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Analytics > Designing an Analysis > Step 2: Reviewing Results and Creating Layouts > Adding Narrative Text to Results
Adding Narrative Text to Results
Use the narrative view to add one or more paragraphs of text to appear with the reports. Narrative text is useful for providing information such as context, explanatory text, or extended descriptions. You can perform the following actions in the narrative view:
- Type a sentence with placeholders for each column in the results.
- Specify how rows should be separated.
- Use formatting buttons to make text bold, italic, or underlined, and insert line breaks.
- Apply cosmetic formatting to the fonts used in the narrative view, or import the font formatting from a previously saved view.
Example Usage Scenario for Narrative Text View
A user creates a report that returns the region name in the second column as part of the result set. The user wants the narrative view to appear as shown in the following example, with introductory text and each region listed on a new line:
This report shows your sales by region. The regions are:
East Region
West Region
The following table lists and describes the user’s narrative view entries:
Field
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Entry
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Explanation
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Prefix
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[b]
This report shows your sales by region. The regions are:[/b][br][br]
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The entry prefixes the narrative with text. The text is formatted to appear in bolded type and is followed by two line breaks.
The user positions the cursor into the Prefix text box and clicks the bold text button (B) to insert the tags to begin and end bolded text. The user types the following text between the tags:
This report shows your sales by region. The regions are:
The user then clicks the Line Break button twice.
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Narrative
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@2
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The entry includes the results from the second column (the region name) in the narrative text.
The user positions the cursor into the Narrative text box and types the characters @2.
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Row Separator
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[br]
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The entry starts each row of the narrative text on a new line.
The user positions the cursor into the Row Separator text box and clicks the Line Break button twice.
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Postfix
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[br][b]
End of Sales by Region report[/b]
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The entry appends text to the narrative, in the same manner as the Prefix.
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Reserved Characters in the Narrative View
In the narrative view, the following characters are reserved characters:
@ (at sign, unless used as a column placeholder in the Narrative text box)
[ (left bracket)
] (right bracket)
‘ (single quote)
\ (back slash)
NOTE: If you want to include a reserved character, precede it with a backward slash character (\) to escape it. For example, to include a backward slash character in narrative text, type \\.
Adding or Modifying Narrative Views
The following procedure provides the steps to construct a narrative view.
In the Prefix, Narrative, and Postfix text boxes, you can use the formatting buttons to make text appear in bold, italic or underlined type.
NOTE: To include a line break, use the Line Break button. Pressing Enter does not result in multiple lines of text.
To add or modify a narrative view
- In the Results tab, perform one of the following actions:
- Enter your selections for the fields in the workspace.
The following table describes the fields.
Narrative View Workspace Field
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Comments
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Prefix
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Specifies the header for the narrative. This text appears at the beginning of the narrative.
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Narrative
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Indicates the narrative text that will appear for each row in the results. Use @n to include the results from the designated column in the narrative. For example, @1 inserts the results from the first column in the narrative, and @3 inserts the results of the third column.
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Row separator
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Specifies a row separator tag. To use a separator other than the default for the format, enter the desired row separator in the Row Separator text box.
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Postfix
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Specifies the footer for the narrative. The text appears at the end of the narrative.
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- To apply cosmetic formatting to the font used in the narrative view, click the Format View button.
- To import the font formatting from a previously saved view, click the Import Formatting from Another Analysis button, and navigate to the saved view.
Note: You can import formatting from reports that have formats from Step 2 (Creating Layouts). Formatting from Step 1 (Defining Criteria) cannot be imported.
- Select the Display Results check box to preview the narrative view.
- Click OK to return to the Layout Views page.
- To move or edit the narrative view (and other views, as required) on the page, do the following:
- To move the view to a different location on the page, drag the view, and drop it in the new location.
- To format the appearance of the narrative view, click the Format View button for the view.
You can specify Cell, Border, Background, and Additional Formatting Options (Width, Height, Indent, Right Padding, Top Padding, Bottom Padding).
- To edit the narrative view, click the Edit View button for the view.
- To delete the narrative view, click the Delete View button for the view.
- When you finish making your changes, save the report.
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