Cloudera Docs

Using custom display formats for large numbers

Currency magnitudes use expressions such as thousands (103), millions (106), billions (109), and trillions (1012). In contrast, scientific notation uses prefixes: k: kilo- (103), M: Mega- (106), G: Giga- (109), and T: Tera- (1012). viz-display-format-custom.png has an option that helps you to distinguish between scientific and currency unit abbreviations.

The following steps demonstrate how to adjust the display format for currency, using the S format option.
  1. Create a new Bars visual on the Capital Expenditure by Industry dataset.
  2. Add the industry field on the X Axis shelf and the expenditure field on the Y Axis shelf.
  3. Click the expenditure field to open the FIELD PROPERTIES menu.
  4. Under FIELD PROPERTIES, click Display Format.
  5. In the Display Format modal window, select Currency from the Category menu and change the format to display the $ (dollar) currency symbol.
  6. Click SAVE.
  7. Click REFRESH VISUAL.

    You can see the display of numbers on the axis scale and in the tooltips.

    Obviously, the standard currency form is inadequate for representing very large numbers and quickly reviewing the difference in their magnitude.

  8. Change the display format of the expenditure field to a custom format by setting the value of Customize Date/Time to $,S (currency, ',' thousands separator, and 'S' for currencies).
  9. Click SAVE.
  10. Click REFRESH VISUAL.

    The new display format categorizes the magnitude of the currency more clearly , with Educational Services expenditure valued at approximately $226 Billion, contrasting with Manufacturing at nearly $2 Trillion, for the years covered by the data.

  11. Optional: You can see how the data format appears across the data set by creating a dashboard that contains both this bar chart and a table visual.
    • Clone the visual and change the chart type to table.
    • Name and save that visual.
    • Click NEW DASHBOARD, and add both visuals to it.
    • Name and save the dashboard.

    Some column values have the suffix B (billions), while larger columns have the suffix T (trillions).