MicroStrategy ONE

Drill Mode Dialog

Drilling is one of the most powerful data analysis functionalities in any reporting environment. Drilling lets you explore data beyond the data immediately visible on a report or document. You can drill through a report or document to analyze data that is closely related to the original report data, or you can expose an entirely different object on a report or document to see what the data looks like within a different context.

For example, an analyst viewing a high-level summary of your organization's annual sales data may want to drill down into a more detailed view of that data. They may want to drill down to see the details behind the sales data for the month of January only, or they may want to drill to see details on sales data from the Northeast region. Likewise, analysts who initially view a detailed report may want to drill up to see a higher-level summary of that data.

The Drill Mode page allows you to select default drill settings for your reports. To access this page, see How to Access Project Defaults and User Preferences

Drilling on a report or document is only possible if the report's designer added a drill map to the report. You can set the following project defaults even if no reports in your project contain drill maps, but the preferences will only take effect for reports that contain drill maps.

Options denoted with an asterisk (*) are available only to you as the administrator. They do not appear as options in the User Preferences section that is accessible by users.

Fields

Common Drill Preferences:

* Group drill options on the drill context menu according to the drill path type: Determine how drill paths are grouped within the drill context menu.

  • To see all available drill types (up, down, across, to template) grouped according to drill type, select the checkbox.
  • To display drill types in an ungrouped order (default), clear the checkbox.

* Sort drill paths and set names alphabetically: Determine if hierarchy names and set names within the drill context menu are displayed alphabetically. This checkbox is cleared by default.

* Disable hyperlink drilling: Disable one-click hyperlink drilling on objects. When this option is selected, objects do not appear as drillable hyperlinks. This checkbox is cleared by default.

* Enable drilling options on metric values in grids: Determine the methods in which you can drill on a metric:

  • To click a metric header name to drill to that metric's default (high-priority) drill path, select the Display default drilling path as a link checkbox. This checkbox is cleared by default.
  • To right-click a metric header name and select drilling paths from a drill context menu, select the Display context sensitive menu checkbox. This checkbox is cleared by default.

Keep parent while drilling: Determine whether or not the parent of an attribute or compound metric is kept when you drill on a report. Alternatively, you can ensure that the drill settings stored in the report definition are enforced (default).

Keep thresholdswhile drilling: Determine whether or not thresholds are kept for reports when you drill on a report. Alternatively, you can ensure that the drill settings stored in the report definition are enforced (default).

Open drill results in a new window: Determine if the drilled report results are displayed in a new window when you drill on a report. This checkbox is cleared by default.

* Report Drill Preferences:

* Drill options: Determine if and how drilling is enabled for all reports in the current project.

  • Allow drilling as defined in each report (default): Drilling is enabled according to the drill options saved in each report's definition.
  • Allow simple drill only: Users can drill only in simple drill mode.
  • Allow drilling with hyperlinks only: Users can drill only where hyperlinks are presented on the grid report.
  • Disable all drilling: Users cannot drill on any portion of the report.

* Enable context menu drilling (DHTML only): Enable the right-click options for drilling on grid reports. This checkbox is selected by default. Enabling this setting also reduces the HTML file size of reports.

* Display advanced drill options as: Determine what is included in the drill context menu that appears when you right-click and drill on a report object.

  • Link to advanced drill editor (default): Lower-priority drill paths are not included in the context menu and must be accessed using the More options... link in the context menu.
  • Sub menus on the context menu: Low-priority drill paths are included in the drill context menu.

Report Services Drill Preferences:

* Drill options: Determine if and how drilling is enabled for all documents in the current project:

  • Allow drilling as defined in each grid (default): Users can drill according to the drill options saved in each grid's definition.
  • Allow simple drill only: Users can drill only in simple drill mode.
  • Allow drill within only: Users can drill only within each individual dataset (on Drill Within paths)
  • Allow drilling with hyperlinks only: Users can drill only where hyperlinks are presented on the grid.
  • Disable all drilling: Users cannot drill on any portion of the report.

Drill within behavior: Determine how Drill Within paths are resolved:

  • Automatic (default): If the drill can be resolved with the base dataset, it is. Otherwise, a new report is opened.
  • Based on menu location: If the drill is performed in the first submenu level, then it is resolved within the base dataset. Otherwise, a new report is opened.
  • Always drill to new report: A new report is always opened.