Bind Report to Dabacon Project Data

To bind a report to the project data, click Data Source on the AVEVA toolbar. The Data Source Wizard window is displayed.

There are three options:

• Use New to define a new data source

• Use Copy to select an existing data source, editing it if required

• Use Edit to modify the data source of the current report (this option is not available if the current report does not have a data source defined for it).

Select the required option and click Next.

Defining a New Data Source

1. To define a new data source, start the Data Source Wizard and click New, then Next.

   The Properties page of the wizard is then displayed:

   

   A name for the new data source is automatically generated. This may be changed to a name which describes the element(s) the data source will use.

   Enter a description if required.

2. Click Next.

   The Base Element Types page of the wizard is then displayed:

   

   At least one element type must be selected. This will be the element type used to populate the report.

   The list of elements shown may be filtered by typing in the filter box.

   

3. Select the element or elements required by clicking on them. The Ctrl and Shift keys may be used to make multiple selections. Use the arrow buttons to move the selected elements for the data source to the Base Element Types box.

   

4. Click Next.

   The Filters page of the wizard is then displayed:

   

   Using this page, filters may be added to limit the elements retuned by the data source. These filters maybe simple attribute based comparisons, or more complex PML1 expressions.

5. Enter attribute based comparison filters in the Attribute Filters box. Enter PML1 expression filters in the Expression Filters box.

6. To add a new filter, click the appropriate Add Filter button and enter or select the filter details in the row of fields that is then provided. Multiple filters may be defined.

7. To delete a filter, select it from the list of filters and select the appropriate Delete Filter button.

8. Click Next.

   The Columns page of the wizard is then displayed:

   

   The attributes of the base elements of the data source are displayed in the Available Columns box.

   If multiple elements have been selected for the data source, then either all attributes of these element types may be listed by clicking All Attributes, or only those common to all the selected element types may be selected by clicking Common Attributes.

9. Select the columns that are to be available for use in the report by clicking on them. Use the Ctrl and Shift keys to make multiple selections.

10. Use the arrow buttons to move the selected columns to the Data Source Columns box.

    Once one or more columns have been selected PML1 expressions may be typed into the Data Source Columns box, the results of which will be available for use in your report. For example:

    

11. Click Finish when the data source definition is complete.

    The new data source is now available for use in the report. The data source is saved inside the report. For example:

    

    It may be edited by selecting Edit option of the Data Source Wizard (see Editing a Data Source).

Copying a Data Source

12. To create a new data source by copying an existing data source, editing it if required, select the Copy option of the Data Source Wizard.

    The Copy Data Source page of the wizard is then displayed:

    

    The existing data sources are listed. Data sources may come from three sources.

    

    Element

    Element Views are created automatically by the system. One element view is created for every base element type. Selecting an element view is an easy way to include data from one type of element in a report.

    Project

    Project Views are stored in a Lexicon dictionary database. A user must have read access to the Lexicon database to see Project Views. Project Views may contain more complex data, and will be set up by an administrator. A set of sample project views are include in the sample project.

    User

    User views may be copies of Project or Element views, or maybe data sources users have created and stored locally.

    Whichever view is chosen to use for a report a copy of it is taken. The original view is left as it is. Write access to important project resources such as the Lexicon dictionary database is therefore not required.

    The views shown may be filtered based on the type of the owning database of the elements in the view.

    

    View sets are a way of grouping views together. Currently from the data source Wizard this is used purely to help the administrator to group logically related views together, for ease of distribution and use. However, in later releases it will be possible to build relationships between single views in one view set, in the same way that tables are related in a relational database. When the view set is selected for use in a report these relationships will be resolved and the results presented for use in Reporting as a Report data source.

    

13. Select the data source to be copied and click Next.

    The subsequent steps of the wizard are the same those of the New option, as described above, but with the details of the selected data source populating the wizard so that they can be edited if required. See Defining a New Data Source for details.

Editing a Data Source

14. To modify the data source of the current report, select the Edit option of the Data Source Wizard (this option is not available if the current report does not have a data source defined for it).

    The subsequent steps of the wizard are the same those of the New option, as described above, but with the details of the current data source populating the wizard so that they can be edited as required. See Defining a New Data Source for details.