Overview
The 'Business Intelligence' screen allows you to create and edit dashboards and reports. These can then be accessed by users from the 'Dashboards & Reports' options on the main FinanSys Apps screen. These are created using a full featured browser-based report designer and so allow for much more flexibility and customisation than is possible within the 'Quick Reports' screen.
The FinanSys Apps report designer can read data from sources other than FinanSys Apps. These can include databases, files, spreadsheets etc. Data from these sources can also be combined with FinanSys Apps data to create a single report from two or more sources.
Reports vs Dashboards
Both reports and dashboards are created using the same designer, but depending on which one is selected some different controls and options are available. In general a dashboard is more suitable for displaying high-level information on screen which may include some interactive elements such as being able to change parameters or drill-down for more details, whereas a report has features that you might associate with a traditional printed report such as paging, saving and emailing options. In general in this help document references to 'reports' will also include dashboards unless otherwise specified.
Working with Reports and Dashboards
To work with existing reports and dashboards go to the 'Business Intelligence' section on the left, and from the action menu to the far right select the 'Edit' option. Use the 'Create New Report' or 'Create New Dashboard' button at the top to create a new report or dashboard. Reports and dashboards remain in a 'Draft' state until they are published, which is also done from the 'Action' menu for the relevant report. Publishing a report allows you to chose which individuals or teams you want to share the report with, and once published this dashboard/report will be available for viewing in the 'Dashboards and Reports' section. This section also allows the user to select a 'default' which will be the first dashboard/report they see when clicking on this option.
Exporting and Emails reports
Dashboards can be saved as PDF, Excel, HTML or image (SVG) files from the 'Save' option at the top right of the screen. Reports have a much wider range of options include XPS and Microsoft Word. Reports can also be emailed directly from the report screen by selecting the 'Send Email' option from the top menu. The report will be attached to the recipients email in the selected format (PDF, XPS, Word etc.).
Emailing of reports can also happen automatically as part of a process, for example a sales invoice or purchase order document might need to be produced and emailed when the invoice/order has been approved. This is done via a FinanSys Apps API, more detailed information on how to do that is available in the API section of this help.