Ways to share

Every way a report reaches people, who can open it, whether they sign in, and where its data comes from.

Halo shares a report in several ways, from a link inside your organization to a chart on your public website. They differ in who gets in and which rows they see, so it's worth picking on purpose.

Every way, side by side

Way	Who can open it	Sign-in	Data	Whose rows
Shared with people or groups	People and groups you pick, on a report, chart, dataset, folder or workspace	Halo sign-in	Live	Each person's own
Anyone in the organization with the link	Members of your organization, within their role	Halo sign-in	Live	Each person's own
External guests	People outside your organization that you name	Halo sign-in	Live	Each person's own
Public link	Anyone with the link	None	Snapshot, or live	Nobody's: datasets with row policies show no rows
Expiring link	A public or embed link with an end date, until then	None	Snapshot, or live	Nobody's
Public iframe embed	Readers on the sites you list	None	Snapshot, or live	Nobody's
Signed embed	Whoever your server signs a token for	Your app's own. None in Halo	Always live	The attributes in the token
Scheduled email	Members, groups and addresses you pick	None to read the file	Live when it's sent	Each member's own. Outside addresses: nobody's

In every way but the first three, people see only the published version. Members who can edit also see the draft in Halo Data. See Drafts, versions and publishing.

Which to choose

You want	Use
Colleagues to see a report	Put it in a workspace they can reach, and send the link from Share
Anyone to read a report, with no account	A public link
A report on your public website	An embed link, framed on your site's address
A dashboard inside your own product, with each customer seeing their own rows	A signed embed
A report in people's inboxes every Monday	Scheduled email

Snapshot or live

Public links and embeds read a snapshot by default. It's a copy of the answers the published report gives before anyone touches a filter, built when you publish, and read by everyone. Pages open fast and your database isn't asked each time. A reader who changes a filter gets live data for that question.

A report with editions reads each edition's frozen figures instead, for good.

You can switch any other report to live under Data for links and embeds, in the Share dialog. Then every view asks your database, which suits data that changes by the minute. How snapshots build and refresh is in Public links and snapshots.

Signed embeds and scheduled files are always live, because each carries its own filters or reader. Members in Halo Data read live data too, through your extracts and caching settings.

Whose rows they see

Row policies follow the person asking, and policies fail closed. On a public link or an embed link, no person is asking, so a dataset with row policies shows no rows. To show each reader their own rows outside Halo, use a signed embed, whose token carries the attributes policies read. See Row policies.

What every shared page has in common

The published version only, with your brand, and your name. Public links show your logo too.
Only the report's datasets and fields. A shared page can ask only about the datasets and fields its published report uses. Nobody outside Halo Data opens an explorer. Within those fields it can ask for any values, unless a locked filter stops it: an unlocked report or page filter shapes the page rather than limits what's reachable. To share only part of your data publicly, lock a report filter, or give the report a dataset that holds only that part. A dataset with a row policy shows a public link no rows at all.
No search engines. Public pages are marked noindex.
Downloads are off unless you turn on People who open public links and embeds can export data, or They can download the report as a PDF. See Exports.
Rate limits per link and per reader, so one busy page can't crowd out the rest.

To	Needs
Make a public link	Edit access to the report, and Share publicly (`share.public`)
Make an embed link	Edit access to the report, and Embed reports (`share.embed`)
List the sites a report may be framed on	Edit access to the report, and Embed reports (`share.embed`)
See or rotate the signing secret	Owner or Admin (`org.manage`)
Schedule email	Edit access to the report. Outside addresses need Share publicly, and CSV or JSON needs Export data

Owners, Admins and Builders have Share publicly and Embed reports by default. Analysts and Viewers don't. Every link made, changed or turned off is in the audit log.

When a link is posted elsewhere

A public link posted on a social network or in a chat app shows the report's title and description. A report on snapshots also shows a picture of the top of its first page, from when it was published, so it shows what anyone opening the link sees. A link that's turned off or has expired shows nothing of the report.