Reporting on artifacts across projects with Report Builder

Using Report Builder, you can create reports to view data from across your projects. For example, create a report to determine whether you have adequate test coverage and to ensure that defects are identified and tracked. You can define conditions to return only the data you need in your report, and, you can specify whether conditions can be changed when report is run, which enables other organizations to reuse your report and change it for their needs.

In this case, you create a report about requirements, related test cases, and the defects that are related to those test cases.

For more information about reporting on data in configurations, see this topic and this article on Jazz.net.

To watch a video tutorial about creating cross-project reports, see Create, refine, and manage reports. These videos were created in Jazz Reporting Service version 5.0.1; in the current version of Report Builder the user interface has changed slightly and you will find new features.

About this task

As you build your report, your choices are shown in the My Choices pane on the right side of the page.
To change your choices:
  • Click the heading near the top of the page and go to the section to change.
  • In the My Choices pane, click the pencil Edit beside the section to change.

Procedure

  1. Open Report Builder, and click Build: https://server_name:port/rs

    If you do not see the Report Builder page, contact your application administrator for the URL.

  2. To report on artifacts in and across projects, in the Choose report type section, click Current Data (Table or Graph).
    Note: For information about creating metrics reports about artifact and project trends, see this related topic.
  3. In the Limit scope section, choose the projects to report on, and click Continue.
    The list shows the projects that you can access in the data source that you selected.
    Note: Some artifact types are project specific. After you select the artifact type to report on in step 4, to see only the projects that contain that artifact type, return to the Limit scope section and select Show applicable projects for selected artifact types.

    If the projects that you want are not in the list, see the administrator who created the data sources for Report Builder.

  4. Choose the artifact type to report on, and click Continue. You might have to expand some artifacts to make a specific choice; if you do not expand an artifact, all of its types are included in the results.

    If you select an artifact type that is project specific, you can show only those projects that are relevant for your selection. Return to the Limit scope section and select Show applicable projects for selected artifact types.

    Tip: To report on requirements from specific modules, click Requirement and select the requirement types. In a later step, you specify the requirement collections or modules.
    To report on versioned artifacts in configurations in requirements management (RM) and quality management (QM) project areas, you must select an LQE data source. There are considerations for using this data source - see Reporting on data in configurations with Report Builder and this Jazz.net article for more information.
  5. Set conditions to further refine the content of your report. You can specify conditions for any attribute of the artifact type that you selected, and for any artifact type that you created relationship links for.
    1. Click Add condition.
    2. From the list, select an artifact type.
    3. Choose the attribute that you want to specify a condition for, and select the values to return the artifacts you want.
    4. Click Add to keep the window open so that you can add other conditions, or click Add and Close if you are finished adding conditions.
    5. Optional: Change the lock to control whether people can or must supply a value for the condition when they run the report.

    Sometimes a set of projects uses the same custom attribute, and although the attribute has the same name across the projects, its ID is different in each project. To report on this attribute, you must add a condition for each project's version of it. Then, to consolidate them in your report, you must group the attributes by using an OR condition. For example, if the projects you report on each have Risk Status attribute and it means the same to each project, select this attribute for all the projects; then, group them and add an OR condition between each of them. To show the results in one column, instead of one column for each version of the attribute, see the note in the Format section.

    To edit a condition, click the pencil Edit beside it.

    To create logical groups of conditions, they must be beside each other. Select their check boxes and click Group.

    To remove conditions, select their check boxes and click Remove.

    To show a specific relationship to another artifact, you must create a specific condition. For example, to show that a requirement is validated by a test case, select the Related Test Case relationship. In the Set conditions section, you can create a condition that selects the specific relationship.

    Tip: To report on requirements in specific modules, from the attributes list, select the requirement or requirement type and choose the Collection or Module attribute; then, choose the collections or modules, and click Save.

    After you create your conditions, click Continue or Format results.

  6. In the Format section, select whether to show the report as a table or a graph. To preview what your report looks like, click Refresh. Only a subset of data is shown in this section. To see all the results, you must run the report.
    • Table

      Your report already has some columns, including columns for the attributes you created conditions for. If you want your report to link directly to the artifacts in the lifecycle products, you must include the Name and URL attributes for the artifact in your report.

      Add columns to show the attributes or the calculated values that you want to see.
      Add attribute columns
      Select the artifact from the list, and the attributes to add to the report, and then click Add.
      • To change the column name, type in the Column Label field.
      • To arrange or remove columns, use the controls in the Actions column.
      • To sort columns, select the sort method from the Sort Type list for that column. You can sort more than one column. To change the sort order, manually edit the numeric values in that field.
      Add calculated value columns
      Add columns that show calculations such as averages, sums, counts, and so on.

      Click Add to keep the window open so that you can add other calculated values, or click Add and Close if you are finished.

      To combine values into one column, for example, if a condition contains an attribute that is semantically equivalent across projects and the versions of it are grouped together in one condition, specify one column label for all versions of that attribute. Using the Risk Status example from the Set conditions step, for each version of the attribute (Risk Status in DM; Risk Status in QM, and so on), set the Column Label to Risk Status. When you run the report, the Risk Status attribute from all the projects is shown in one column.

    • Graph
      Report Builder selects the graph type based on your selections so far. Experiment to find the best graph type. Typically, line graphs convey trend information effectively, but you can also use a bar chart (stacked or grouped).
      Note: Before you can preview a graph, you must select a value for the unit of measure, and optionally, the dimension.
      1. Select the category to show on the horizontal axis of the graph. Above the graph, experiment with the scale to find the best one for your report.
      2. Select the quantities or units to show on the vertical axis of the graph. Typically, you select what you want to measure.
      3. Optional: Select a dimension to separate the value being measured by all the values of the dimension.
      4. Optional: Change the colors of the lines or bars on the graph. Do this to make the categories easier to see or to comply with conventions in your organization.
      5. To show more data in the graph, click Add attribute data items.
      6. To add information such as averages, sums, counts, and so on, click Add calculated value data items. Then, select the calculation to show and the attribute it applies to. Click Add to keep the window open so that you can add other calculated values, or click Add and Close if you are finished.

    When you finish arranging the columns, click Continue or Name and share.

  7. Specify the details of your report.
    1. Give your report a name and a description. The description is important to help other team members find your report if it is public.
    2. Optional: Tag your report to make it easier to find or to group it with related reports. Each tag becomes a category in which you can see your report on the Use and My Stuff pages.
    3. Specify if your report is public or private. Public reports show up in the Report Builder catalog.
      • If you make the report public, team members can add the report from the catalog as a widget to their Jazz dashboards.
      • If you tag the report, the tag becomes a category in the report catalog to make your report easier to find or to group it with related reports.
    4. Click Save, and click Continue.
  8. To see the complete report, click Run report.

What to do next


Feedback