Custom Reports

[Bensta]

I am a Crystal report development. I do not have a lot of experience with Cognos Impromptu. Can anyone explain to me how I could desing a report in Cognos. That is, have the ability to design a custom report just like in Crystal or MS Access? I want to be able to specify where my data should display on the report. I would appreciate any help
Thank you

 

[martyc71]

You can start by creating the catalog, you'll need Impromptu Administrator to create a catalog.

The catalog is the schema of your database you defined the tables you want to query against with the appropriate joins.

Once your catalog is created you can then create a report. You can start by creating a simple list report is very straight forward just click and drag any field you want to view in your report.

Martin

 

[Diesels]

I learned Access reports on my own, I learned Crystal Reports on my own, (with the help of some books) but I had to take the Impromptu Administrator Course at Cognos to figure how the catalog worked. I don't know why there are not any books on the subject.

Diesel

 

[Bensta]

Thank you so much for your responses to my question.
I am sorry I think I was not very clear with my question.
I was wondering if It was possible to design reports just the way it is possible with Crystal and Access. I can define my header, my footer, and my detail sections for all my groupings if any, and choose present my details information in any position on my report. That way, I could have a complete control over my data presentation for my reports. Another example, maybe I want to create a text field that would for instance display the number of records ( using the Sum function ). I can even make it visible or invisible. These are the kind abilities I wish to be able to have with Cognos. Is it possible???
From a programmer point of view, it would be nice to have that much flexibility.

 

[DoubleD]

If you design your report using a form frame, you have a great deal of flexibility regarding how & what data is displayed. It is cumbersome though, and more difficult to support in a production environment.
If you decide to build Form Frame reports, I suggest using the Show Boundaries functionality in Impromptu so you can always see where all your objects are.

Pain is stress leaving the body

DoubleD