Building a report

A report answers one question about your organisation. Learnient ships several, and New report builds your own in three steps: Select fields, Advanced options and Preview. The decision worth getting right comes before all three: what the report is about, because filtering afterwards cannot change it.

Before you build one

Check what exists first. The library ships reports for the common questions, and the usual reason for a near-duplicate is that somebody did not look. Where one is close, Duplicate it and adjust the copy. You start with a working data source rather than a decision.

Choosing the report type and data source

Open Reports in the main menu and select New report. The panel on the left asks three things.

Setting	What it decides
Report type	Table for rows and columns, Chart for a picture, Tiles for one headline number
Chart type	Charts only: Column, Bar, Line or Pie
Data source	What the report is about, and so which fields it can use

Data source is the one that matters. It fixes which records a report can reach. A report built on courses cannot become one about people by changing a filter. Pick by what one row should be. For one line per person per course, choose a source that crosses the two, such as User × Course detail. A source about courses alone never gives you that, however you group it.

Some sources answer a particular question, such as Manager team performance or Retained certificate proofs. They are usually faster than building the same answer yourself.

All three settings lock when you move on from Select fields, so go back to that step to change them. Once the report is saved they cannot be changed at all. To change what a saved report is about, duplicate it or build a new one.

Screenshot missingreport-builder-type-and-source

New report with Report type set to Chart, Chart type Column and Data source User course engagements in the left panel, and the Select fields step open on the right.

Expected at src/assets/screenshots/guides/build-a-report/report-builder-type-and-source.png

Step 1: Selecting fields

What you choose here depends on the report type.

A table

Select fields from Available fields to add them as columns. Search fields narrows a long list. Under Selected fields, drag the columns into the order you want. To give a column a clearer heading, rename it. If two columns end up with the same label, the builder warns you, because a CSV export is harder to use when two columns share a heading.

A chart

Field	What it is
Label (x) axis	What you are comparing, such as course or department. Each value gets its own bar, point or slice
Value (y) axis	The field being measured
Aggregate type	How the values for each label are combined (see below)
Label axis title, Value axis title	Optional. Leave them blank to use the field names

A tile

Choose the tile value field, an aggregate type and a Tile name. The name is the label shown above the number.

Which aggregate types you are offered

Aggregates combine many records into one number. The choices depend on the kind of field:

Field	Aggregates
Number, such as a score	Sum, Average, Maximum, Minimum, Count
Date and time	Maximum (latest), Minimum (earliest), Count
Text, yes/no, or a list of choices	Count only

Count counts records, not yes answers. A count of Is overdue is the number of records, whether overdue or not. To count only the overdue ones, add a filter on Is overdue with Is true (see Filtering what is included).

Select Next to go to Advanced options.

Step 2: Advanced options

Advanced options is a set of sections that expand. Which sections you see depends on the report type, and all of them are optional apart from any you start filling in.

Order for a table

Select order by fields sorts the rows. Select Add order by field (the + button), choose the field, and choose Ascending or Descending. Add more fields to sort ties: the first field sorts first.

A table also has a Select aggregates section. At the moment it has no effect on what the report shows, so leave it empty.

Groups for a chart

The Selected group section adds a group. A group splits each bar or line into series. For example, a column chart of completions by course, grouped by department, shows one coloured column per department inside each course.

Chart	Groups
Column, Bar	Up to two
Line	One, which gives one line per value
Pie	None, because a pie has no room for a second split

Chart options

Sort order orders the chart By label or By value, Ascending or Descending.
Show empty values keeps labels that have nothing in them, so a department with no completions still appears.
Hide values removes the numbers printed on the chart.
Show legend adds a key, which you need once you have groups.
Show trend line and Show target line are for every chart except pie. A target line needs a target value, such as the number of completions you expect.

Tile options

Icon puts an icon beside the number, in the Icon colour you pick.
Select tile indicator colours the tile by its value. Select Add tile indicator (the + button) to add a range with a Lower value and an Upper value, then pick a Container colour and a Text colour for it. A range includes both of its ends, and the lower value must be less than the upper one. Add a range for each band you want, such as green for 0 to 5 and red for 6 to 100.
Value options adds a Value prefix or Value suffix to the number, such as £ or %.

Screenshot missingreport-builder-tile-options

Advanced options for a Tiles report with Icon, Select tile indicator and Value options expanded: one indicator range from 0 to 5 with green container and white text, and a Value suffix of "%".

Expected at src/assets/screenshots/guides/build-a-report/report-builder-tile-options.png

Filtering what is included

Every report type has Select filters. Filters decide which records are counted or listed.

Select Add filter to start a group.
Choose the field, then the filter type, then the value. The first row of a group reads Where.
Select Add additional filter to add another condition to the same group, and choose And or Or to join it to the one above.
To add a second group, select Add filter again. Choose And or Or between the groups.
To take a group away, select Remove filters in it.

Groups are how you combine conditions that would otherwise be ambiguous. For “overdue in Sales, or overdue in Support”, put Is overdue Is true in one group, and the two departments joined with Or in another, with And between the groups.

The filter types depend on the field:

Field	Filter types
Text	Equals, Does not equal, Contains, Does not contain, Starts with, Ends with, Is any of, Is none of
Number	Equals, Does not equal, Less than, Greater than, Less than or equal to, Greater than or equal to, Between, Outside range
Date and time	The number comparisons plus Between and Outside range, and the rolling periods Today, Yesterday, This week, Last week, This month, Last month
Yes/no	Is true, Is false
A list of choices	Contains any of, Contains all of, Does not contain

Every field also has Has a value and Does not have a value, for finding records where something was never filled in.

Rolling periods move with the calendar. A report filtered to This month shows the current month whenever it runs, which is what you want for a report you schedule.

Select Next to preview.

Step 3: Previewing and saving

Preview runs the report against your data as you have built it. If it is not what you expected, select Previous to go back and change it. Nothing is saved until you save it.

You can export from the preview before saving. A chart’s export menu offers Export to PNG, Export to JPG, Export to PDF and Export to CSV. A table exports to CSV, PDF or Excel.

When it is right:

Select Save report.
Enter a Report name. It is required.
Choose a Report category to file it under.
Select Save report.

A report with no category shows as Uncategorized. That is where everything ends up in an organisation where nobody files reports, so choose a category. Categories are managed on their own screen: see Organising reports into categories and dashboards.

Changing a report later

Open the report from the list and choose Edit. You can change its fields, options and filters, but not its report type, chart type or data source.

A saved report can also be exported, shared, scheduled or archived. Sharing and scheduling have their own rules about whose data each recipient sees. See Sharing reports and Scheduling report deliveries. Archived is a separate view from Active, so you can set aside a report you no longer run without deleting it.