Getting started with TIBCO Spotfire

In this section, we are going to explore loading and visualizing data using the Spotfire rich desktop client and the Spotfire web authoring clients.

There are a few different Spotfire client applications. As of Version X (pronounced 10), these are as follows:

1. Desktop clients (rich, installed):
   • Spotfire Analyst: This fully featured application connects to an on-premises Spotfire server that's installed at your organization and is sometimes called Spotfire professional.
   • Spotfire Cloud Analyst: A fully featured desktop application that connects to a cloud-based Spotfire server, you can download it from your Spotfire Cloud account if you have one.
   • Spotfire for macOS: This is a hybrid application—it's essentially a wrapper around the Spotfire web clients (detailed later), but it is installed on desktop machines.
2. Web clients (thin, accessible via a web browser):
   • Spotfire Consumer: This is a standard, read-only Spotfire web client, usually available on-premises. You can consume existing visualizations and data. You cannot create new visualizations, load data, or change the configuration of visualizations (unless explicitly enabled by the author of a Spotfire file).
   • Spotfire Business Author: This is an advanced web client. In addition to the features of consumer, it allows loading of data, configuration of visualizations, and many other Spotfire authoring capabilities. You can check if it's available to you by logging in to Spotfire web (Consumer) and checking if there's an option to edit or create an existing analysis—more on this later.
   • TIBCO Cloud Spotfire: This has all the features of Business Author and is accessible via https://cloud.tibco.com/. You can even sign up for a free trial account—I recommend you do this if you just want to explore Spotfire before you purchase it.
3. Mobile clients:
   • Spotfire Analytics for iOS: Provides Spotfire Consumer-type functionality for iPhone® and iPad® devices.
   • Spotfire Analytics for Android: Provides Spotfire Consumer-type functionality for Android phones and tablet computers.
   • Important: You cannot create new analyses or modify existing analysis files using the mobile clients.