Do you have lots of reports that need to be run daily and you sometimes forget to run them or send them out? Think you need more time in your day? Did you know that scheduling reports in Cognos BI is a simple process that can automate sending reports and save you time? Below I will take you through the easy steps of scheduling your reports in both IBM Cognos Analytics 11 and IBM Cognos 10.

In IBM Cognos Analytics 11, scheduling reports is now call subscriptions. There are a number of different options to consume reports and if you want to email them you will need to have your Cognos BI administrator ensure that the email server is set up through IBM Cognos Configuration. Now that we have that set up, I will take you through the simple steps!

1.  Open the report you want to subscribe to and click on the …(more) and click subscribe.

3. Choose the day or days you want the report generated or sent.

4. Choose the time of day you want the report generated or sent.

5. Chose the format of the report – you can choose more than one.

6. Choose the type of delivery for the report – you can choose more than one.

7. You have now scheduled this report to be sent, saved or printed and it will run based on the schedule you provided.

8. To see a list of scheduled reports, click on the Cognos icon at the top and then click my subscriptions.

9. To modify or delete – click on the down arrow next to the modified date.

10. In the notification area, you will be alerted to all generated reports.

11. You can click on the links and be taken directly to your reports or check your email or printer!

Much like Cognos 11, Cognos 10 has the ability to schedule reports to save you time and frustration. The steps are similar and explained below. As with Cognos 11, you will need to ensure that your Cognos administrator has your email server set up through IBM Cognos Configuration.

1. In Cognos Connection, find the report you want to schedule and click on the schedule icon located on the far right of the below picture.

2. Schedule menu has many different options starting with the time period and time.

3. Next, choose options for the schedule. Within the options you can choose the type of report to be delivered and the type of delivery.

5. You can check what reports you have scheduled by clicking on the preference icon and then choose my activities and schedules.

6. You can find your reports in Cognos connection, your email or on the printer!

As you can see, the instructions are a little different for Cognos 11 and 10 and there are certain things not yet available in Cognos 11. However, no matter the version you own, by spending a few minutes to set up your reports on a schedule can save you lots of time in your day!