Chapter 2 Introducing Reports and List Reports

What is a report?

A report allows you to publish valuable information about one model (model report) or several models (multi-model report) using different outputs. You can print a report in order to have it on a paper support, or you can generate it in RTF or HTML format for better reusability. RTF and HTML can be customized using RTF and HTML templates.

PowerDesigner manages a structured representation of the report using a tree view format. You define a report by selecting items in the Available Items pane (left pane) and insert them in the Report Items pane (right pane). Each item you add in your report can be formatted individually. The items you use to create your report structure are part of a stored list of items. You can use reports templates, which indicate what information to include in your report. They allow you to quickly generate reports. You use the Report Template Editor to build report templates.

You generate the created structure from the design objects of your model.

There are two types of standard reports that you can generate:

Model reports
Multi-model reports

The Report Editor and the Multi-Model Report Editor have their own respective windows but share the same graphical interface.

The title bar indicates which editor you are using.

Since both Editors share the same features, the term Report Editor is used in this manual when specifying is not required.