What is a 'Custom Report'?
A very important stage of the continuous improvement cycle is measurement. By automating your business processes in Flokzu, you can collect data and analyze the execution of your processes from the “Metrics & Reports” section (only visible to the Administrator, Business Analyst roles and those users who have permission to see that section).
In addition to the Metrics & Real time reports and Historical reports (BI - Business Intelligence), it is also possible to create custom reports. Custom reports are a very simple way to customize the information you want to measure and analyze from your organization’s business processes.
When creating a new custom report, you will find the following sections:
Report Name: mandatory field that identifies the report (although it does not have to be unique).
A good practice is to define a short and significant name (e.g., 'Ongoing Purchases').
Description: optional field where you can provide more information about the report (e.g.: "Currently ongoing purchases report").
Data filtering: section that allows you to define filters and criteria to determine what sort of data will be included in the report. The conditions established here will be applied when obtaining the data.
Report design: section that allows you to define the elements of your reports and how they are going to be shown.
The first step is to select a process. This is mandatory and you may choose only one.
This means that you will not be able to generate reports that combine information from 2 or more processes.
In the Instances combo box you must select if you only want to include ongoing instances, finalized, paused by timer or all. Depending on that selection, the report will only include user tasks, end states or both.
You can also define conditions based on dates and fields.
The report will only include the results that comply with all the conditions simultaneously.
Date-based conditions will depend on the value you selected in Instances.
If you choose only ongoing instances, you can filter by due date.
If you choose only finalized instances, you can filter by completion date.
In any case, you can always filter by start date (which corresponds to the date on which the process was launched).
Once the date is chosen, you can restrict the time range by selecting Current month, Previous month and Fixed date. The fixed date allows you to select a start day, end day or both (See the following example).
In field-based conditions, you will find process form fields and special fields. For these conditions you can select between:
All conditions are met: Only those process instances that met all the defined conditions will be shown here. (Field Area = IT AND Field Urgency = High)
At least one condition is met: Only those process instances that met at least one condition will be shown. (Urgency Field = High OR Urgency Field = Medium)
If you select the condition "Process Initiator Equal to Logged User", you can create a dynamic report.
When sharing it with other users, each user will only see data of instances initiated by them, without the need to create a report for each one. This is an excellent way to let users know quickly the status of all the processes they launched.
Once in the Report design tab, you'll see a table with only one column (Identifier) by default. This table gathers all the information of the process instances that met the conditions defined in the Data filtering tab.
To edit the element you need to click on the pencil that's at the right of it. This will open a pop-up that will allow you to define the fields that will be the columns of your table. The identifier field cannot be deleted.
When viewing the report, the identifier will contain a direct link to the process instance.
Within this same pop-up, you will be able to choose the order in which your results will be shown. The order determines the column by which the report will be ordered. By default, it is ordered ascendingly by the Identifier, but you can also choose other options (such as Initiation date, Modification date, Due date or Task name).
It is not possible to delete the data table or the row in which it is located.
In addition to the table, you can add other types of widgets such as graphics or arithmetic calculation results, based on your process form fields' values.
To add a new widget you must click on Click to add an empty row. All widgets, except for empty widgets, must have a Title.
It will generate a blank space in the display of your data.
This type of widget allows you to group and graph documents according to a numeric field. The fields that can be used for this widget are Integer, Decimal or AutoCalculated.
When selecting this widget you must define an interval (range) in which you will group the values of a numeric field. Said that you need to set up the numeric field where the data is obtained and the type of chart to show: pie, bar or line.
For this type of widget, you will also need to select an interval for a date-field value, from the following: Daily, Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly or Annual.
The types of fields from which the results can be obtained are the Date and also special fields Start Date and Due Date of the tasks.
For both Numeric and Temporary Widget types, you can hide intervals without results.
This type of widget will create a group for each unique value that the process instances present in a given field. For this widget, you only have to define the field involved and the graphic type.
The types of fields enabled for this widget are Email, Combo Box, Radio Button, Multiselect Combo Box, Checklist, Yes/No and also the special field Process Initiator.
This widget allows you to define an arithmetic function to be performed on a form field value. The fields that you can include in this type of report are Integer, Decimal Number and AutoCalculated.
It is mandatory to define the operator:
Quantity: will return the total number of rows.
Average of the values of the field.
Sum of the values of the field.
