2280673 - How to Create a BIRT Template for a Table Report

BIRT (Business Intelligence and Reporting Tool) is an open source technology platform used to create data visualizations and reports that can be embedded into rich client and web applications. BIRT reports are made of objects and data sources that can be used in your report and can create different data sets.

IMPORTANT: BIRT Templates can be created by Customers, Partners or the SAP Premium Reporting Team and NOT by SuccessFactors Product Support.

This KBA is an additional reference to guide Customers and Partners through the steps to create a sample BIRT template and upload it to Table.

Image/data in this KBA is from SAP internal systems, sample data, or demo systems. Any resemblance to real data is purely coincidental

• SAP SuccessFactors HXM Suite
• Table reports
• BIRT

1. Log into SuccessFactors and select Reporting from the main menu;
2. Select Table reports;
3. You can create a new report or use an existing one from the report list;
4. Edit the report then export the Dataset from the Data Sets drop down list via Save As. Save the file to a location and take note of it as you will need this file to build your BIRT report:
5. Next step is to run BIRT tool. You can do this by clicking on the eclipse.exe file from your downloaded folder;
6. Create a new project and save it to desired location:
   
   
   
   
7. You can proceed to create your first report as follow:
• Choose File->New->Report. The new report dialog appears;
• In the tree view, choose the project we just created: My Reports;
• Enter the desired file name:  for example, Customers.rptdesign;
• Click Next;
• Select the location and file Name: Custom_Employee_Profile_x_BIRT_Demo.rptdesign:
  
  
  
  
8. When BIRT opens your new report in the Eclipse workspace, Right Click on Data Sources then to New Data Source:
   
   
   
   
9. Select the folder where you saved the csv file in:
   
   
   
   
10. The New Data Source is now created
11. You can then proceed to build and test your new data set by right clicking on Data Sets and select New Data Set:
    
    
    
    
12. Select the desired columns by moving them across to the box on the right then check the Output columns you just selected:
    
    
    
    
13. When done, you can drag and Drop the Data Set to create a new table with the selected fields:
    
    
    
    
14. You can customise the report layout using the Editor. For example, by adjusting the headers font size, background colour etc:
    
    
    
    
15. At any time, you can preview the report output by selecting the preview tab:
    
    
    
    
16. To add a chart to the report, you right click on the report design then select Insert and Chart from the list:
    
    
    
    
17. Choose the chart type you want to use:
    
    
    
    
18. For the Data tab you can chose the desired fields for the Y and X series. In this example, you can select the username, for the Y series, and the  aggregate expression count:
    
    
    
    
19. Drag and drop the location column to the x field:
    
    
    
    
20. You can customise the Chart area as you wish via the Format Chart tab:
    
    
    
    
21. To view the report result, select preview at any time:
    
    
    
    
22. Once you are happy with the BIRT report you can upload the newly created BIRT Template to the Table Report as follow:
• Edit the report you have downloaded the data set from;
• From the People scope tab click on Data Sets then upload template;
• Browse to the folder where you saved the rptdesign file;
• Select open: 
  
  
  
  
• Save the report:
  
  
23. You can then see the report output by running the report online, export to excel or by generating it, when in edit mode:
    
    

• KB article 2280300 - BIRT Eclipse Version Supported for Ad Hoc Reports
• KB article 2283529 - Support Guidelines for Ad Hoc Reports with BIRT Templates 

sf, success factors, ANA, RPT, adhoc, Data Sets, Eclipse , KBA , eclipse , data sets , premium , LOD-SF-ANA-BIR , BIRT Reports , LOD-SF-ANA , Analytics & Reporting (Ad Hoc, YouCalc, ORD) , How To

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