Comparison Groups

System generated data cuts

All surveys have a Default System Data Cuts comparison group in the Data Cuts app:

Note that this group's title is italicized: this indicates that data cuts in this comparison group are not user editable.

When an administrative user runs a report, it may require that the system generate a new data cut or comparison group to create the report. If this is the case, the comparison group containing the necessary cut(s) will appear in this app. Suppose, for example, Compare By is used in a Topline report. To create this report, the system needs to generate a data cut for every option used to compare a given question against. These cuts show as a comparison group, titled as the question or variable against which Compare By is run.

Creating and editing comparison groups

To create a new comparison group, click C Group under the Create heading in the Actions menu.

This launches the Create Comparison Group menu, which appears on the lower portion of the screen:

First, provide a name for the group. If none is provided, the system will create a generic name. Next, select the fields. All possible permutations of the options in all selected fields will be created as different data cuts in the new comparison group. It is possible to edit these generated data cuts to elimination unneeded cuts within the new group. For more information about editing, see Data Cuts.

Creating a custom comparison group

Some comparison groups require more complicated datacuts than simply every option permutation of a field. To create such a group, create an empty comparison group in which to place the custom data cuts which will be the individual banners. To do this, click the Empty Grp option under the Create heading in the Actions menu.

This creates a new empty group in the list. To rename, double click on the title area of the new empty comparison group:

The text can now be changed. Within an empty group, create new data cuts by selecting Data Cut under the Create heading in the Actions menu when the group is selected. Alternatively, cuts can be duplicated, and click-dragged into your new group.

Collapse and expand

To show and hide the contents of comparison groups, click the Collapse and Expand buttons in the Actions menu under the Grid heading.

Collapsing comparison groups compacts the list, such that only the names of the comparison groups are visible. The individual cuts contained within are hidden:

When collapsed, individual groups can be expanded by clicking the '+' in the titles. All groups can be expanded simultaneously by clicking Expand.

Delete

To delete a comparison group, delete all of the data cuts it contains.