Maximum of the field values from the process instances set.
Minimum of the field values from the process instances set.
Cardinality: returns the number of different values in a column.
At any time during the creation of your Report design tab, you will be able to see a preview of how the different elements will be placed in the actual Report.
Custom reports are fully editable: you can modify both the Data filtering and the Report Design tab at any time.
This section is very important since it allows you to share the report with other users in your organization. If you want a user or role other than Administrator or Business Analyst to view the report, you must include it here.
Keep in mind that they will only be able to access the report output in Flokzu and download it to Excel, they will not be able to modify its configuration.
Any user who has permission to view a custom report will have a new section in the left menu called My Reports. From there they can open the reports and visualize their content.
If you want an Administrator or Business Analyst to access a certain report in their 'Custom Reports' left menu, you need to explicitly add them here.
Keep in mind that by sharing the report, you are creating direct access to it. If you modify the configuration, it will affect the data that all other users can see.
This feature is only available for organizations subscribed to our Premium plan
The Schedule functionality allows you to automatically send your report by email to all the email addresses you enter here. You can also set a frequency of delivery. Example: The report can be sent on the first day of each week.
In case you select Daily you'll be able to define the Delivery time.
Click here for more information about this feature.
Once the report is created, click “Save settings”.
Custom reports are based on the current status of the processes. Therefore you will always see the process instances in their current tasks and the most recent information in the fields.
Keep in mind that only Administrator users can delete a report, and this action will eliminate access to it for all other users.
Many reports have columns whose content is wide and cannot be displayed correctly. This first button activates a scroll bar so that all the content is displayed.
It also allows you to define a default width for the columns of that report and every time you are in the full width display the defined width will be remembered.
Users allowed to visualize the reports will also be able to refine the custom report based on a date type field from the forms.
If you don't select the "To" Date when refining the report, the date by default will be that day's date.
All custom reports can be exported to Excel. Note that if you have applied a date filter only the results will be downloaded.
In case the report contains too many results it cannot be downloaded. In that case we recommend to adjust the filters to decrease the results and to be able to download it.
You can filter by the values in your report by clicking on the blank space below your column name and typing in.
In addition to the Metrics & Real time reports and Historical reports (BI - Business Intelligence), it is also possible to create custom reports. Custom reports are a very simple way to customize the information you want to measure and analyze from your organization’s business processes.
When creating a new custom report, you will find the following sections:
Report Name: mandatory field that identifies the report (although it does not have to be unique).
A good practice is to define a short and significant name (e.g., 'Ongoing Purchases').
Description: optional field where you can provide more information about the report (e.g.: "Currently ongoing purchases report").
Data filtering: section that allows you to define filters and criteria to determine what sort of data will be included in the report. The conditions established here will be applied when obtaining the data.
Report design: section that allows you to define the elements of your reports and how they are going to be shown.
Data filtering
The first step is to select a process. This is mandatory and you may choose only one.
This means that you will not be able to generate reports that combine information from 2 or more processes.
In the Instances combo box you must select if you only want to include ongoing instances, finalized, paused by timer or all. Depending on that selection, the report will only include user tasks, end states or both.
You can also define conditions based on dates and fields.
The report will only include the results that comply with all the conditions simultaneously.
Date-based conditions will depend on the value you selected in Instances.
If you choose only ongoing instances, you can filter by due date.
If you choose only finalized instances, you can filter by completion date.
In any case, you can always filter by start date (which corresponds to the date on which the process was launched).
Once the date is chosen, you can restrict the time range by selecting Current month, Previous month and Fixed date. The fixed date allows you to select a start day, end day or both (See the following example).
In field-based conditions, you will find process form fields and special fields. For these conditions you can select between:
All conditions are met: Only those process instances that met all the defined conditions will be shown here. (Field Area = IT AND Field Urgency = High)
At least one condition is met: Only those process instances that met at least one condition will be shown. (Urgency Field = High OR Urgency Field = Medium)
If you select the condition "Process Initiator Equal to Logged User", you can create a dynamic report.
When sharing it with other users, each user will only see data of instances initiated by them, without the need to create a report for each one. This is an excellent way to let users know quickly the status of all the processes they launched.
Report design
Table
Once in the Report design tab, you'll see a table with only one column (Identifier) by default. This table gathers all the information of the process instances that met the conditions defined in the Data filtering tab.
