Derived Elements

Defining Attribute Elements On The Fly

A derived element is a grouping of attribute elements on a report. Derived element groups are defined by a list, filter, or calculation. These groups provide a new view of report data for analysis and formatting purposes.

For example, the reports below contain Region, Category, and Profit. The report on the left does not display any derived elements. The report on the right displays derived elements defined using groups of Region attribute elements:

• East Coast: This derived element combines the data for the Mid-Atlantic, Northeast, and Southeast regions.
• West Coast: This derived element combines the data for the Northwest and Southwest regions.
• Central and South: This derived element combines the data for the Central and South regions.
• Web: This derived element displays the data for the Web attribute element, which is not included in any of the derived elements listed above.

You can do more than just simple combinations of attribute elements with derived elements. For example, after you have defined the East Coast derived element, you can determine the East Coast region's percent contribution to profit, as shown in the last row of the report below.

This demonstrates only a fraction of the analysis and formatting capabilities of derived elements. With derived elements you can also create custom sort orders for attribute elements, use aggregation functions such as Average to combine attribute elements, and perform other analysis and formatting tasks.

Derived elements are evaluated on the report dataset without regenerating or re-executing SQL.

The following sections cover derived element concepts, functionality, and procedures:

• Types of derived elements
• Creating derived elements
• Defining derived element functionality and formatting
• Interaction with other reporting features