InetSoft Product How-To: Binding Data to a Report Section Element

Sections and tables can both present tabular data. However, sections render the data in a different manner than tables: Each section row, or “band,” is just a container for other elements. To display tabular data, each element in a section must be bound to an appropriate data field. By adding elements to a section and manually binding these elements, you can create very precise layouts. Report Designer also allows you to automatic generate and bind section elements in the form of a pseudo-table, which you can then tailor to suit your needs.

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Section Wizard

The simplest way to generate a section is by using the ‘Section Wizard’. The ‘Section Wizard’ allows a report developer to select data binding, define grouping and summarization, and generate a section with appropriate section structure and elements. After the wizard generates a section, the report developer can adjust the element positions and sizes.

Walkthrough: Creating a Report Section with the Section Wizard

1. Open the Designer and click the ‘New’ button. In the ‘Create Report’ dialog box select ‘Blank Tabular Report’ and click ‘OK’.
2. Click the ‘Section Wizard’ button to open the ‘Data Binding’ dialog box for a new section.
3. Under the Data tab, bind the section to the ‘Order Model’ data model from the ‘Orders’ data source.
4. Under the Columns tab, select the ‘Customer’ node and click on the right-arrow button to add all the attributes from the ‘Customer’ entity.
5. Remove the following columns by using the left-arrow button:
   • ‘Customer.Contact First Name’ ‘Customer.Contact Last Name’ ‘Customer.Region’
6. Click the Grouping & Summary tab. Group by ‘Customer.State’ and summarize by ‘Customer.Reseller’.
7. Click the ‘Customer.Reseller’ field and choose ‘Count’ for the summarization formula. This will provide a count of the customers in each state. (Note that it does not matter in this case which field is chosen for the summarization, because the count will be the same.)
   • You will now create a Named Group that groups data from states NJ and NY together into a single group called ‘Local’. (See Named Groups for more information about this kind of grouping.)
8. Click the ‘Customer.State’ field in the ‘Grouping’ pane, and select the ‘Define Named Group’ option.

View the gallery of examples of dashboards and visualizations.

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