Crystal Reports Customized Groups

Did you know that in Crystal Reports you can design your own customized groups for your reports? All you need to do is to decide what the new groups will be called and what the rules or criteria are for the different groups. You are ready to go!

Let’s say that you have a list report containing 250 companies and the total sales amount for the year to date. The Sales Manager would like to see them grouped as follows:

Gold Star Customers (Total Sales Amount greater than $100,000)Silver Star Customers (Total Sales Amount between $50,000. and $99,999)Bronze Star Customers (Total Sales Amount between $10,000. and $49,999)Must Contact Customers (Total Sales Amount less than $9,999)

Here’s how you customize the grouping in Crystal Reports:

Insert a group on the Total Sales Amount field.Select Group from the Insert menuIn the order drop down (second drop-down on Common Tab)—choose Specified Order.A New Tab will open with the label Specified Order.

Type the name of the group ie. ‘Gold Star Customers’ and click on the New button, which opens the following dialog for entering the criteria of this group:

Add your criteria and click OK.Create the other two main groups in the same manner.The last group, Must Contact Customers, will go on the tab for Others.
Select the tab Others – notice the radio button is already there, just change the name in the text box from ‘Others’ to “Must Contact Customers”.You now click on OK and you are done!!

You have now made your first custom grouping for your report! Congratulations.

Happy Reporting!

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Drill in chart to different Tab

Posted on 5 October 2010 12:02 am.Femke

If you want to give your users the choice of clicking on a chart (e.g. clicking on the chart title) and then going to a specific tab where the KPI is displayed in more detail, you can use the property “Selected Item: Item (by position)” of the Tab-component and several toggle.

You can even return to the overview tab by using the same method (toggle button). However If you want your users to be able to navigate through BOTH the tab buttons and your toggle buttons, you need to set-up the “return” toggle buttons “with non existing tab positions” as source data. This as the Tab component does not have an insert selection option itself. And when clicking on a tab and then clicking in the chart (on toggle button), the position is not changed and thus it does not trigger the “Selected Item: Item (by position)” property.

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SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 SP3 naujienos

Pasirode ilgai lauktas SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 Service Pack 3 (SP3) paketas.

Jame yra ištaisyta visa aibe klaidu, kurios iki šiol buvo taisomos tarpiniuose atnaujinimuose (XI 3.1 FixPack 2.x) bei atsirado nauju patobulinimu ir funkcionalumu.

Štai keletas naujoviu:

Itrauktas nauju OS bei duomenu šaltiniu palaikymasWebIntelligence Query Stripping – užklausu optimizavimas eliminuojant ataskaitoje nenaudojamus objektusMerge Dimensions – dimensiju apjungimo ir detalizavimo (drill) patobulinimaiOLAP Universe pre-defined filter editorNauji Xcelsius servisai – Xcelsius Cache ir Processing ServersNajas Crystal Reports duomenu šaltinis – Universal Web Services ConnectorSAP Integration Kit atnaujinimaiKiti patobulinimai

SAP BusinessObjects XI 3.1 Service Pack 3 (SP3) gali buti diegiamas kaip esamu sistemu atnaujinimas arba kaip nauja pilna versija.

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Two Advantages of a Manual Maximum Calculation in Xcelsius

By

AmyPublished: August 4, 2010Posted in: Business Intelligence, Tech Tips, Xcelsius, Xcelsius End UserTags: Dashboard design, Xcelsius

Problem A: I have data that could be in the 1000s but sometimes could be 1 or 2.  Users do not want to see a division of 1.5 (or any part of a whole) since the data is tracking incidents and there are never “half incidents.”  How do I force the values to integers without losing the divisors for the high numbers (i.e. when there is 1000 maximum, I want to still see 250, 500, 750 divisors)?

 

Solution: Set a manual calculated maximum

{ =IF(MAX(AE15:AE26)<100,100,MAX(AE15:AE26)) } and then set the division number to 1.  With the division number to 1, it often also looks better to remove the grid lines (in case the data for the charts sometimes is much higher).

          

  Problem B:  I want to display a line chart on top of a stacked bar chart because there is no combination chart with this option.  My data for the stacked bar chart, however, is sometimes over 100 and sometimes under 100 and the extra space shifts the chart so that the two do not align.  How can I make the layered charts always align? 

