Summary
This document describes the basic use of reports, how to filter them and the advanced sorting techniques that are available.
Basic Report Overview
Reports and any list in EngageIP are formated in the same general way throughout EngageIP. Below is an example of the report. It consists of the following items:
Column headings which describe the data within the column
Column headers links which are links to the sort / filter window. An arrow (beside
[glossary_exclude]Owner[/glossary_exclude]' in the image to the right) shows how the report is sorted
(ascending/descending). In the example, the Owner column is sorted ascending. If you click the Owner link on the report once again, you will see the sort / filter window (shown on the image to the right) allowing you to switch the sorting to descending (Biggest First) . Clicking on any of the other column header links will allow you to sort the report / list by that column ascending or descending as required. Note: Where invoice names exist, the sort is alphabetic even if you are not using invoices names with letters.
Filter which as shown above appears when you click a Column header link, allows you to filter (search) by that value entered into the textbox. E.g. If you want the report to show a specific owner, enter that owner name in the filter box and hit 'Enter' and the report will filter by that owner. See the Filtering Reports section below for more information on using filters.
Tool Links - the tools on the right hand side perform various actions on the data present in the report.
View - this provides filtering functionality and the ability to hide columns. Hiding a column removes the column from view and will also initiate summarization. If for example you remove a unique column, such as User in the case below, the report will then try to summarize any outstanding unique data and collapse the report to its lowest common denominator. The Save Current View option lets you save and use the customized view as the standard view each time the report is loaded. See the Filtering Reports section below for more information on using the View tool.
Email - this option allows you to email a pre-canned email message from the email messages configured in EngageIP to the users listed or linked to in the report. If you want to email a subset of users, filter them until you have a list of the customers needed, then click email, select the message and click send. The email will be sent to the contact as specified when contact information was setup for each customer. If the contact specified does not exist, EngageIP will attempt to email the billing contact if an email address exists for that contact.
SMS - this option allows you to send an SMS to every user listed in the report view, or subset of users if filters are applied. Note: before you can send SMS messages you must configure an SMS Gateway, see the guide SMS Gateway Configuration for instructions
Export - this option provides the ability to export data into XML or CSV, the file by default will be called export.xml/export.csv.
Print - this provides the ability to print the selection, or results of the report. First filter the report as needed to get the desired data set, then click print to provide print options for the data set returned.
Page Links at the bottom of the report allow navigation of the result set. You can click to the next page, or click a page number to jump to a specific page.
Notes on tool functions and effectiveness:
Column headers and the View / Email / Export / Print links affect all the data in the list or report including the paged items (i.e. the items not in the first list of 10 results for example that show on the first page). If there are 400 returned items in the list but only 10 show, using the headers or the top right tool menu affects all the data in the list/on every page.
Using the select checkboxes or the buttons along the bottom affect only those records that can be seen on current page, not additional pages that the report has paginated.
Filtering Reports
Reports can be filtered in two ways, by clicking on the column header and using the basic filter for that particular column as described above or by clicking the 'View' link on the top right side of any report or list. When a column is filtered, a filter icon will now display on the column that has been filtered as shown next to "Priority" in the image below:
The view window as show below allows filtering by many columns at once. In that example screenshot below, a filter (search) is entered to return all 'Full Name's' that include 'Bob' in them, and for all accounts that have a status of 'Enabled'. Notice those items are filled in. You can enter filtering data in one or more of the text boxes and the report will be sorted based on that criteria. To filter for more then one item or name in a text box, you can separate the values by a semicolon (i.e.: bob;jane;harry). To exclude data in the report you can use an exclamation mark. For example, if I want to exclude Bob from the report and show all others, I could enter '!Bob'.
Example: clicking update while 'Bob' is in the full name filter, 2 results are returned. There are two customers in the system with the name Bob.
Example: clicking update while 'Bob' is in the full name filter, 2 results are returned. There are two customers in the system with the name Bob.
Filtering by Date and Time
On the View Parameters form you can also enter date ranges based on the report by using the calendar drop down window.
