November 21, 2002

1. Shared reports: Save reports for others to view, download, run.

Managers and other users of OpenAir can mine important operational and financial data using the many reports in OpenAir. In the past, to share that information with other managers throughout the organization, users had to download the report in question to Microsoft® Excel® or Word® and circulate, or alternatively, to proxy in as the user who had created the report. Now, OpenAir allows the sharing of saved reports in a very convenient and flexible way, to facilitate the distribution of critical business information across the enterprise.

The ability to share reports is role-based. A user who has a role with this privilege enabled can create and save a report, and then elect to share it with specific other users. Those users can view, edit, download or run the report, by going to Reports > Saved reports > Shared reports. If a sharing user modifies the shared report, a new report will be created, which can be shared in turn. The original report remains as created and saved.

To enable the sharing of saved reports, an admin needs to navigate to Account > Roles > [Select a role] > General settings. Check the box to “Share saved reports” and click Save. Users who have this role will be able to share reports they create and save. A second switch (“View all saved reports”) is available, and a user whose role has this setting enabled will see all reports, saved by any user, whether or not the user has marked them to be shared.

2. Other reporting enhancements: Select "date to use" for specific values, historical utilization in account-wide reports, more flexible subtotaling in account-wide reports.

OpenAir continues to expand the flexibility of its reporting options to meet the needs of our users. For example, the account-wide summary report on users now enables you to report on resources’ historical utilization, in addition to booked hours, booked utilization, booking availability, realization and work schedule hours. Navigate to Reports > Summary > Account-wide > Users.

We’ve also provided more flexibility in the dates to be used for certain values in summary reports. For Invoice values in Summary reports, users formerly had two options available for the "date to use" for those values: either the Timebill date or the Invoice date. In this month’s release, we’ve added two more options: the Timebill created date and Invoice created date. Similarly, in reporting on Expense values, users now have four options for "date to use": receipt date, envelope date, receipt created date or envelope created date. Please see Reports > Summary > Account-wide, Reports >Summary > Invoices > and Reports > Summary > Envelopes, for examples of these new options.

We have extended the ability to report and subtotal on a wide range of values. Users can now select any available field for subtotaling, provided at least one of the values selected to report on can be subtotaled by that field. If a value cannot be subtotaled by the field in question, the report will display "not applicable" for that field. In global reporting options, users can specify how "not applicable" report values will be displayed in the web interface or in downloads (i.e. n/a, 0 na or not applicable).

Finally, the addition of a Save button to the report configuration form allows users to configure and save a report for future use without running it immediately. Users can also download a report directly from the Saved reports list, without running it; an improved download message includes the report description ("Click here to download [Report description]" instead of simply "Click here to download".)

3. Create "snap shots" to track budget and analysis versions.

Project pricing and financial analyses may change over time. As a result, it is important for project managers to track past estimates and compare them with current projections. The addition of a powerful new feature allows you to take a "snap shot" of pricing and/or financial analysis at specific points in time. Later, managers can view one or more snap shots to assess values as of a particular point in the project history, and compare those assessments against current estimates.

If a display is enabled for snap shots, a dropdown menu above the displayed report provides the controls to view, create, edit and delete snap shots. In this release, two such displays are enabled: the pricing analysis and the financial analysis (available in a particular project by clicking the Pricing and Analysis links, respectively). If users select a snap shot from the dropdown, a notice at the bottom of the report alerts the user that s/he is viewing a snap shot, and gives details of when and by whom the snap shot was created.

To enable the new feature, an admin should navigate to Account > Roles > [select a role] > General settings. There are three switches, which enable viewing and modifying snap shots and viewing other users’ snap shots.

4. Revenue forecasting: View over time and rolled up by customer.

The pricing analysis report is an important tool for forecasting project revenue, cost and profit. This month’s release significantly enhances this report. Project managers can filter the report based on project stages. Further, they can now view forecasted revenue and profit over time, (i.e. annually, quarterly, monthly, weekly, etc.), with totals for all periods and/or for the entire project. Projects can be grouped by customer, and the results can be weighted by closing probability, if desired. Hyperlinks on project names allow drilldowns to details of the project pricing, including hours and rates. To see this report, please navigate to Reports > Advanced > Projects > Pricing analysis.

5. Suggestions, problems, or questions?

As always, please contact us at support@openair.com or 888.367.1288 (outside the U.S. and Canada, call 617-351-0226). We pride ourselves on the outstanding care we give our customers. Please let us know how we improve your experience with OpenAir.