 

 (Layered line chart does not line up with stacked bar chart when maximum is less than 100)

 

 (Layered line chart lines up with stacked bar chart when the maximum is over 100)

 

Note: If the charts are less than a magnitude different, the following method is a not-so-elegant-but-perhaps-acceptable workaround.  In the example above, I have emphasized the issue of alignment by making the different much greater in which case a more-involved display control of multiple charts may be the only acceptable option. 

Solution: Set a manual calculated maximum within an if() statement so that the maximum is always 100 or greater even if the stacked bar chart total is less than 100. (See above note for exception) 

 

This “fix” may not be acceptable for the right visual consumption. What may need to be done when the data is more than a magnitude of 10 different is to work with display properties for two charts with different widths based upon the maximum chart height formula instead.

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Sharing Reports in SAP Crystal Reports Server

In this post, the 2nd in a three part series for the Reportapalooza “Reporting Remix” challenge, I will describe my observations of SAP Crystal Reports Server after logging on with Internet Explorer into the Java Infoview portal.

I logged into SAP Crystal Reports Server as the Administrator and was given two categories of options: Navigate and Personalize. Beneath the Personalize category was a Preferences selection. I’ve never been the type of person to pass on the opportunity to tweak a couple settings, so I clicked Preferences. Below is a screenshot of the initial screen displayed after I logged into the system.

Preferences are available in four categories:

GeneralChange PasswordCrystal ReportsDashboard and Analytics

The General section was expanded by default and the first setting provides the option to change the InfoView Start Page. I modified this selection by clicking the option button beside Folder then browsing to the “Report Samples” folder. By making this selection, all of my subsequent logons to the SAP Crystal Reports Server will no longer display the Navigate and Personalize categories as previously described. Instead, I would be taken directly to the Report Sample folder. 
This option saves time and allows me to get right to the folder that contains the reports I’m most interested in analyzing.

Browsing BusinessObjects InfoView
The contents of the Java Infoview portal, (or BUSINESSOBJECTS INFOVIEW as it’s titled in the upper left corner of the page header), delivers Crystal Reports and other local document types to users in a similar format as Windows Explorer. Users have the ease of navigating through a folder structure on the left side of the page while viewing the contents of the selected folder on the right side of the page.
This basic style should be very familiar to anyone that has spent any time working with a PC. The simplicity in navigation seems like it would lead to a very productive user experience.

Adding Reports to the Portal
To begin sharing reports with other users, I will need to add them to the portal. Will this be difficult or easy? Should I right-click or look for something like “Add”? The answer is: either.
If you want to add a report to the portal, just click Add in the toolbar located across the top of the folder structure. After clicking Add, two choices will be available – Crystal Reports and Local Document. If Local Document is selected, you’ll have the opportunity to browse for a Microsoft Office document (Excel, Word, or PowerPoint), PDF, Text file, or other file type. If Crystal Reports is selected, you’ll be taken to a screen prompting you to select a Crystal Report. The screenshot below shows the Add button in action.

Another way of adding a report to the portal is by right-clicking on a folder and selecting Add. This option is available in the tree of folders on the left side of the screen. You can also right-click on a folders displayed on the right side of the screen to add a Crystal Report to the portal. Picture below is this example.

Sharing Reports with Folders and Categories
Reports can be shared or delivered to authorized users in either folders, categories, or both. Folders are the primary structure for storing published report objects while categories seem to work as custom views that may contain reports from different folders.

My Favorites and Inbox
The My Favorites folder in the Java Infoview portal allows users to save their own personal copies of reports. This is a great place for storing report variations or reports that are still in the development and verification phase.

The Inbox is an extremely useful feature for passing around instances of reports to other authorized users. Also, the Infoview Inbox is a common destination for sending the results of scheduled report instances. Any user with Schedule rights can send refreshed report instances to other users with a valid logon by selecting “Business Objects Inbox” as the scheduled destination while scheduling a report to refresh.

Enterprise Convenience
After spending a short amount of time with SAP Crystal Reports Server, it has become very obvious how powerful this product can be to an organization. A report developer in Mobile can create a report, publish it to the portal, and then have users in Portland, New York, and Atlanta all view it within seconds of publishing it. With this type of collaborative environment, someone in another city can see a report quicker than someone four cubicles away can walk to your desk. Now that is cool!

Please feel free to email me if you have any questions. Thank you!

