The Report Node
The main Report node () contains information about the formatting and defaults for the report.
If you have added a custom report, you can generate a report tree based on the available templates as specified in the Template section (described below) by clicking Generate (). If the report tree is not empty, you will be asked if you want to replace the current tree.
Regenerating the report tree can be useful if you want to update the tree to reflect changes you have made in the model or if you want to change the report template without replacing the entire report.
Click the Preview Selected () or Preview All () button to show a preview of the report in the Preview window. Click the Write button () in the toolbar for the Settings window for Report, right-click the Report node, or press F8 to create a report. You can also click the downward arrow beside the Write button or right-click and choose Write To() to open the fullscreen Write window for writing the report to a database. The Write and Write To options are also available by right-clicking any node in the report tree. Selecting Write from any report node’s context menu generates the entire report.
Template
This section, which is collapsed by default, contains the setting for the level of detail in new nodes that are added to the report manually. It also determines which nodes are added as well as their level of detail if you click Generate () in the main Report node’s toolbar. The Template list takes its initial value from the template used to create the initial report contents. Alternatively, if you added an empty report, the default value is Intermediate. The options available for selection include the values Brief, Intermediate, and Complete as well as any custom report templates found in your user and installation report templates folders and in the current model (see Creating, Exporting, and Using Custom Report Templates).
Format
You can select to create a report in one of the following formats, which you choose from the Output format list:
HTML, for creating the report as an HTML file for display in a web browser.
Microsoft Word, for creating the report as a docx file for use as a document in Microsoft® Word (version 2007 or later).
When adding a new report, the initial setting for the output format is that of the last report you wrote (or previewed).
The Report Generator stores the report in a file with the chosen name and by default gives it the extension .html or .docx. For HTML reports, it stores images included in the report and the style sheet in a subdirectory with the same name as the report plus the suffix _files. Reports in Microsoft Word format are self-contained.
Specify the report’s directory path and filename in the Filename text field or click Browse () to launch the Specify Report File dialog box, browse to the desired location, and enter the filename in the File name text field. If the text field is empty, you will be asked to specify the filename when you click Write. You can also click the downward arrow beside the Browse button and choose Browse From () to open the fullscreen Select File window. Click the downward arrow for the Location menu () to choose Copy Location () and (if you have copied a file location) Paste Location ().
If you select Always ask for filename (only available if you are not writing to a database), the Specify Report File dialog box will always prompt you for a filename; if specified, the current name is the default choice.
When you add a new report, the filename will by default be empty. You can override this behavior by specifying a default report directory in the Preferences dialog box; see the subsection Edit the Default Report Settings below.
Select Open finished report to directly open the generated report in a web browser (HTML) or Microsoft Word.
By default, report output data that refers to model contents will be rendered as hyperlinks if there is a report section for the referenced object. For example, in the report section for a solver you can follow a link to get to the section describing the study step that defines the solver. If you want to disable hyperlinks, for example when printing a report, select the Disable cross-reference hyperlinks check box.
To customize the style of reports in the HTML output format, you can specify the CSS-file to use in the Style sheet list:
Select Default to use the default style file specified in the Preferences dialog box (see Edit the Default Report Settings) or the built-in style in COMSOL Multiphysics if no valid default style file has been given.
Select Custom if you want to use a custom style sheet for a particular report. If you select Custom, specify a style sheet in the Style-sheet file field, or click Browse to locate the style-sheet file (CSS file). Click Refresh to reread the style-sheet file. Click Import to import the style-sheet file into the model; otherwise, COMSOL Multiphysics references it on your file system. When you have imported a style-sheet file, the Imported style-sheet file field shows its filename. Click Export to save an imported style-sheet file on the file system at a location of your choice. The Style-sheet file field will be updated accordingly. Click Discard to remove an imported style-sheet file from the model.
Also for reports in the HTML format, select a level from the Generate separate files a section level list: None (the default; one file only), Level 1, Level 2, or Level 3.
For reports in the Microsoft Word format, you can control the layout using the Template list:
Select Default to use as the style template the default Microsoft Word template (.dotx) or Microsoft Word document (.docx) file specified in the Preferences dialog box, on the Results>Presentation page. If no such file has been specified, COMSOL’s built-in template will be used.
Select Custom and type a path to the .dotx or .docx file of your choice in the Template file text field or click Browse to navigate to its location on the file system. Click Refresh to reread the template file. Click Import to import the template file into the model; otherwise, COMSOL Multiphysics references it on your file system. When you have imported a template, the Imported template file field shows its filename. Click Export to save an imported template file on the file system at a location of your choice. The Microsoft Word template file field will be updated accordingly. Click Discard to remove an imported template file from the model.
