I am looking at a stream created by a previous colleague and was wondering what these white squares with folded top right corner refer to? See this SPSS stream.
As they suspiciously look like notes I was hoping there were similar to an annotation of some sort, which would be helpful in deciphering the model.
Thank you.
The note icon means that caching has been enabled on a node. You can enable by right clicking on a node, select Cache, then enable.
The reason to enable caching in SPSS Modeler is to enable faster execution of the stream on the following runs and/or to troubleshoot.
Upon the next execution of the stream, SPSS Modeler will drop a copy of the node to that point into a file (really its a a .SAV file) on the local desktop or server depending upon where you are running the application. The icon will turn to green indicating that the cache of that node is filled.
See an example here: Source icon that has been cached
On all subsequent runs while the node note icon is green, the stream will execute from that point forward.
Further, if you make a change in the stream prior to that node after its filled it will flush the cache, turn the note icon back to white, and execute all further runs from the start of the stream.
Final note, this same behavior occurs for databases as well. If you have purchased SPSS Modeler server or have an SPSS Modeler Subscription with SQL Enablement, instead of using .SAV files on a local desktop or server, Modeler will create a temporary table on the database itself. That icon will be a database and when the cache is filled it will turn purple.
