published version. Available when viewing a saved bookmark.