Report, print and export

Amongst other things, the Collections WebAPI enables integration with powerful reporting tools like MS Power BI. Details about the Collections WebAPI can be found here.

With Axiell Collections it is possible to view predefined reports of your data, to print and to export data. Both reporting and printing use templates to lay out and style your data; the main difference between the two is that reporting displays your record data on-screen, and printing is obviously intended to output your data to a printer.

Reporting and printing

In Collections, a report is an alternative display view of the current recordClosed The record currently displayed in Record details View or highlighted (with a solid grey background) in Result set View or Gallery View for instance.. More than one report can be available in a data source, each one designed for a particular reporting purpose, and to that end a report includes a specific subset of fields: a report is a template designed (by Axiell or your Application Administrator) to layout and display data drawn from the current record for a specific reporting purpose.

Reporting is performed by selecting the Report viewer button in the top Toolbar. Details here.

Printing and reporting use the same templates to determine what fields are included in the output and how it is laid out and styled, so while it is not possible to print a report directly from the Report viewer, you can print reports by selecting Print in the top Toolbar and selecting a template from the Output formats box. Details here.

A number of templates are available in Collections out-of-the-box; these are designed using Microsoft Word (templates with a .docx extension), or XSLT style sheets. Application Administrators are able to modify these and to design additional Word or XSLT templates. Templates are used for both reporting and printing:

  • An XSLT style sheet can generate HTML output styled for your organization.
  • Word templates, which are built in MS Word itself, can be designed using house-styles, including logos, colours and fonts. They can be used in parts of the application that automatically generate letters and documents, for example in Loans. When used as an output format, Word templates can be designed to print labels and barcodes; and of course, PDF files can be created from Word documents that are generated in Axiell Collections.

Although no third-party report generator is required to build reports in Collections, if your reporting needs are not met by Collections' in-built reporting facility, integration with powerful reporting tools like MS Power BI is supported by the Collections WebAPI. Application Administrators can find details about the Collections WebAPI here (or contact Support for details).

OfficeConnect (Microsoft Office)

It may also be possible to use Collections in conjunction with MS Office applications.

Axiell Collections features an MS Office plug-in called Axiell OfficeConnect, which enables users of Word, Excel and PowerPoint to search their Collections data directly from the Office application.

Note: This plug-in was designed for desktop users of office rather than Office365 cloud users.

Data from the database will show in Office (if access is allowed) and the user can insert images and (html) formatted data into an Office document or automatically create a table by selecting multiple records. With OfficeConnect it is possible to build documents / reports using information managed in Axiell Collections without having to use an Axiell user interface at all. This type of reporting is available to users who do not need to work in Axiell Collections.

Any part of the Collections database can be configured to be available in MS Office while respecting access rights.

Details about OfficeConnect can be found in a PDF here.

Note: Although this PDF was produced for Adlib (the desktop predecessor of Axiell Collections), the broad techniques described apply to Collections.

Export

The Export tool allows authorized users to export data from the currentClosed The record currently displayed in Record details View or highlighted (with a solid grey background) in Result set View or Gallery View for instance. record, one or more markedClosed Marking a record means selecting it by adding a tick to the record's checkbox in Result set View or Gallery View, and in Record Details View from Collections 1.15 onwards. One or more records can be marked and then actioned in some way (e.g. printed). records, or all records currently listed in Result set View.

Although data can be exported in a number of formats, the principal export format is CSV.

Details here.