Hiding Columns (Grouping Data)
By checking or un-checking the columns on the View Parameters form you can specifying whether to show the column in the returned data set or not. If you want a list simply showing Parent accounts and Full Names, you would de-select all the other columns and leave only the 'Parent' and 'Full Name' columns checked. You can still use the filtering on other columns even though they are unchecked.
Note: When un-checking columns, the report will attempt to summarize the data. For example, if you remove a unique column like Users and there are no other unique columns in the report, it will generate a summary or total of all the accounts if possible rather then displaying multiple rows that all show the same data. This is an important thing to keep in mind when hiding columns and using the reports.
On some reports there will be a COUNT column.
When the list is summarized, the value of the COUNT field/Column will show the sum of the line items. The example Audit Log report illustrates that there are 3 records that match the criteria listed in the columns shown.
Logic Options
OR = Bob;Jim;Larry - means the search will only contain: Bob OR Jim OR Larry
NOT = !Bob;Jim;Larry - means search will not contain: Bob but will contain: Jim OR Larry. To omit Bob, Jim, AND Larry, the filter list would be: !Bob;!Jim;!Larry
EXACT Match - Using !! (double exclamation points) - means to look for an exact match, example of a search !!Bob. That will return ONLY account names or data that match exactly that with no surrounding text or symbols (i.e. accounts with a Contact Name containing 'Bobby' would not be returned).
Advanced Sorting Functionality
To see a summation of unique items in a report, we can use the sales report which has Total values at the bottom. You can see below that the report was sorted by Full Name = Bob Smith so that we can see all rows returned relating to Bob Smith. The image below also has the Service column removed. The report now summarizes by unique packages. You can see that there are two Package 15's in the list because the date on those packages is different.
If we now remove the date column, there will be one of each package because the report now can summarize those two Package 15's into one row. See the difference between the two screen captures, Package 15 shows now in one row, and the base fee is 2 dollars instead of 1 to describe the summary of those two services. ie, the values are summed up in the rows for the packages / services that are rolled up in them.
The overall totals are then shown at the bottom of the report for the data set returned.
The summation functionality described very basically here can be used in any report if there is a specific set of data you're looking to acquire. The understanding of what makes a column unique is key here to getting the summarized data as required.
Saving a Custom View
You can save your custom view by entering a name into the "Save Current View" text box in the lower right of the View Parameters Form and then pressing the Enter key.
The view will then be an option when clicking on the 'View' link. For instance if the View was saved as 'Omit user data view' it would appear when clicking 'View' as shown in the image below
Clicking "Omit user data view" will load the custom view you created, to switch back to the standard view you can use the "Reset View" link as described below.
Overriding the Default View
The saved custom view (described above) can be set up to be the default view that loads every time the report / list data is displayed. To set the saved view as the default view click on View->Filter Report->and in the lower left Default next to the saved filter name. An asterisk (*) will appear next to the saved filter to indicate it is now the default view to be used every time the report is loaded. To switch back to the default view for the report or list simply click the Default link again.
Resetting the View
The Reset View link will appear after you filter a report or list
Clicking on Reset View will return the list back to your saved default or if there is no saved default, to the system default for the report
Exporting Data
Once the desired data set is filtered, summed as required, you can click the 'Export' link. this will export the data to a location of your choice with a file name of export.txt. You can then change the extension to .xml and open in any spreadsheet that supports XML. The data can for there be further sorted, organized, saved or exported into any format required.
EngageIP handles getting the required data exported to Microsoft Excel or any other spreadsheet, the data at that point can be worked on as required, details on how to further use spreadsheets with this data is not covered in this article.
Troubleshooting:
Did the data export correctly? If you're finding any issues with the data, first be sure that the extension is .XML and that it opens in Excel without any special import wizard (it should not require it). In windows sometimes extensions are hidden so be sure that your extensions are visible so you're actually changing the extension and not just the file name
Emailing
To email, first sort and filter the report as needed, then click email, select a canned message and click send. This will send an email to the email contact (configured to receive emails on Contact Types / Setup tab) associated with any account that still exists on your list / report.
This is excellent for emailing promotional / marketing content, or notifying customers of outages etc.