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Run or Save Report Templates

You can manually run a report using any of the predefined report templates from the Report Templates page. You must at least specify a target for the report (for example, a service, server, or Blueprint) if there is an entry in the Target column of the Report Templates table. You can also edit any other settings before generating a report to return more specific information.

If you think that the report settings you specify while generating a manual report are something you could reuse in the future, you can save the settings as a custom report. For example, if there were servers in your organization named Bertha, Minglewood, and Darkstar, you could customize the Change Detection - Servers report template to be a custom report for each of them: Change Detection - Bertha, Change Detection - Minglewood, and Change Detection - Darkstar. The custom reports are displayed on the Saved Reports page.

Note: If you want to schedule a report to run at a specific time you must save it as a custom report.

To run a predefined report template or save a template as a custom report

  1. Click the Management link, then click the Reports tab.

    The Report Templates page appears unless you have created custom reports, in which case the Saved Reports page appears.

  2. Click the name of the template you want to run or save in Report Name column of the the Report Templates table.

    Note: Some report templates have the same name except for the target identifier (Servers, Service, Virtualization, or Blueprints). This supports either the server- or service-centric methods of configuration management.

    The Details page for the selected template appears with the General tab displayed by default.

  3. Edit the following Details fields as appropriate:
    Name

    Specifies the name of the report template, or the report if you save it.

    Description

    Describes the purpose of the report.

    Share the Report With Other Users

    Specifies whether the saved report is available to other users, or only the user who created it.

    Format

    Specifies the output format of the report. The following options are available:

    • Crystal Reports
    • Microsoft Excel
    • Microsoft Excel (Data Only)
    • PDF
    • Rich Text Format
  4. Click the check boxes to include or exclude the report options in the Customizable Output Fields area.

    The options with a check are included in the report.

  5. Click the Targets tab if it is available for the selected report template, or skip to step 7.

    The Targets tab page appears and displays the available targets that corresponds with the selected report type (Servers and Server Groups, Services, or Blueprints).

  6. Double-click any entry in the Available <object> column (you can also click an object, then click the right-facing arrow to move the object to the Selected column). For example, if you selected Rule Compliance (Servers) as the report template, the Target tab contains Available Servers and Selected Servers columns.

    The selected object appears in the Selected <object> column.

  7. (Optional) Click the Filters tab to further control what information is included or excluded from the report.
  8. (Optional) Click the Schedule tab to create a schedule for the report to run, and the details of the notification that is sent when the report is generated.

    The options are:

    Not Scheduled

    Specifies that you must run the job manually (by clicking Run/View as described later in this procedure).

    Once

    Specifies that the report runs one time only. When you select this option the Time field appears where you specify the date and time for this job to run.

    Minutes

    Specifies that the report runs at an interval defined by minutes. When you select this option, additional fields appear where you specify the date to start and end, the start time, and the interval in minutes.

    Hourly

    Specifies that the report runs at an interval defined by hours. When you select this option, additional fields appear where you specify the date to start and end, the start time, and the interval in hours.

    Daily

    Specifies that the report runs at an interval defined by days. When you select this option, additional fields appear where you specify the date to start and end, the start time, and the interval in days.

    Weekly

    Specifies that the report runs every seven days on a specific day. When you select this option, additional fields appear where you specify the date to start and end, the start time, and the day.

    Monthly

    Specifies that the report runs on a monthly interval (configurable from 1 through 12) on a specific date (or the last day of the month). When you select this option, additional fields appear where you specify the date to start and end, the interval, the start time, and the date.

    Notification Profile

    Specifies the notification profile you want to use to generate the notification that is send after the report is generated.

    Subject

    Specify the Subject of the email message sent by the notification profile.

    Scheduled report jobs can be viewed in the following locations:

  9. (Optional) Click the Destination tab, and select one of the following delivery types from the Delivery Method drop-down list:
    None

    Specifies that the report is not delivered. Instead, it opens on the client computer after it is generated.

    FTP

    Specifies that the report is delivered by file transfer protocol (FTP) to the location specified in the following fields:

    Server

    Specifies the server name where the report is delivered.

    User/Login

    Specifies a user account on the specified server with write privileges.

    Path

    Specifies the location on the specified server to save the report.

    Password

    Specifies the password for the user name specified in the User/Login field.

    Retype Password

    Ensures that the password was typed correctly in the Password field.

    File Name

    Specifies the name assigned to the report file. The file name you enter here is appended with the file extension that corresponds with the report format you selected in step 3. The file name is also suffixed with the time stamp when the report was executed. For example, if the file name is Servers_Open_Ports and the selected format is Adobe Acrobat (PDF), the file name will be Servers_Open_Ports2010-04-20-16-19-59.pdf.

    File System

    Specifies that the report is saved in a non-default directory on the server on which BO is installed as specified in the following fields:

    Path

    Specifies the directory in which to save the report.

    File Name

    Specifies the name assigned to the report file. The file name you enter here is appended with the file extension that corresponds with the report format you selected in step 3. The file name is also suffixed with the time stamp when the report was executed. For example, if the file name is Servers_Open_Ports and the selected format is Adobe Acrobat (PDF), the file name will be Servers_Open_Ports2010-04-20-16-19-59.pdf.

  10. Do one of the following:
  11. (Optional) After you run a report, report instance is saved. To view the report, click report name and the Instances tab. The tab lists all the report instances that you executed and the ‘shared’ report instances executed by others.