Report filters

In this article, we'll walk through how to use the report filter you'll find on most Populi reports. Filters let you focus on the information that you're after in a particular report by paring away people (or invoices, or application fields, or whatever the report covers) that don't fit your criteria—and leaving onscreen only those that do. You can then export your filtered report or perform various actions—for example, apply a communication plan to the 30 applicants you've filtered for, or remove a tag from them, or...

Many reports also have checkboxes, which are discussed at the bottom of this article.

Two ways to use the filter

When you navigate to a report, you'll see the two essential functions of the filter:

• Click Filter to change the default report filter or start creating a new one.
• Click Load to load a saved report.

Using the filter to find people

When using the filter, imagine that you're asking it to find certain people who fit a certain profile. Below is the filter from the Leads > Summary report.

Here, you're asking it the following: "Hiya, filter. Find me the Leads that are Active and are tied to the Spring 2021-2022 Academic Term and whose representative is Gemma Frye." If you were elsewhere, say, the Inquiries report, you might be asking it, "Good morning, filter. Find me the Inquiries who've verified their email addresses and are waiting to hear from us and learned about us through our Facebook campaign." And so on.

Conditions

Conditions let you select the actual criteria by which you are searching. Click choose a condition, select the field you're interested in, then whether or not you want matches (is/is not), and then select from the options the field gives you. For example, if you select the representative field, your options would be a list of your Admissions staff/representatives. If you selected Academic Term, you'd get a list of academic terms. And so on.

Any/all

The any/all drop-down changes your request in significant ways:

• When you select all, you're asking the filter to find people who match this and this and this, etc.
• When you select any, you're asking it for people who match this or this or, etc.

Below, you're using any to ask for people whose representative is either Gemma or Monique or Omar:

Add more conditions

Say you have a list of Leads assigned to either Gemma, Monique, or Omar, and now you want to see only which of those have a source of Conference. What you want to do now is add more conditions.

Adding more conditions makes your request to the filter a little more complex. In the above, you're asking it to find you Leads whose representative is either Gemma or Monique or Jillian and whose Lead Source is Conference. As you add more conditions, each new one introduces a new and to your request. Additional conditions can be as simple or complex as you wish.

• Click Add conditions and make your new filter selections.
• To remove a condition, just click the X.

Saved reports

The filter lets you save your conditions (and column sort settings) as custom reports. They're really handy for quickly loading commonly-desired information without having to set up all of the filters every time you need that report. Some reports include some built-in filters—Donations, for example, features Donations this month and Donations this year.

Learn how to use an Export Helper field set as the default export option in this article.

Loading a saved report

1. Click Load and select a report. It will load the moment you click it.
2. Click Choose a saved filter to see custom reports you've created or that have been shared with you.

Saving a report filter

You can create and save new filters, update your existing custom filters, or save a modified custom filter as a new report.

1. When you have your filter set up the way you like it, click Save. You can do this after setting up a new filter or loading a saved one. If loading a custom filter, you can select either Save/update or Save as.
2. Give the report a name.
3. Check if you'd like to share this filter with other staff members. Leave it unchecked if you wish for this filter to be for your own use.
4. If you're the type that's inclined to forget, remember to Save!

Checkboxes

Many reports also have checkboxes, giving you more granular control over who is affected when you perform an action on your filtered report. If a person has a check next to her name, she'll be affected by the action or included in your export. If not checked, she will neither be affected nor exported. Clicking gives you options to rapidly select or de-select a bunch of people all at once.