Adding Report Template
To create report templates, you must have the Manage Report Templates permission. This permission allows you to modify and delete any report template (except certain predefined reports installed by CentraSite). By default, users in the CentraSite Administrator role and the Operations Administrator role have this permission.
If you do not belong to a role that includes the Manage Report Templates permission, you can modify and delete a report template if you have the:
appropriate instance-level permissions (Modify or Full) on the report template.
—AND—
Use Reports UI permission.
CentraSite reports are designed using the BIRT (Business Intelligence and Reporting Tools), an open source, Eclipse-based reporting system that comprises an Eclipse-based report designer and a runtime component, that is, a viewer. Report template are deployed as BIRT report design files (.rptdesign).To create a custom report template, you must perform the following high-level steps:
1. Create a new rptdesign template file using the BIRT Report Designer.
During this step, you create a new rptdesign template file, where you specify the query for generating a report and select the fields and layout by which you would like to expose the report.
With the BIRT Report Designer, create a rptdesign file. This rptdesign file is referred to as the Template File in CentraSite Control.
The rptdesign file contains a parameter named ROKEY. This parameter helps to retrieve the object-specific metadata from the CentraSite data store.
2. Create a new Report Template in CentraSite Control.
During this step, you specify the details of the template and upload the rptdesign file with which you would like to generate the report.
You can add a report template to CentraSite Control, making it available to create new reports using this template.
To add a report template
1. In CentraSite Control, go to Reports > Report Templates.
A list of defined templates is displayed in the Report Templates page.
2. In the Report Templates page, click Add Report Template.
3. In the Add Report Template dialog box, provide the required information for each of the displayed data fields.
Field | Description |
Template File | Click Browse to upload the rptdesign template file. |
Name | Name of the report template. A report template name can contain any characters (including spaces). Note:
A report template does not need to be unique within the organization. However, to reduce ambiguity, you should avoid giving multiple report templates the same name. As a best practice, we recommend that organizations adopt appropriate naming conventions to ensure the assignment of distinct report template names. |
Description | (Optional). The description for the report template. This description appears when a user displays the list of templates in the Report Templates page. |
4. Click OK.
The newly created report template is displayed in the Report Templates page.
5. To specify the object types that are allowed to use the template for association purposes, click the Applicable to Object Types tab, and then click Applicable to Object Types. Select one or more object types you want to associate with the template, or select them all by using the All Object Types check box.
6. To enable other users to view, modify, and delete a template that you have created, you must modify the template's permission settings. To do this, click the Permissions tab, and click Add Users/Groups. Select one or more users and groups to which you want to assign permissions. If you want to filter the list, type a partial string in the Search field. CentraSite applies the filer to the Name column. Click OK. Select the View, Modify, and Full check boxes to assign specific permissions to each user and group in the Users/Groups list.
7. To define custom properties for this report template, click the Object-Specific Properties tab, and click Add Property. In the Add Object-Specific Properties dialog box, provide a property name and a value, and click OK. You can add multiple values for a single property. You can optionally specify a namespace to fully identify the property. The property name can contain any character (excluding spaces).
8. Click Save.