Another round of Hex updates, hot off the presses! We’ve got big features, we’ve got little features, we’ve got features that are just right— but all of them, big or small, are the direct result of user requests and feedback over the last few months.
We’re always excited to ship new features, but we’re way more excited when we get to build things that you all have asked us for. Keep the feedback coming, and enjoy the new features!
♻️ Writeback cell
This one has been in the works for a long time! You can now writeback any dataframe in a project to a database table, choosing to overwrite or append data.
Writeback unlocks an entirely new set of workflows in Hex. You can use it in Notebook view to quickly reshape or clean a table. You can use it in published apps to allow end users to generate datasets and push them into your warehouse (be careful!). You can use it on scheduled runs to regularly update a table or push out status updates.
To get started, just enable it on any data connection:
✍️ Edit from app view
We get it – clicking back and forth between Notebook and App views could be pretty annoying, especially for quick fixes to charts or text.
So, we added a new option to open and edit cells, right from App mode! Just click the ✏️ button and edit to your heart’s content:
🗺️ Area and Heatmap map layers
We’ve added two new layer types to the Map cell, giving you the ability to plot custom polygon shapes (with the Area layer) and to easily visualize the distribution of points (with the Heatmap layer).
Our friends at Iggy built an awesome app showcasing the kind of thing you can build with custom map areas:
Check out the documentation for more on the different kinds of map layers.
🔠 Case sensitive sql autocompletion
Some of you like to yell at your SQL. And you probably want the SQL autocompletion to yell right back at you. That’s okay! We love that for you.
Others might prefer a gentler touch with their database, opting for lowercase queries. If so, you’re probably tired of the SQL autocompletion always yelling back at you in all caps— did you do something wrong!?
No dear user, you are perfect just the way you are. And now Hex’s SQL autocompletion listens to the case you’re using, and returns suggestions in the same case.
Other improvements
- Workspace admins can now see the last active date of users in the Admin > Users panel.
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We’ve improved warnings on chart cells for unexpected chart behavior.
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You can now duplicate chart layers.
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The “All” option in multiselect inputs now excludes ‘null’.
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Hex now uses DuckDB 0.4.0
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Many smaller bugfixes!