[AccessD] Reporting request form

I've always found that the only way to make them happy is to get them to
tell you what data they want to see (i.e. a list of all the red frogs with
bus passes living in the Detford area) and then to draw a picture of how
they expect the report to look, in terms of order of columns, totals etc.

If you can't do that, these are some of the questions on a proforma I used
to use:

- Requested by, date, deadline; all that stuff.
- Title:
- Description (what information you want to see):
- Full list of details or just counts?
- Order of columns:
- Sorted by which columns?
- Grouped with totals? (e.g. showing all payments by trainee with a sum of
payments per trainee)
- If grouped, what are the levels? (e.g. Area, Trainee, Payments or
Supervisor, Trainee, Payments)
- Filters (e.g. you select a specific trainee or payment type when running
the report, or a date range or other detail):

None of this makes sense to a user the first time; they had to be trained to
use the form. I included a space for drawing a picture and as I said, it was
the most useful part. Can't see how a web page will give you that :(

HTH

Roz

-----Original Message-----
From: Jim Lawrence (AccessD) [mailto:accessd at shaw.ca] 
Sent: 12 June 2003 09:14
To: accessd at databaseadvisors.com
Subject: [AccessD] Reporting request form

Hi All:

I have to prepare a Reporting sheet...it will eventually be web page, that
will give a client a nicely ordered list, that if they answer and fill out
all the appropriate spots, will provide (or nearly provide) sufficient
information to generate a report from.

Has anyone created such a report request form before? Any help would be
greatly appreciated.

MTIA
Jim

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