Determining Which Model To Use

Before creating a report, answer the following questions:

• Will the report deal with historical data (data from report logs) or with operational (current) data? (The following example focuses on building a report that uses historical data.)

• Will the report deal with product usage or feature usage?

• If it is Feature Usage, will it use an organizational structure? All Product Usage reports must use an organizational structure.

• Do you need to report on tier-based (Autodesk) or token-based (Cadence) usage?

• Will the report rely on hourly, daily, or monthly data? Monthly data is desirable for faster report performance, although monthly is not available for Operational data.

• Is there a specific level of the organization that should be reported on?

Each of these questions is closely related to the path that should be taken down the data model hierarchy (in Query Studio or Report Studio), to determine from which model you should pull items to create a report.

Using Historical Or Operational (Real-Time) Data

Historical data is more accurate because it comes from report logs. Because of this, however, the data is not available immediately. Report logs must first be imported (rotated), which typically happens daily, and then the imported report-log data must be aggregated before it is available for reports.

Operational data is more readily available because it is collected more often, but it is less accurate due to incomplete processing (for example, no special processing of duplicate-grouped events). Operational data is available for a period of only two weeks. In addition, operational data does not take into account any organizational structures that might exist.