Report Builder in Web

[JRO061601]

When I use the Report Builder in Desktop, the prompts take me directly to a list of attributes and metrics.

When I use the Report Builder in Web (as a Web Analyst), I am forced to drill from Schema Objects > Attributes and from Public Objects > Metrics. Why is this, and is there a way for the administrator to 'fix' this behavior in Web?

Thanks.

 

[chael]

This is an excellent question/observation, and judging by the lack of responses it appears that this is just the way it works. The issue is particularly a problem when trying to use Web Professional and creating a report from scratch via the web. A typical report creation usually employs 2 things: attributes and metrics. Why couldn't MicroStrategy just have 2 boxes where one box has attributes, the other has metrics?

I suppose part of the argument is that users may want to drag pre-defined filters and templates into reports, or that attributes and metrics may not always be stored in their respective folders. Thus, users are forced to fully 'drill' down and find the objects. This aspect alone makes Web Professional clunky and harder to use than Desktop, which was what it is suppposed to replace for most users in an enterprise deployment.

Just my $0.02.

Chael

 

[JRO061601]

Thanks for the reply Chael. I agree that the Report Builder is not user friendly when trying to build a report from scratch. Another observation is that in Desktop, the list of attributes are immediately presented, but they are not grouped in their folders. An end user has to pick through a list of all attributes. In Web, you have to drill from Schema Objects -> Attributes, but at least from there on the attributes are presented grouped in their folders. Finally, in Web, unless you go through a lot of effort to change security in the Access Control Lists, a user will also have to see a lot of extraneous folder under Schema Objects, such as Facts, Transformations, and Functions.

The Report Wizard is fine for combining templates and filters, but the Report Builder needs work as the utility end users are expected to use to build reports from scratch.