Text and image cards carry the context that makes the measurements interpretable: what the instruments are, where they sit, and what a reader should do about what they see.
Neither card type is tied to the dashboard time range. They show the same thing regardless of the window, which makes them the right place for information that does not change reading to reading.
Text cards
Use a text card for a heading that divides a long dashboard into sections, a note on what a group of instruments monitors, the response procedure when a threshold is crossed, or who to contact.
The content editor gives you bold, italic, underline, links and three heading levels, so a card can carry a short structured note rather than a wall of plain text.
The most valuable text on a monitoring dashboard is usually the sentence that says what to do. A reader who sees an alert and does not know whether to phone someone is the situation these cards exist to prevent.
Keep it short. Text competing for space with the charts defeats the point.
Image cards
Use an image card for a site plan showing where instruments are installed, a section or elevation drawing, or a photograph of the installation.
An instrumentation layout is the single most useful image on most monitoring dashboards. Device names alone rarely tell a reader where on the structure a reading came from, and a plan with the instrument locations marked closes that gap immediately.
Upload the image in card settings; it can be replaced or removed later from the same place.
Check that an image is legible at the size the card is actually displayed. A drawing that needs zooming to read is not doing its job on a dashboard.
Keep supporting content in proportion
These cards should frame the monitoring data, not crowd it. If context is taking up more of the dashboard than the measurements, it probably belongs in a linked document or a knowledge base article instead.
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