--- title: "Data apps in Rig: open, run, inspect and share — Rig guide" description: "Open a saved data app, run it, use the Inspector to trace any number back to the query that produced it, read its run history, and share it with your team." canonical: "https://rig.so/guides/data-apps-basics" format: markdown --- Search guides, references, playbooks…⌘K Browse guides # Data apps: open, run, inspect and share A data app is a saved page that runs queries against your warehouse and renders the result. This guide is about reading one: finding it, re-running it, reading an older run, and saying exactly where a number on the page came from. ## What a data app is A data app is a dashboard, tracker, scorecard or report that someone saved so the rest of the team can open it. Behind it sits a workflow: the steps that fetch data, run SQL and render the output. You do not need to open the workflow to use the app, but it is what produces everything you see. Each execution is a **run**. Runs are kept, so last Monday's figures stay available exactly as they were on Monday. Opening an app does not re-run it, you land on the most recent run. Running it queries your warehouse as it stands right now. ## Find and open one 1. Click **Data Apps** in the **Build** group of the left rail. The page lives at `/data-apps`. 2. The page is headed **Data Apps** with a count beside it, and below that a grid of cards, one per app. 3. Narrow the grid with the search box (*Search data apps…*) or the **All** / **Favourites** / **Drafts** pills. **Group by folder** switches between folder grouping and a flat grid; the same control reads **Ungroup** once grouping is on. 4. Click a card. You land on that app's most recent run. Nearly every app works this way. A small number are **persistent** apps: they hold a standing list of cases people work through rather than a series of runs. Clicking one of those cards opens the cases view, there is no **Run Now** (the toolbar has **Update Now** instead, with a status beside it reading *Updated 5m ago* or *Updating…*), and there is no run selector until you switch to the runs view with the toolbar's view toggle. From there, everything below applies unchanged. ## Run Now and run history Use **Run Now** to query the data currently in your warehouse. A new run does not refresh the source data itself; check Connections or ask your admin when the source last synced. If the app takes parameters, a **Run Parameters** popover asks for them first. The run then happens in the background, so the page stays usable while it works. The run selector at the top of the page lists **RECENT RUNS** with a total count. Pick an earlier entry and the page re-renders with that run's numbers. This is how you answer "what did this say last week?" without rebuilding anything, and how you confirm a new run has finished: a new entry appears in the list. ## The Inspector The Inspector is a panel on a run that shows the machinery behind it. Which tabs appear depends on what the app does. Three matter to you as a reader: - **SQL Queries** — the queries that actually ran for this run. - **Data** — the rows those queries came back with. - **Report** — the rendered output you see on the page. The rest are there for whoever built the app: **Raw JSON**, **State**, **Metrics**, **LLM Prompts**, **Template**, **Data Flow**, **Tables**, **Volume** and **Markdown**. You can open them, but you do not need them to read a result. ## Trace a number to its SQL This is the single most useful thing the Inspector gives you, and it takes under a minute. 1. Pick a figure on the page that you want to defend or question. 2. Open **SQL Queries** and find the query that produced it. Note the tables it reads from. 3. Open **Data** and find the matching row. Confirm it agrees with what the page shows. That chain — figure, query, source table, row — is the whole audit trail. When someone asks "where does this number come from?", you can answer with a table name and a query rather than forwarding the question to an engineer. ## Sharing Use **Share**. The dialog is headed **Share Data App** and has three tabs: **People** (grant a colleague access), **Embed link** (a public link you can put in another page) and **Active shares** (what is currently shared, and how to revoke it). Two gates apply, and neither of them hides the button: - **People is owner-only.** Only the person who created the app can add or remove access. Role does not come into it, so an admin who did not build the app is refused too, with *Only the owner can change sharing*. You can always share an app you built yourself, whatever your role. - **Embed link** additionally needs a role that is allowed to share outside the workspace. Owners and editors have it; analysts and viewers do not, and the tab says so instead of showing the form. It can also be switched off for the whole workspace. So if you are looking at an app someone else built, you do not share it. You ask its owner to add you from their **People** tab. ## Scheduling An app can run on a clock, but that is set up deliberately by whoever built it. You cannot tell from the grid card whether an app is scheduled, and the card does not show a schedule. If you need to know when an app last refreshed, read the run selector; if you need to know when it next will, ask the person who built it. ## Common problems - **Run Now seems to do nothing.** Runs happen in the background. Watch the run selector — a new entry appears when it finishes, and a long query can take minutes. - **The app shows old numbers.** You are looking at a saved run. Check the run selector and re-run to query the warehouse again. If the numbers are still old, check when the source last synced or ask your admin. - **It says there are no runs yet.** The app has been created but never executed. Run it once. - **The numbers do not match your old system.** A data app reads live warehouse data, which is not the same thing as a validated, signed-off figure. Report the difference rather than assuming either side is wrong. - **You cannot see an app a colleague mentions.** Data apps respect access. Ask its owner, the person who built it, to share it from the **People** tab. Nobody else can, including admins. - **You get "Only the owner can change sharing".** You opened **Share** on someone else's app. The button is shown to everyone; the grant is not. Step 4 of 10 Was this guide helpful? 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