Creating your Excel

Just like with the PDF generation, you need to create a Reporter Layout Builder record when you want to to generate your Excel workbook. The same Reporter Layout Builder record can be used to generate both a PDF document and an Excel workbook or you can use the record to only generate one type.

Your Excel workbook can contain multiple pages and contain data from multiple datasets. The dataset types that are supported for Excel are Search, Custom Label Search and SuiteQL. You can use the same dataset for both PDF and Excel and the setup of the datasets, including dynamic filtering, is the same regardless of file type. Read the referenced chapter on how to create your datasets as well as adding them to the Reporter Layout Builder record.

The following setings can be made for each individual column from your search / query result:

• Include: All columns with this column ticked will be added to the excel workbook. Untick if the column should be omitted.

• Label: Default from your search / query. You can change this value to a label of your choice. 

• Type: The type that will be used for the column in excel. The type is usually defaulted and mapped from the NetSuite type but could be changed when needed.

• Text/Value: For some NetSuite type fields, you can get both a numerical value and a string. For example for select fields you can get both the internal id of the record/list value. Set to Text or Value depending on if you want your excel to display the textual value or the internal id.

When you are done with your setup on the dataset, click on the blue Update button and then save the Dataset record.

Please note that the order in which the columns are added to your search / query will decide the order in which they will be added to Excel. To change the order, adjust your search / query.

When you are done with the dataset configuration, view the Reporter Layout Builder in Edit mode and navigate to the Excel subtab. Click on the pen icon in the upper right corner to start or update your configuration. Use the trash bin icon located in the same area to remove / reset your configuration for Excel.

The setup is done in two parts. The first part contains the settings made for File Name and Folder in which the Excel documents should be stored once created. The name follows the same syntax as for the PDF file name. Read more here. Please note that the folder setting here is a default value. In workflow, the folder can be set / overriden in that configuration.

The second part is for the workbook sheets. You can add multiple sheets to your excel. To add an additional sheet, simply click on the Add Sheet label.

Page Name

Start by assigning the sheet a name. Please note that the sheet name must be unique for that workbook and there are some special characters that are not allowed (e.g. /, ", ').

Texts

Use texts to add for example headings or hard-coded, predefined texts. You can choose if the text should printed as bold and the font-size. The row + column settings sets in which cell the text will be printed. For example, Row/Column = 1, 1 is equivalent to cell A1 in excel.

Tables

Select the dataset from previous step and add to your excel. You can also select a predefined style from the list to format your table.

When you are done with your setup, click on the blue Update button. Make also sure to save your Reporter Layout Builder record of save all of your changes.

Please note that if you use the same placement (row+column) for multiple objects (for example setting both Texts and Tables as 1+1, the latter will overwrite the former.

There is an easy way to preview your configuration and excel workbook directly in the layout builder. In edit mode, click on the Preview Excel button located in the upper and lower buttons bar. Reporter will generate the excel and automatically download it on your computer so that you can review the results. If you apply filtering on your dataset, those settings will also apply for the preview.

Read the next chapter, Excel in Workflow, on how you deploy your work and make the excel accessible from the user interface.