Creating reports with large volumes of data that are easy for users to understand becomes a major challenge for information managers. A simple and structured design is needed to achieve the goal of transforming data into knowledge.

In the search for a tool for report generation, one of the main aspects to evaluate is ease of use, ensuring that the tool allows, without technical knowledge, the transformation of aggregated data into meaningful documents.

Details of the iberDok solution

Reports are living documents that, although they may not change very frequently, must still be adaptable when data changes. Business experts may not have the knowledge to access the data, so if the chosen tool allows them to adapt the logic and avoid depending on IT staff to make adjustments or implement changes in the program, it provides them with independence to carry out their modifications.

The most sensitive aspect of reports is usually data retrieval. In some cases, it may be possible to query a database, but in other cases it may be preferable to prepare raw information using XML or a text file. Having the flexibility to choose the type of data access allows the solution to adapt to the needs of the program’s users.

The structured information to be displayed may vary depending on the data obtained. The ideal solution would be a single template containing the report design, where the necessary logic can be created, showing parts of the report that depend on certain conditions. These conditions may be static data, but they may also depend on a person’s decision-making.

Reports can be generated in bulk, producing a large volume of PDF files prepared for distribution through selected channels, but sometimes they require user decision-making. In this latter case, the solution should allow the creation of a question flow through a wizard that focuses on the points where decisions must be made, simplifying the user’s task, skipping unnecessary data, and minimizing the potential human error of forgetting to fill in certain fields.

The report format has traditionally been linked to the creation of a PDF document, chosen because of its standard that enables independence from proprietary platforms. However, recently the trend toward customer portals has shifted this format toward a web-based version. For this, the chosen technology for creating reports must provide different output formats, allowing the user to request one or another depending on their preference or the preference of the target recipients.