Setup

Overview

Fast and flexible reports

Highlight's reporting feature provides a wide range of statistical analysis and reporting. A key feature of your report is speed, loading in seconds not minutes, and changes made on a report will reload equally fast. Functionality includes:

• A wide range of fields and predefined templates to include in a report

• Flexible filtering and sorting

• The option to include graphics

• The option to save your chosen settings as a custom report template, so you can run it again quickly later. There are three options for a custom template:

  • Public: others in your organisation can see and use it

  • Private: only you can see and use it

  • Private Scheduled: Highlight will run the report when specified and email the result

Setup

Setting up a report in Highlight is broadly defined in these three steps:

1. Set time period:

   Choose day, week, month, quarter or year and date

2. Set options:

   Select all the options for your report (what to include, how to order the output, etc.) or use one of the predefined public templates

3. Set filters:

   If needed, you can further refine your output by filtering on specific text, exceptions and business hours

1. Set time period

Use the calendar control to select a given period: any day, week or month. The default setting is the current week. Please note:

• Daily reports cannot be run for the current day as the summarisation of statistics only occurs at midnight. However today's date may displayed if there is a timezone in the world which has already passed midnight for today's date.

• Weekly reports are for Sunday - Saturday

• Monthly reports are for a full calendar month e.g. 1 – 31 January

With Month selected, the Period drop-down is available. Use this to select:

• 3 Months to this Period: runs a quarterly report. If the current month is selected, the report will contain the 2 previous full months plus the current month up to yesterday.

• 12 Months to this Period: run an annual report. If the current month is selected, the report will contain the 11 previous full months plus the current month up to yesterday.

Graphics are not available for quarterly and annual reports. Quarterly and annual reports cannot be saved or scheduled.

2. Set options

Use the options shown here to define the contents of your report. You can also load a predefined set of options by clicking on an existing template. In either case, clicking

The "Run report" or play button generates the report.

• On

  Filter the types of watches to include in the report. For example, choose All Performance Tests in the selected folder, or choose to narrow the report to show only Bearer circuits, Classes of Service, etc.

• For

  Shows the folder or location you've selected in the Network Explorer tree by default. If you have containers defined you can select one and report on only the watches associated with that container. You can also run a report on Favourites by having the Favourites virtual folder selected in Network Explorer. See Favourites Reporting for more details.

• Sort

  Order the output. For example choose Issues to have Highlight put items needing attention at the top of the list. Available options vary according to the selected report.

• Period

  Only available if Month is selected for View by. Choose 3 or 12 Months to this Period to run a quarterly or annual report. If the current month is selected, the report will contain the 2 (or 11 for annual) previous full months plus the current month up to yesterday.

• Results

  Not available if the report is sorted alphabetically or sequentially, for example by "Name" or "Device Address". Choose to see all the resulting lines, or just the 'Top N' results, which can be useful if you're sorting by, for example, heaviest traffic, worst performance, or overall Issues. Options are: All Results (default), Top 10, Top 20, Top 50, Top 100.

• Show (N)

  Where 'N' is the number of columns selected. Choose which columns to include from the drop-down list (see image below). The columns available change based on the report type selected and become the columns of your report. You can choose to All columns or not. Using this selector you can also include graphics in the report, choosing from: Strip Chart, Trend Chart, Behaviour Chart and Performance Chart (for performance tests only).

3. Set filters

There are three options for further filtering of the results:

• Filter Text

  You can enter any text here and the report will only show items which include that text in either the Name, Details or Reference fields. The comparison is not case-sensitive and looks for that text anywhere in those fields. Even if you don't include Name, Details or Reference as columns in your report, Highlight will still use them to filter the result.

• Exceptions

  To filter a report to only show watches that triggered a heat tile to turn amber or red during the selected time period (Day, Week, Month), you can multi-select the exceptions to look for Availability, Health and/or Load. The report will only include the watches that had exceptions, and show the total number of times the amber sensitivity threshold was triggered for each watch, and the total duration each was in a non-green state.

• Business Hours

  Highlight keeps two sets of statistical information for every watch: one covering the full 24-hours of a day and one just for the Business Hours that you have set up for the watch's location. If you haven't set specific Business Hours, the default window will be 06:00 to 18:00, Monday to Friday. Find out more about setting up business hours, which is an administration function. Note: selecting Business Hours for a report refers to the Business Hours associated with each watch's location, not the Business Hours set on the user's folder.

Once you have made your selections click the "Run report" play button to generate the report. You have the option to "Save & schedule" as a template. Refer to the Templates section below for details.

Templates

Report templates allow you quickly run different reports with the sort order, columns and filters preset.

Predefined Public Templates

There are a number of predefined public templates which you can load by clicking on the name. Examples are:

• Default - Highest Utilised lines (Business hours)

• Default - Site Availability

• Default - Broadband Clarity - Most speed changes

Create a custom template

Alternatively, Highlight offers the flexibility to create your own template. There are three options for a custom template:

Public: others in your organisation can see and use it

Private: only you can see and use it

Scheduled (private): Highlight will run the report when specified and email the result

To create a custom template, setup the report options, and click "Save & schedule". Alternatively select an existing template and click the cog . Use this dialog to save, modify, copy or delete one of your templates.

The left section shows the fields of the report template. The right section is for private templates only and defines any schedule that has been set for this template.

Public / Private

A custom report template is private by default, meaning only you can see it. Alternatively, you can make a template public by checking 'Public Template'.

Save: stores your new or edited custom template

Save As New: enables you to make a copy of a template if, for example, you want to use a public template and create a private copy for scheduling automatic reports

Users in a location, who only see a location pin in the Network Explorer tree, cannot save a public template.

Scheduled reports

A report can be scheduled to arrive by email every day, week or month. Follow the steps in the Templates section above to create a private template. Most users have a weekly scheduled report created for them by default showing their top 10 busiest circuits.

To schedule a report:

Schedule a report for multiple folders

Each template can only have one schedule. To schedule a report for multiple folders, you can either:

• Schedule it for a folder above the folders you want or

• Create multiple templates

Saving an existing template for a different folder

1. If the Edit Report Template dialog is open, close it

2. Navigate to the new folder in Network Explorer tree (left panel)

3. On the left of the existing template click the cog

4. In the Edit Report Template dialog, click "Edit " to the right of "For:" to switch to the currently selected folder

5. Save button or Save As New button with a different name

Scheduled report emails

This is an example of an emailed scheduled report:

Scheduled report emails contain links (on the right of each row) which take those with Highlight access to the Details page for each watch in the report. Scheduled reports can be sent to anyone, even those without a Highlight account, but they won't be able to access Highlight.

To set up a scheduled report, please refer to the Scheduled reports section above.

Disabling a scheduled report

Most users have a weekly scheduled report created for them by default showing their top 10 busiest circuits.

To disable this report, follow these two steps:

1. Navigate to Reporting, Network and click the cog on the far left of the report you want to disable

2. Find Schedule: and toggle from "Send this report via email" to "Disabled" and Save

Contact us for any questions about scheduled reports.