Assemble the Reports on a Page

The prompts and the target reports in a page or a dashboard create an interactive and easy way to access IBM® Cognos® Business Intelligence environment.

Each report is displayed using the IBM Cognos Viewer portlet. The reports communicate with each other using the properties of this portlet.

You can use different design strategies to implement global filters in a page. The following figure shows an example of a basic page layout:

Diagram showing an example of a page layout

Use the following steps when defining global filters in a single page. If you want to implement this functionality in a dashboard, you must complete additional steps. For more information, see Create a Dashboard with Multiple Tabs.

Procedure

  1. In IBM Cognos Connection, click the new page button New page icon.
  2. Type the name, and select a location for your page.
  3. Click Next.
  4. In the Set columns and layout page, set the number and width of columns.

    For example, the reports that display the prompts and prompt controls can be placed in one column, and the target reports in a separate column to the right.

  5. Click Add at the bottom of the first column.
  6. In the Available Entries box, click IBM Cognos Content.
  7. Select the IBM Cognos Viewer portlet, click the right arrow button Right arrow icon to move the portlet to the Selected Entries box, and click OK.
  8. Repeat steps 5 to 7 for each column.

    You must add the IBM Cognos Viewer portlet for each report that you want to include in the column. For example, if the column on the left will contain a prompt and prompt controls, add two IBM Cognos Viewer portlets.

  9. Click Next.
  10. Complete the remaining steps in the wizard, if needed, and click Finish.

    For more information, see the steps in the section Create a Page.

  11. Go to the folder where you saved the new page, and open it.

    In the page columns, you can see the empty frames of the IBM Cognos Viewer portlets.

  12. For any portlet in the page, click the edit button Edit icon in the portlet toolbar.
  13. In the portlet properties page, click Select an entry to select the report you want to display in the portlet.
  14. Click Report Properties.

    The Set the properties page appears.

  15. For the Fragment Action property, specify the default portlet action when the portlet is invoked in a page.

    You can choose to show the run icon, run the report, or view the most recent saved output.

    Tip: For more information about the portlet properties, click the Help button in the portlet.

  16. For the Prompt the user property, specify how to execute the prompts.
    • When you select Every time, if the report contains optional or required prompts, the user is prompted to enter the prompt values before the report is run.
    • When you select Only when required parameter values are missing, the user is prompted if the report contains required prompts and the values are missing. Otherwise the report runs successfully.
    • When you select Never and show the report only when required values are provided, IBM Cognos Viewer attempts to run the report, but the page remains hidden until the required prompt values are provided.
    • When you select Based on the prompt settings of the report, IBM Cognos Viewer uses the prompts specified in the report.
  17. For the Prompt values property, select the Communicate with other portlets check box.

    This property enables communication between this portlet and other portlets in the page that have this property set up.

  18. If you want to set up communication between only specific portlets in the page, type the channel name in the box provided.

    Only the portlets that share the same channel name can interact. By specifying the channel name, you have more control over the page. For example, you can link only the reports that have matching parameters.

    For more information about this property, click the Help button in the portlet.

  19. If you selected the Communicate with other portlets check box, you can specify how global prompts are matched. Select either Parameter name or data item or Parameter name only.

    Typically, prompt values are matched using the parameter name only. However, for date and time prompts, such as From and To, using the parameter name may not work because the parameter names are using the same data item, for example, Order date. In these situations, use the Parameter name or data item option to get the correct results in your reports.

  20. If you want to see the portlet toolbar in the page, for the Show Toolbar property, select the Normal mode and Maximize mode check boxes.
  21. Click OK to close the Set the properties page, and click OK again to close the general properties page.
  22. Repeat steps 12 to 20 for each portlet in the page.
Parent topic: Defining Global Filters