To edit the element you need to click on the pencil that's at the right of it. This will open a pop-up that will allow you to define the fields that will be the columns of your table. The identifier field cannot be deleted.
When viewing the report, the identifier will contain a direct link to the process instance.
Within this same pop-up, you will be able to choose the order in which your results will be shown. The order determines the column by which the report will be ordered. By default, it is ordered ascendingly by the Identifier, but you can also choose other options (such as Initiation date, Modification date, Due date or Task name).
It is not possible to delete the data table or the row in which it is located.
Widgets
In addition to the table, you can add other types of widgets such as graphics or arithmetic calculation results, based on your process form fields' values.
To add a new widget you must click on Click to add an empty row. All widgets, except for empty widgets, must have a Title.
Empty
It will generate a blank space in the display of your data.
Numeric
This type of widget allows you to group and graph documents according to a numeric field. The fields that can be used for this widget are Integer, Decimal or AutoCalculated.
When selecting this widget you must define an interval (range) in which you will group the values of a numeric field. Said that you need to set up the numeric field where the data is obtained and the type of chart to show: pie, bar or line.
Temporary
For this type of widget, you will also need to select an interval for a date-field value, from the following: Daily, Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly or Annual.
The types of fields from which the results can be obtained are the Date and also special fields Start Date and Due Date of the tasks.
For both Numeric and Temporary Widget types, you can hide intervals without results.
Unique terms
This type of widget will create a group for each unique value that the process instances present in a given field. For this widget, you only have to define the field involved and the graphic type.
The types of fields enabled for this widget are Email, Combo Box, Radio Button, Multiselect Combo Box, Checklist, Yes/No and also the special field Process Initiator.
Arithmetic
This widget allows you to define an arithmetic function to be performed on a form field value. The fields that you can include in this type of report are Integer, Decimal Number and AutoCalculated.
It is mandatory to define the operator:
Quantity: will return the total number of rows.
Average of the values of the field.
Sum of the values of the field.
Maximum of the field values from the process instances set.
Minimum of the field values from the process instances set.
Cardinality: returns the number of different values in a column.
At any time during the creation of your Report design tab, you will be able to see a preview of how the different elements will be placed in the actual Report.
Custom reports are fully editable: you can modify both the Data filtering and the Report Design tab at any time.
The previous example configuration, would generate this report:
Permissions
This section is very important since it allows you to share the report with other users in your organization. If you want a user or role other than Administrator or Business Analyst to view the report, you must include it here.
Keep in mind that they will only be able to access the report output in Flokzu and download it to Excel, they will not be able to modify its configuration.
Any user who has permission to view a custom report will have a new section in the left menu called My Reports. From there they can open the reports and visualize their content.
If you want an Administrator or Business Analyst to access a certain report in their 'Custom Reports' left menu, you need to explicitly add them here.
Keep in mind that by sharing the report, you are creating direct access to it. If you modify the configuration, it will affect the data that all other users can see.
Schedule
This feature is only available for organizations subscribed to our Premium plan
The Schedule functionality allows you to automatically send your report by email to all the email addresses you enter here. You can also set a frequency of delivery. Example: The report can be sent on the first day of each week.
In case you select Daily you'll be able to define the Delivery time.
Click here for more information about this feature.
Save Settings
Once the report is created, click “Save settings”.
Custom reports are based on the current status of the processes. Therefore you will always see the process instances in their current tasks and the most recent information in the fields.
Keep in mind that only Administrator users can delete a report, and this action will eliminate access to it for all other users.
Actions on Custom Reports
1. Full width
Many reports have columns whose content is wide and cannot be displayed correctly. This first button activates a scroll bar so that all the content is displayed.
It also allows you to define a default width for the columns of that report and every time you are in the full width display the defined width will be remembered.
2. Date filter
Users allowed to visualize the reports will also be able to refine the custom report based on a date type field from the forms.
If you don't select the "To" Date when refining the report, the date by default will be that day's date.
3. Excel Export
All custom reports can be exported to Excel. Note that if you have applied a date filter only the results will be downloaded.
In case the report contains too many results it cannot be downloaded. In that case we recommend to adjust the filters to decrease the results and to be able to download it.
Filter in the report columns
You can filter by the values in your report by clicking on the blank space below your column name and typing in.
Updated on: 06/07/2021
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