Scheduling and Distributing Content


Distribution Options

The Distribution tab in the Basic Scheduling tool provides the options available for distributing the report output for the scheduled report procedure (FEX). After selecting the option from the shortcut menu of a procedure, you can distribute a report output using one of the following methods.

  • Email
  • FTP
  • Printer
  • Report Library
  • Repository

Note:

Specifying Parameter Values

You can customize a report and control its execution with parameters. When scheduling a report procedure (FEX), the schedule Task Parameters section allows you to supply a value for parameters referenced in the report procedure or add a parameter to the schedule by creating a new parameter and specifying the parameter name and value.

If the scheduled procedure contains parameters for which values must be supplied at run time, these parameters are displayed in the parameters section of the scheduling tool.

Using Sample Data to Create and Schedule an Alert

A data-driven Alert is an event that is prompted by a guideline that you define. This guideline can vary from the simple to the complex. The following tutorial describes how to create a simple Alert that is triggered when the cost of goods exceeds the revenue for a brand. This type of Alert could help a company decide whether they should continue to carry a specific brand, based on the money loss throughout a given timeframe.

To follow this tutorial, you must have access to the WebFOCUS Retail sample data source.

Checking Scheduled Alerts

When an Alert test is false (and therefore not activated), the Alert result report is not run. When an Alert schedule runs, information about the Alert test evaluation (true or false) and any error or warning messages that occur during schedule or Alert processing are written to the log file.

In order to track the completion of a scheduled Alert, or errors that occurred during processing without checking the log report for the Alert schedule, we recommend that you use the Schedule Notification option.

In the Scheduling tool, the Notification tab allows you to specify:

Alert Assist Overview

When you create an Alert in the web browser, it invokes Alert Assist and then InfoAssist. Alert Assist has a user interface similar to InfoAssist. The following image shows the WebFOCUS Alert Assist interface.

Alert Assist window

Alert Assist Main Menu

Components of an Alert

The Alert feature requires the following components:

  • WebFOCUS Reporting Server. This server is responsible for processing the procedure, accessing and retrieving the requested data, and creating the report when the Alert test is triggered (true).
  • Managed Reporting. This environment is used to create and manage Alerts in the WebFOCUS repository.

An Alert consists of the following:

Creating Schedules

This section provides the overall procedure to create a new schedule for a report procedure (FEX). Some steps in the procedure contain details on the associated options, while other steps direct you to a separate section that contains detailed descriptions of the options and additional information, such as tips in making a selection.

Distributing Content

A Distribution List is an easy way to distribute content to multiple recipients. You can specify the name of a list stored in the Repository that contains the individual recipients, rather than entering each recipient separately into a schedule. A Distribution List can be made available to other users by sharing it or changing its ownership to be managed or published.