The benefits of the renewed OneStream Guided Reporting solution

The OneStream Guided Reporting provides a complete dashboard where the user can open Cube views and dashboards organized in groups, protected by security, in a user-friendly interface.

Using this renewed solution from the OneStream MarketPlace makes it easy to:
– Unify parameters over reports for a more consistent user interface.
– Present reports grouped by user role and restricted by security per user role.
– Allow users to vary row- and column sets to look at their data from multiple perspectives.

Guided Reporting is not an extensive solution, making it easy to use and quick to configure. This blog will take you through all the steps required and all of its features.

How to configure Guided Reporting in OneStream

Like most other Market Place solutions, Guided Reporting requires access to Ancillary Tables. If you don’t have this set up yet, you can follow the steps described in the setup instructions document. Do you have other solutions running already? Then this is not required anymore.

After downloading the XML, you can import it into the application (via Load/ Extract).
The dashboard now appears in the Dashboard section of OnePlace. Here, you can create the tables and launch the solution:

After launching the solution, the main dashboard is opened. You can add this dashboard to your workflow or access it via the Dashboards section in OnePlace.

Setting Global Options and User Preferences in OneStream Guided Reporting

Next, you can set the Global Options and User Preferences via the settings button on the right top:

In Global options, you define the global parameters. These parameters are always visible on the top of the dashboard and are mainly used for dimensions that apply to all reports, such as entity, time, or audit dimensions. The User Preferences gives you 1 button to decide if parameter filters are updated automatically or not.

When these settings are final, you can further configure the application’s functionality in the Report Management section.

Report Management

Here, the first step is to create Report Groups in the left top pane:

Users can select Report groups in a pull-down menu in the main window, and access can be limited via the embedded OneStream user groups. This setup enables you to ensure that all Guided Reporting maintenance is done centrally, while the user experience can vary based on their access rights.

Within a Report Group, a list of reports can be added. For each report, the administrator must choose if this is a Cube view or a Dashboard. After that, it will be linked to an existing object. If required, you can narrow down the security per item. You can also set items as active or not and sort these via the Display Order column.

Setting parameters in the OneStream Guided Reporting solution

When a Cube view item is selected, the Discover button reads the parameter information from the selected Cube view. Pressing this button is also required when parameters in your Cube view are changed.

Some parameters can be left unchanged, for example, if they are formatting-related. Dimension-related parameters can be updated with a list label and a Default Value. This functionality allows you to use different parameters (for the same dimension) that look the same. Doing so enables you to unify the user experience for the users.

Next, you configure the Interface (and order) per parameter:

• None                             The parameter is not visible in the dashboard
• Global                           The parameter is linked to a global parameter, as configured in global options
• Selector                        List View The parameter is linked to a button with a member selection box

When a parameter is selected, its properties are shown on the bottom right of the screen.

If you want your users to handle reporting more flexibly, you can add column and row templates to your reports using parameters. In this example, we’ve used prmSelCVC and prmSelCVR_PL. These are set to None, but will be visible to the user. I will come back to that in a minute.

Now all configuration is done. Next, the home button will bring you to the User interface.

How to use Guided Reporting in OneStream

On the left top, you see a pull-down menu with the configured Reporting Groups:

When you select a Group, the containing reports are shown in the list box below, and the parameters (with the chosen titles) are shown on the top. If a global parameter is defined, it will be shown in a separate header bar above the current parameters.

By clicking a button on top, the contents of the attached parameter are shown in a user-friendly pop-up menu:

Adding row or column templates to your OneStream MarketPlace solution

On the bottom left, there is a pull-down menu for the Column set and the Row Set. This out-of-box functionality is automatically presented if you add a row or column template to the Cube view via a parameter. This might be confusing, but don’t worry; I will share the details below.

In my Cube view, I use Column and Row sharing. But instead of typing in the name of the Cube view containing my templates, I entered a parameter for each (using |!…!|):

The Application Dashboard section configures these parameters as Delimited Lists with user-friendly Display items. Also, the names of the column templates are configured as a separated Value list:

In this case, there are 3 column template Cube views and, therefore, also 3 user-friendly names. Please note that the Default value must be a Value item.

As you can see in the Cube views section, these are existing Cube views. Also, these only contain information for the Columns tab, since that part is used when the Cube view is referenced as a Column template:

And this is precisely what the user sees in the Column set pull-down menu:

Each selection will change the column layout of the report. So, using a 3-row and 3-column template, your user can create 9 variations to view their data.

Our view on the renewed OneStream Guided Reporting

The renewed Guided Reporting is as simple as that. You can set the solution up in a few hours by using your parameters consistently, especially for row and column templates. In fact, I’m using this renewed version for all the clients I’m currently working for. It’s simple, quick to implement, and gives users a smooth, flexible interface to report on their data.

Pros of OneStream Guided Reporting:

+ Quick and easy to implement, run a basic solution in hours
+ Unify parameters over your reports, resulting in a better user experience
+ Automatically picks up row and column templates, offering flexibility to your users

Cons of OneStream Guided Reporting:

– Some (minor) technical issues when your application is still in development.

To explain this point a little further: we found some technical issues when setting up Guided Reporting while the reports were not ready. For example, when you change the name of a Cube view after it was added to Guided Reporting and used by users, it is stored in their temporary files, thus presenting an error to the user. So, ensure your reports are ready before implementing them as a part of this solution.

Admin configurable but nearly plug-and-play

Guided Reporting is a user-friendly solution for your end users and yourself. The instructions are clear, and a limited amount of steps have to be taken to configure this MarketPlace Solution. Therefore, I classify this solution as Admin configurable, but it’s nearly plug-and-play. Please see my earlier post, “The OneStream XF Market Place in real life”, about classifications.

Let’s discover the OneStream MarketPlace together

Want to know more about the OneStream MarketPlace? In a series of blogs, we’ll delve into the details of the MarketPlace and the solutions available. In the blog “The OneStream MarketPlace in real life”, you’ll find more information on the basics of the MarketPlace. And in the blog “How to implement Scenario Analysis in OneStream”, you discover how to work with scenario analysis in OneStream.

Any questions or suggestions for a Market Place solution you would like to learn more about? Don’t hesitate to contact me!

Do you prefer to discuss the details live? Finext organizes OneStream events regularly. Please let me know if you’d like to receive more information about our events, and we’ll keep you updated.

Cannot wait for our events? Don’t hesitate to contact me with your questions, so we can plan a (web) session to answer any questions you have about OneStream and the Market Place.