Material Forecast Report

This help file applies to an out-of-date version of MainBoss.
The most recent version of MainBoss is MainBoss 4.2.4.
For the latest version of this help file can be found here.

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The material forecast report predicts the items that MainBoss expects will be used in a specified period of time. MainBoss assumes that all materials for a job are needed on the date given by "Work Start Date". You obtain a material forecast report with Unit Maintenance Plans | Reports | Material Forecast.

The report is created by obtaining information from all work orders whose "Work Start Date" falls within the given period. For example, suppose you ask for a report covering the week starting next Monday. Then the report will cover all work orders whose "Work Start Date" falls within the given week, including any preventive maintenance work orders that might be generated for that week.

Note that the report does not include any ongoing work orders that begin before the given period. For example, if you ask for a report covering the week starting next Monday, the report will not include materials on work orders that start before that Monday.

Note: In order to create this report, MainBoss must do the same amount of work that's required to generate preventive maintenance work orders. This can take a great deal of time, especially if you have a lot of unit maintenance plans.

By default, the report covers the forthcoming week, starting today and ending a week from today. To change the report's period, set the "From Date" and "To Date" values in the Filters section of the report window.

The report window contains the following:

Grouping section: Options controlling how the report is broken into sections and sub-sections.

Show summary footer for the overall report: If this box is checkmarked, the report will include a final line summarizing information from the entire report. If the box is blank, no such line will be included.

Sorting section: Options controlling how records are sorted within each section and sub-section.

For more on how to use Grouping and Sorting, see Report Sections.

Filters section: Options controlling what kind of information will be included in the report. For more information, see Report Filters.

Include Resources for existing Work Orders: If this box is checkmarked, the report will include information about resources on existing work orders as well as on preventive maintenance work orders that might be generated. If the box is blank, the report will only include information about preventive maintenance work orders that might be generated for the given period.

PM Generation Filters: Make selections based on the date of PM generation. For example, you can restrict the print-out to PM work orders generated between a certain set of dates.

Field Selection section: Options controlling which information fields will be included in the report.

Suppress Costs: Omits any money information that might otherwise be displayed in the report.

Advanced section: Miscellaneous options.

Format Report in Columns: If this checkbox is checkmarked, the report will have information formatted in columns; this has the advantage of compressing a lot of information into a small amount of space, but may be difficult to read, especially if you ask for many pieces of information to be displayed. If the checkbox is blank, information will be laid out in a less rigid format.

Summary Format: If this checkbox is checkmarked, the report is just a summary. You don't see information on individual materials; instead, you get a summary of all materials in a particular group, as dictated by the options specified in the Grouping section. For example, if you are grouping by Item Category, you will get a summary for each category.

Report width in pages: Makes it possible to have lines that are wider than a single page. This is particularly useful when you are previewing reports on a monitor screen. For further information, see Report Sections.

Title: The title to be printed at the beginning of the report.

Main Font: The font that will be used for most of the characters in the report. This should be a font that is supported by both your Windows system and your printer.

Fixed-width Font: The font that will be used for information that is printed with fixed-width characters (mostly unit specifications). This should be a font that is supported by both your Windows system and your printer.

Preview section: Displays a visual preview of the report. If you click the Preview button, you automatically go to this section.

The Preview section contains buttons for looking through the report preview and for actually printing the information. For more on using the Preview section, see Report Buttons.

Preview: Clicking this button generates a preview of the report, displayed in the Preview section of the window.

Print: Immediately prints the report.

Export Data: Exports the report's data in XML format.

Cancel: Cancels the preparation and printing of a report. This button is enabled only when MainBoss is preparing a report, i.e. gathering the data and formatting it. For more information, see Report Buttons.

Close: Closes the window.

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