Reporting and Data Modeling#

How reporting works from source to reader: model your data, build web reports and Excel reports (lists, crosstabs, charts, maps, professional reports and AI insights), view them live, and run them in distribution jobs. Also covers the early release features and how to send feedback.

How reporting works#

• How reporting works - The whole chain on one page, from a data source to a data model to a report to what a reader receives, who does what, what is live and what is static, and what needs a license.

Data modeling#

• Data models - What a data model is, why it sits between a source system and report authors, how to explore and export its source, get views and hierarchies suggested by the AI assistant and ask it to change a view, join views across sources, curate fields and filters, build hierarchies, set who sees each view in the Excel add-in (Public, Hidden or Disabled), and the limits to know.
• Bring several sources into one model - Add a second connection or workspace file to a data model, see how Reportworq names and uses each source, and know how views and joined views draw from them.
• Build a view with the designer - Build a data model view on a SQL datasource by picking a starting table, ticking columns, and following links to related tables, or write the view as SQL, then check it on the Preview tab.
• Join views across sources - Combine the rows of a data model's views, usually views of different sources, into one joined view, or find the rows of one view that have no match in another. Relate two views once, check the match on real rows with Test match and Discover, line up values the two systems write differently, read the Explain plan, and know the limits an administrator sets.
• Table relationships - Where the view designer's links between tables come from, which sources supply them, and how to add a manual relationship to a data model when the database does not declare one.
• Hierarchies - Define manual or level-based hierarchies on a data model source, attach them to fields, and use them to roll values up into subtotals in web report crosstabs and professional reports.
• Field filtering - Narrow a view's rows with conditions on its fields, use variables for run-time values, and understand where the filter runs and why text matching can differ by source.
• Direct queries - Let report authors in the Excel add-in query a data model's sources directly, without a curated view, and know what that gives up and how to turn it off safely.
• View visibility - Set each data model view to Public, Hidden or Disabled, and see exactly what that does in the Excel add-in, the web report studio, joined views, reports and jobs.
• Data model variables - Set a data model variable's default, whether it is required, and how a report prompts for it (free text, a view of the model, or any job parameter type), and write {{tokens}} so their values are filled into SQL, MDX, and DAX safely. Includes what changed for queries written before this release.
• Global parameters - Define a value once for the whole workspace and reuse it in distribution jobs and in the choice lists of data model variables, with the rules that keep it safe (one hop, no global pointing at a global, an impact review before you change it).
• Discover your data - Look at what a data model's sources and views really hold before you build on them: browse a source's tables, preview a view, explore a whole model, export a source to Excel, check how views match, and ask the AI assistant to explain.
• Ask AI on a data model - Use the data model assistant to get views, joined views, and hierarchies suggested from your sources, or to change the view you have open, with the exact starter requests it offers, what it reads and sends, and what it cannot do.
• Build a data model from a workspace file - Point a data model straight at an Excel workbook or SQLite database that lives in the same workspace, with no datasource connection in Integrations, the file is picked from the workspace, and the connection is built and thrown away each time the model runs.

Building reports#

• The web report studio - Create a web report, lay out its sheets, formats and pictures, put live lists, crosstabs and charts on the page, and save it.
• The Excel add-in and the studio - Build the same lists, crosstabs and charts in Excel or in the web report studio, and learn how a workbook and a web report relate and which one to start in.
• List reports - Build a list report from a data model view, in Excel or in the web report studio, with sections, sorting, totals, filters and row limits.
• Crosstabs - Build a crosstab from a data model view, in Excel or in the web report studio, with row and column groupings, values, filters, Top N and totals.
• Charts and maps - Add a chart or a map to a web report or an Excel workbook, bind it to cells or to a report, and know how it reads its data and what a distribution job does with it.
• Professional reports - Build a formatted, formula-driven financial report such as a P&L, either from a blank start or by converting a crosstab, and see what happens on a server that is not licensed for it.
• AI insights - Add a short AI-written explanation of a report or a range to a sheet, know which AI connection it needs, what it sends to the provider, and how it behaves in a distribution job.
• Combine report types on one sheet - Put lists, crosstabs, charts, maps and AI insights on the same sheet or workbook so they follow each other, and see which combinations work and where they stop.
• Cell-driven variables - Let a worksheet cell supply the value of a report filter or variable, so changing the cell re-queries the report, and drive the same cell from a job parameter.

Viewing live reports#

• The viewer - Open a web report in the viewer to filter it, expand it, drill into it and refresh it with live data, without changing the report itself.
• Download, burst and keep a view - Take a live web report away as Excel or PDF, burst it into a book or a set of files by one or two of its filters, and keep a view you adjusted.

Web reports in distribution jobs#

• A web report as a job source - Add a web report to a distribution job as its source report, aim the job's parameters at the report's filters, and understand what each run sends.
• Convert a web report to Excel - Turn a web report into an Excel workbook that its jobs then refresh in place, and know what changes for the jobs and for the report.
• Key-cell formats and what a job keeps - How a list's or crosstab's formats are stored in key cells, which formats a job over a converted or pane-saved workbook keeps, and what makes a run fail instead.

Early release#

• Early release features and Send feedback - Which features are in early release, what the Early release pill means, what Send feedback sends and where it goes, and the notice you will see at the top of early release pages.

Troubleshooting and limits#

• Troubleshooting and limits - Every limit that guards a web report, a data model and a job over a web report, the exact messages Reportworq shows when a variable value, a license or a size is refused, and what to do about each.