Jim Brogden

jim.brogden@daugherty.com

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Kimono Starts to Open on BusinessObjects XI 4.0 at ASUG BO Conference

The 2010 ASUG BusinessObjects User Conference provided a lot of interest not just for the 1,100 registered attendees but also for the additional 600 attendees of the SAP Fall Focus who shared the same venue. Judging by the number of attendees in the various sessions, it appeared a large number of SAP Fall Focus attendees decided to attend the BusinessObjects tracks. The same was true in the exhibit area as many of the BusinessObjects sponsors were swamped with excited and interested customers.

This year Xcelsius dashboards shared the limelight with Mobile Business Intelligence in terms of the most popular topics being discussed amongst attendees.

There was also some buzz around the new BusinessObjects XI 4.0 release promising to be the first truly integrated business intelligence platform. While there were a few small demonstrations of some of the new XI 4.0 products in the general session, most of the other sessions stuck to slides and pre-recorded Camtasia demonstrations.  With the release moving to “ramp up” stage in November, the kimono was only half opened on some of the new features and functions. These included the new Data Services that will now incorporate Text Analytics in addition to Data Integrator and Data Quality in a single engine solution. Also, there is the new Universal Metadata Layer that not only combines Business Views and Universes but also now provides direct access to Multidimensional OLAP data sources.

Part of the integration approach with XI 4.0  is to provide common services across all the main content provider tools like Crystal Reports, Web Intelligence, Xcelsius, Explorer. These include a common query panel for accessing data through a universe so in the new Xcelsius Enterprise 4.0 developers would have access to universe objects while building the dashboard.

An updated Web Intelligence brings new charting libraries from the Explorer product and an update Crystal Reports delivers a new grid view with drag and drop on graphics capability.

Common platform services like Auditing and Life Cycle Manager now extend across all the content provider tools including Xcelsius.

SAP’s new solution for in-memory analytics, known as HANA (High performance ANalytical Appliance), was also discussed.

Once the ramp up period gets underway, we will have a better chance to more thoroughly explore the new features and functions but based on this sneak preview, there appears to be some promising new functionality in XI 4.

Paul Grill started his career in Information Technology in the U.K. in 1978, as an Executive Data Processing Trainee for Honeywell. More than thirty years later, he still has a voracious appetite for learning as Information Technology continues to advance at an ever accelerating pace. He was first introduced to the world of Business Intelligence in 1991, in France, when he saw a demonstration of an early version of BusinessObjects on Windows 2.1. He returned to the U.S. to rave about this phenomenal product, but it was many years before BusinessObjects made it into the mainstream. Paul founded InfoSol in 1997, and made Business Intelligence one of the key solutions offered by the company. Today, InfoSol is a leading SAP BusinessObjects solutions partner, known for its expert consulting, education and innovative add-on solutions. Paul is well known within the SAP BusinessObjects community for his extensive knowledge of Business Intelligence, and he has lectured and written many articles on the subject. Paul enjoys writing, running and coaching kids soccer, and is passionate about Ancient Egyptology.

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Changing Default Field Settings in Crystal Reports

When you design your reports in Crystal Reports, Crystal Reports uses the database format for the database fields.  It also uses the database fonts as I discussed in Setting Default Fonts in Crystal Reports. This, again, requires that you format these fields every time you want to use them in you report.

I recommend you take the time upfront to change these default settings in Crystal Report so that you won’t have to change the settings on each new report you create. Here’s how you change the default field settings in Crystal Reports:

From the File Menu, select Options.Choose the Fields tab.For each field category, select the format you would use regularly. (For example; for Numbers you may like the comma format and 2 decimal places.)Currency could be the same as Number, but with the currency symbol: Floating places the symbol directly to the left of the number, e.g.  $456.87.Fixed places the symbol several spaces away from the number, e.g. $       456.87.Date is often in the database as Date and Time, but your organization does not use the time part!  Format it so that Crystal Reports fixes that so it appears the way you want it on your report.  You can include the leading zero (05/05/2010) or not (5/5/2010.)  Pick the preferred format for your organization.Date and Time should be the same as Date, if your organization does not use the Time part.  Otherwise, format according to the preference of your organization.

Keep in mind, Crystal Reports is considered a presentational report designing tool.  While your report should always look professional, it does not mean the report designer needs to spend hours formatting it.  The report designer needs to present the correct data in a professional manner, but with Crystal Reports, that processt does not have to be difficult!

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