Configuration

This chapter describes how to set up ad hoc reporting on an i-net Clear Reports report server. Please read at least chapter Security since ad hoc reporting may at worst expose the datasources of your server. All adjustments described in this chapter are made in the configuration manager.

Layout and Dataview location

Ad hoc reporting has the ability to obtain the ad hoc layouts and dataviews from three different locations. It will scan the specified location and all of it's subdirectories for ad hoc layouts and dataviews. Please note that the subdirectory structure is as well the grouping of the layouts.

Internal

Internal sets the location to the layouts which are installed by the setup. These layouts are located in the subdirectory 'templates' in your installation directory. This option is active by default since the internal layouts are always available.

External

Switching to an external location requires to set an explicit path. This location will than be scanned for layouts and Dataviews. If custom Ad Hoc Layouts should be used it is recommended to use an external location instead of copying the layouts to the internal 'templates' directory.

Repository

With this option set, ad hoc reporting will scan the current repository for ad hoc layouts. Since there can be only one active repository at a time, ad hoc reporting does not scan all configured repositories. An optional subdirectory can be set to restrict the part of the repository which is scanned by the ad hoc reporting.

Please note that this option requires a Plus License.

Storing

The storing option enables the user to save his ad hoc reports on the server. To enable this feature, an authentication mechanism is required on the server. For more information about login please refer to the security guide.

User Upload

The user upload feature allows your users to upload their own data sources in form of a CSV file. These files may be for instance database dumps or some spreadsheet program. Please make sure to set the limits for the upload feature.

Security

Ad hoc reporting enables users to access data sources on your server and execute custom reports. By default, ad hoc reporting is enabled but protected by the remote interface password and the IP-Filter. If you want to allow your users to use this feature a complete set of security settings should be applied.

Restricting the Access to the Ad Hoc Reporting Interface

The ad hoc reporting feature can be restricted for certain users by activating and setting the ad hoc reporting permission. This can be done in the 'Permissions' category in the configuration manager.

There are two permissions which are relevant to ad hoc reporting:

  • Ad Hoc Reporting: Enables the ad hoc reporting and the XML Interface and thus allows the user to use ad hoc reporting in the remote GUI.
  • Ad Hoc Data Sources: This permission enables the user to use the data sources registered at your server for ad hoc reporting. This permission is critical since the user may use ad hoc reporting to read data from your internal data sources.

If the permissions are activated, these permissions have to be set for every user who is allowed to use ad hoc reporting. Every not administered user or permission counts as forbidden. Please set the permissions for the guest account as well, if the guest account is activated.

Restricting the Ad Hoc Layouts and Data Access

If the ad hoc layouts and ad hoc dataviews in the repository are visible to the user, can be restricted as well. To do so, simply configure the permissions in the repository browser. Now you can define the permissions for every ad hoc layout/ ad hoc dataview and user/group.

Please note, that ad hoc reporting requires only the execute permission to unlock an ad hoc layout for a user.

Using Data Views Instead of Datasources

As a guideline, the access to the servers data sources should only be granted to 'normal users' if your i-net Clear Reports Server runs in a protected Intranet environment. In any other case ad hoc dataviews should be preferred.

An ad hoc Dataview acts as a broker between a datasource and the field, the user is allowed to use. It completely hides away the datasource and the internal structure of the database. Furthermore it allows the administrator to define additional filters and use the formula language of i-net Clear Reports to modify data on the fly or create artificial fields for the user.

For a detailed description of ad hoc dataviews have a look at chapter 5 Ad Hoc Dataviews.

Limit pages and CrossTab

Ad hoc reporting enables the users of your server to create and execute reports which may impact the servers performance.

There are three options on the "Performance" tab which are relevant especially for ad hoc reporting:

  • Stop After Page: Limits the number of pages, which will be rendered. This will prevent long running reports.
  • Database Records Limit: Limits the number of records read from the database. This prevents the server from running out of memory.
  • Crosstab Cells Limit: Limits the overall number of cells in a crosstab. This prevents the server from running out of memory.

Please note that these options are global for the server. Setting the page limit for instance will restrict every report executed on this server whether or not it's generated by ad hoc reporting.