Reporting
The periodic report: what sets it apart from the dashboard and from on-demand analysis, its anatomy (parameters, breaks, detail, subtotals, grand total), its scheduled distribution, ROLLUP subtotals and reconciling two figures that contradict each other.
- 21 cards
- 6 topics
- Free
The outline, topic by topic
Each topic is weighted the way the exam weighs it.
- Concepts
- Questions
- Sort and link
- The numbers
- Scenarios
- Understand
A few cards from the deck
Reporting: what is it?
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The regular production, in a fixed format, of numerical reports sent to known recipients.
It answers a question known in advance and comes back every period. A new question ('why did March drop?') belongs to on-demand analysis.
The same sales report must serve every month and each of the five regions. How should it be designed?
- With parameters (month, region) supplied at each run
- By duplicating the report for every month and every region
- By writing the month and region into the query, edited by hand
- By exporting all sales to a spreadsheet that everyone filters
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With parameters (month, region) supplied at each run
A parameter is a value asked for at launch and reused in the query and in the report header. One definition serves sixty editions a year; copies end up diverging.
In a control-break report, a region's subtotal is printed in the …; the grand total, in the ….
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In a control-break report, a region's subtotal is printed in the group footer; the grand total, in the report footer.
The group footer repeats at every break, once per region; the report footer is printed only once, at the end, after every group.
Control-break report: what is it?
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A report sorted on one or more columns, which prints a subtotal each time the value of the sorting column changes.
The change of value is the break. For the subtotal to be right the rows must be sorted first: otherwise the same region appears in several pieces.