Built-in Reports

This chapter provides overview information and procedures for generating reports applicable to your Microsoft network, including Built-in reports and Custom Query reports.

Overview

After you have conducted scans on storage resources, File Reporter has the content needed to generate reports. The type of report you can generate depends on the type of scan that you have conducted. For example, to create an Assigned NTFS Permissions report, a Permissions scan on a Windows share must first be conducted.

All reports are created by first creating report definitions. The report definition specifies the report name, type, target path to the scans, and more.

File Reporter has built-in aggregate reporting capabilities, meaning that you can specify multiple target paths in the same report. Additionally, File Reporter has built-in scoping, which allows you to browse through the file path or Active Directory and specify the level where you want to start reporting data. Finally, Boolean filtering is available for all File Data Reports. For more information, see Built-in Report Filtering

When the definition has been saved, you can generate the report immediately or schedule it to be generated.

You can generate reports in either Preview or Stored Report mode. Preview lets you view the report where you can save it locally if you want to. Stored Report saves the report to the server hosting the Engine, where it remains for a set amount of days.

You can generate Detailed Reports from certain built-in report types. For example, a File Extension Report can be the means of generating a Detailed Report that includes the specific details of all of the *.mov files.

All built-in reports include a cover sheet that you can customize to include your organization’s logo.

Built-in Report Types

File Reporter has five different built-in report type classifications:

• Directory Data

• Permissions

• File Data

• Historic Comparison

• Trending

Each classification includes one or more report types. For example, in the Permissions category, three different reports can be generated.

Branding and Style

Cover Sheet Logo

All generated built-in reports include a cover sheet that includes a default graphic. If you want, you can replace it with your organization’s logo.

1. Select Reports > Report Definitions.

2. Select Report Branding and Styling > Report Branding.

   

3. In the Company Name field, specify the name of your organization.

   This is the name that appears on the front cover.

4. Click Browse, then browse to and replace the default logo with a new logo.

   

5. Click Save.

Report Data Font

Due to limitations of font encoding in PDF files, you might need to specify an alternate report data font. Locales that have multi-byte characters or characters outside the Latin-1 set of characters supported by the default font are especially at risk.

If you know the collected data is limited to a specific locale or language, choose a font that properly displays all characters for that locale or language.

If the collected data might contain characters that span multiple locales or that include both multi-byte and Latin-1 characters, for example, choose an appropriate Unicode Font that can accurately display most characters from the Unicode set and not just a specific locale.

Two Unicode fonts known for having both good Unicode character coverage and good glyph presentation are MS Arial Unicode (a sans-serif font) and CODE2000 (a serif font).

For more information on these fonts and on Unicode fonts in general, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicode_font.

Headers and parameters in the reports remain in the default Arial font.

To change the report data font:

1. From the Reports menu, select Report Definitions.

2. From the Report Branding and Styling drop-down menu, select Report Data Font.

3. From the Report Data Font Name drop-down menu, select the font you want to use for the report.

4. Click Save.