You can preview a report before you run it to view a sample of the records that are returned by that report. A report preview provides a sample of the data that will be generated if you run the report. It doesn’t usually contain the full set of data because the preview only displays the first 25 records in the report.
If a report has a pivot table configured, you can preview the pivot data, but the steps might be different from the procedure below. See Preview Pivot Tables. If Pivot Table is selected as the default report type in the Layout dialog box, Dayforce shows the Preview Pivot button instead of the Preview button. In this case, you need to change the default report type to preview the regular report.
To preview a report:
- Go to Reporting and Analytics > Reporting > Classic Reports and select a report in the list.
- Click Preview. Dayforce opens the preview in a new tab in a slide-out panel. The preview icon (
) indicates that the tab contains a preview. - Click the Preview tab to view the sample data.
- Enter values for mandatory filters and then click Preview. Dayforce displays a data sample.
- If the sample data represents the information that you need, you can click Run, Schedule, or Edit to continue working with the report.
The preview displays a message at the top of the screen, “Preview displays a sample of the report using a limited set of data. To get the full results, use the Run button.” You can click the close icon on the right side of the message to close it. The message is removed until after you log out and log in again.
The Preview tab in the slide-out panel contains five subtabs:
- Filters: Contains the report filters and enter new values for the editable ones.
- Preview: Displays the first 25 results of the report, according to the filters that you selected in the Filters tab.
- Layout: Displays the default layout for the report. You can't edit the layout settings in preview mode; they can be changed when you run or edit the report.
- Details: Contains information about the report such as the parent feature, category, topic, created by, updated by, created date, and updated date.
- Fields: Displays the names and descriptions of all of the fields (columns) in the report.
After you view the report card, you can use one of the following options to continue working with it:
- Refresh: Click Refresh to revert the report to the last time you saved it.
- Run: Click Run Report in the Filters tab to run the report or click Run in the toolstrip to open the run report dialog box. See Run Ad Hoc Reports.
- Schedule: Click Schedule to schedule a report to run at a specific time.
- Edit: Click Edit to open the report in the report designer for editing. For a standard report, Dayforce appends "Copy" to the name of the report, and after you edit you have to save it as a copy. For a custom report, you can edit the report and save the changes without creating a new copy of the report.
- Copy: Click Copy Report to open a copy of the report in a new tab in the report designer. Dayforce appends "Copy" to the name of the report and copies all other report properties. The Report Integration Name isn’t copied.
- Delete: Click Delete to delete a custom report.