Reports & Dashboard Basics:

Reports & Dashboard Basics:
Reports are lists or summaries that allow you to aggregate and analyze your data in different ways.
Users with run reports permission and access to the specific folder containing the report can run it.
An administrator can set folder access or create  new folders.Report folders can be public,private or
accessible to selected users.In a report users can only see the records and fields that their security settings allowing them to see.In this example you can see different level of filter conditions such as summarized information ,time frame and status values as shown below

Tabular report a simple list of reports used for mailing list and activity reports.
Summary reports records sorted into groups with sub totals.A sample summary report shown below

Matrix report summarizes data in a grid against horizontal and vertical criteria,Provides totals for both rows and columns.Sample Matrix report shown below

Grouping a report by date field select group dates by from the group menu to specify the grouping time frame

Using special date values in custom report filters

Represents charts gives more idea for a report
Bar charts :Each bar represents a data from a grouping .Use horizontal to compare many groups.Use vertical to compare fewer groups or when grouping by a date field
Line charts:Each point represents data from a grouping.Use when grouping by a date field.Great for displaying changes over time.
Pie/Donut charts:Each wedge represents data from a grouping.Size of wedge determined by a summary field.
Use to compare shares of the grand total.Use the donut chart to display the grand total.
Funnel charts:Each segment represents data from a grouping.The size of segment is determined by the summary field of each grouping.Use funnel charts to compare the summarized values of grouping.
Scatter charts:Plot two summary fields against each other .Visualize the correlation between values in a group.Enable the report builder upgrade to use scatter chart.
Multiple Grouping also available to compare various charts
Side-by-side bar:Use this type of chart for multiple groupings.Each source is represent by a set of bars.
Stacked bar:Use this bar graph to display the proportions between values.It displays a single bar for each primary value,with secondary values shown on the same bar.
Stacked 100% bar:Use this for proportions between values in each grouping.All bars are the same overall length.
Grouped line:Each bar represents an ordered set of data.Missing values are displayed as gaps.
Now is the time for little bit about dashboards

Dashboard components:Provide a high level view of reports.Can take the form of tables,charts,gauges and
metrics.
Tables:A table component displays data in column form.Displays grouping or summary field of the report.Can display more than two column.
Charts:A chart component displays data graphically.Is based on the report data.Shows the field that the report is summarized on.
Gauges:A gauge component displays a single data value drawn from the grand total of a report.Helps show a progress towards a goal.Can be followed to get notification when a break point is reached.
Metrics:A metric component displays a single data value from the grand total of a report.Uses conditional highlighting.
Enable Dashboard component snapshot is a cool feature

The running user determines what data users see.Dynamic dashboard is a cool feature.
Dashboard filters can have up to 3 filters each .Must be based on date,date/time ,currency,picklist,lookup or text fields.Users can view different subsets of data on the same dashboard.Users can post chatter snapshots of dashboard components.Scheduled or emailed filtered dashboards display unfiltered data.Users cannot add filters to dashboards with visulaforce or s-control components.
Drilling Down from a dashboard use dashboard as a starting point.Finally Extra features in reports are