Drill-through Access

Drill-through applications are a network of linked reports that users can navigate, retaining their context and focus, to explore and analyze information.

Drill-through access helps you to build business intelligence applications that are bigger than a single report.

For example, you have an Analysis Studio report that shows revenue and you want to be able to drill through to a Report Studio report that shows details of planned and actual revenue. For more information, see Example - Drill Through Between OLAP Reports in the Same Package.

Another example is an Analysis Studio report that lists the top 10 promotions by retailer and you want to be able to drill through to a Report Studio report that shows promotion plan revenue. For more information, see Example - Drill Through from an OLAP Report to a DMR Report.

Drill-through access works by passing information from the source to the target object, usually a report. You define what is passed from the source report by having the system match information from the selection context of the source report to the content of the target (dynamic drill through) or by defining parameters in the target (parameterized drill through). You define drill-through access for the source, either at the package level, in IBM Cognos Connection (Launch, Drill-through Definitions) or at the report level (Report Studio). Within a package, you control the scope of the data for which drill-through access is available in the drill through definition. Within a report, you define the drill-through access on a report item.

What You Should Know

For a drill-through link to work, it is necessary to know:

  • what the source report is or is going to be
  • what the target report is or is going to be
  • whether the users of the drill through link in the source report have the appropriate permissions to view or run the target report
  • how the data in the two reports is related

    Depending on the underlying data, you may create a drill through definition and have IBM Cognos Business Intelligence match the data (dynamic drill through) or map the source metadata to parameters defined in the target report or package (parameterized drill through)

  • whether to run the target report or to open it

    The target of drill-through access is usually a saved report definition. The report can be created in Report Studio, PowerPlay Studio, Query Studio, or Analysis Studio. The target of drill-through access can also be a package that contains a PowerCube, in which case a default view of the PowerCube is created.

  • if the target is being run, in what format to run it and what filters to run it with

    If you don't want to run the target report on demand, you may link instead to a bookmark in the saved output.

Sources and Targets

In IBM Cognos BI, there are many different combinations of source and target. For example, you can drill through

  • between reports created in different packages against different data source types, such as from an analysis against a cube to a detailed report against a relational data source. For more information on creating drill through access in packages, see Setting up drill-through access in packages.
  • from one existing report to another report using Report Studio. For more information on creating drill through access in a report, see Set Up Drill-through Access in a Report
  • between IBM Cognos Viewer reports authored in Report Studio, Query Studio, PowerPlay Studio, and Analysis Studio
  • from Series 7 PowerPlay Web cubes to IBM Cognos BI reports. For more information on setting up drill through access from PowerPlay Web see, Set Up Drill-through Access from PowerPlay Web
  • from Metric Studio to other IBM Cognos BI reports by passing parameters using URLs.

    For more information, see the Metric Studio User Guide.