To create a custom report based on one of the default reports, start by going to Tools / Reports, and open the Default Folder.
This example will demonstrate how to generate a report listing to-dos that are part of actions. Find the report to customize, which in this example is Action ToDos, and click its Copy button.
This example will start with a List report, which is a data-only report with no mathematical calculations. (Summary reports use calculations, and will be covered later in this article.)
Note: The Choose Data for Report section is used when you want to include data from another report. This will be covered in the article on creating a custom report.
The Selected Data for the Report section lists all fields included in the default report. The x icon for each field is used to control which fields will be included in your custom report. Green icons indicate a field that will not be included. So in this example, the report will include five fields: action ID, action name, due date, assignee, and whether or not the action is complete.
In addition to the x icon, each field has several more icons. Click a field’s gear icon to set its report formatting options.
Note: The link icon enables you to bring in data from a URL There are also icons to delete the field and move to rearrange display order.
In the formatting window you can set the column label (if other than the default field name), alignment, text and background color, bold, etc .
Farther down on the report builder page you can set filter options, which will be covered later in this article. There are also report scheduling options.
At the bottom of the page, assign a report name and description. The Sort By field determines initial sort order, though the order can always be changed in the report itself. In this example, sorting will be by due date. We recommend enabling Save Report so that you can easily return to the report to run it, or to make changes. By default, custom reports will go in the Instance Reports folder, unless you select a different folder you’ve created. To generate the report, click Save & Run Report.
The generated report in this example lists all actions, starting with the soonest due dates, displaying the selected formatting options.
Clicking any column changes the sort order.
Each column header has a three-dot icon. Choosing Outer Group from the three-dot menu will regenerate the report based on that field - assignees in this example.
Now the report lists each assignee with their to-dos. To remove the group sorting, click Manage Groups at the top right and remove the field name.
If the report looks good, you can click Export at the top right and choose a format. Or you can click Back to Reports if finished. If you want to make changes to the report, as will be shown in this example, click Edit Report.
This time the report will be a Summary, so that calculations can be included. The summary report will total the number of actions, so the ID field is changed from the default Group (original field data) to Count.
Note: When creating a Summary report, be sure to check all displayed fields to make sure they have the correct data type. Group means that original field data will be displayed.
This report will be filtered to show only incomplete ToDos. This is done by clicking Add Filter.
The field to filter is the Complete field, which is set to equal No.
The report also now has an edited name and description, to indicate that only incomplete ToDos are included. If you want totals displayed, which in this example will be to-do count totals, be sure to check Include Total Row.
After generating the new report, the ToDo IDs are replaced with count values (1 for each item), with a count total at the bottom.
Returning to report editing, another way to generate a report is to create nested objects in which additional details are displayed when expanding a row. In this example, the details of due date, assignee, and completion are displayed Only in Detail.
Now in the generated report, only ID and name are shown in collapsed view, with more details available when expanding a row.
Returning to the Report Builder main page, the custom report in this example can be found in the Instance Reports folder.
Opening this folder, the custom report is now listed. Custom reports can be edited, copied, run, or deleted.