From the Start new page at section level list, choose the section level at which to start a new page of your report in Microsoft Word format: None (no page breaks), Level 1 (the default), Level 2, or Level 3.
For both output formats, choose the section level to which the report should enumerate each section from the Enumerate section to level list: None (no enumerated section), Level 1, Level 2, Level 3 (the default), Level 4, Level 5, Level 6, or All (enumerate all sections).
Publishing and Editing an HTML Report
Once an HTML report is created, it can be published or edited in any HTML editor. If you want to publish a report on the internet or send it to a colleague, also send the HTML file and the folder with the images and style sheet.
Images
From the Size list, you can select the image size as Extra small (240-by-180 pixels for HTML screen output/2.4-by-1.8 inches for print-optimized output), Small (320-by-240 pixels/3-by-2.4 inches), Medium (480-by-360 pixels/4-by-3 inches; the default), Large (600-by-450 pixels/6-by-4.5 inches), or Extra large (720-by-540 pixels/7.2-by-5.4 inches)).
The width and height values above apply to the default Orientation setting, Landscape, for which all images have an aspect ratio of 4:3. If you change Orientation to Portrait instead, width and height are interchanged, resulting in images with the aspect ratio 3:4.
From the Type list, select the image file type: PNG (the default), JPEG, or BMP (not supported for reports in Microsoft Word format; choosing this option gives PNG images).
From the Color theme list, specify which color theme to use for the report: Global theme (the default), Default from preferences, Basic, COMSOL, Dark, DarkSelection, Default, Light, LightSelection, or RYB.
From the Background list, choose which background to use for the report. Current, From theme, Color (the default), or Transparent. If you chose Color, then specify a color using the color palette that become available.
There are three options for controlling image generation:
Generate images (default): Report images are generated in accordance with the settings for the individual report features each time you write the report.
Suppress image regeneration: Images are generated if they are not available. Use this option if you want to quickly rewrite the report to include changes that only affect the text.
Disable image generation: Images are not generated. This option can be useful, for example, when troubleshooting models with a very large number of nodes.
When the output format is Microsoft Word, use the Link information for Word add-in setting to control if images in the report will be possible to update from Microsoft Word using the COMSOL add-in (see The COMSOL Add-Ins for PowerPoint and for Word for details):
From preferences (default) — Image linking is controlled by the Include image link information for the COMSOL add-in for Word check box on the Results>Reports page in the Preferences dialog box.
On — Link information will be included for all images whose source entities support linking.
Off — No link information will be included.
Metadata
In this section, collapsed by default, you can specify metadata for reports in HTML and Microsoft Word formats.
For HTML reports, you can specify keywords in the Keywords text field. The entered text will be included in the main HTML-file’s head section as the value of the content attribute in the meta element with the name attribute value keywords. Similarly, the text entered in the Description field will be included in the head section as the value of the content attribute in the meta element with the name attribute value description.
For Microsoft Word reports, you can specify information to include in text fields with the same names on the Info page in Microsoft Word, which you access via the File ribbon button. For the fields indicated by “(all)” below to be visible in Microsoft Word, you have to click Show All Properties in that program:
Tags
Comments: If you leave the field empty, the text in the Comments field of the Report node’s Properties page will be used instead.
Status (all)
Categories (all)
Subject (all)
Number Format
Using the controls in this section, you can customize how numbers are formatted in report table output. The available Format settings are:
Default — Numbers in report tables are displayed in the same way as in the Value column of the table in a Parameters node in the COMSOL Desktop. In particular, the precision is then controlled by the Display precision setting on the Results>Tables page of the Preferences dialog.
Custom — Choose this option if you want to customize number formatting for your report. You can then specify the Precision as an integer between 1 and 15 (the default is the current Display precision preference setting); the Notation, with the alternatives
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Automatic (default) — display numbers in either scientific or decimal notation depending on their magnitude.
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Decimal — display numbers in decimal notation, for example 0.85.
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Engineering — display numbers in engineering notation, for example 850E-3.
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Scientific — display numbers in scientific notation, for example 8.5E-1.
and the Complex notation:
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Rectangular — display complex numbers in terms of real and imaginary parts, for example 1 + 2i.
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Polar — display complex number in terms of magnitude and argument, for example 2.236163.435°.
For Scientific and Decimal notation, select the Display all significant digits if you want to keep trailing zeros within the chosen precision.
Select the Right align numeric columns check box to right align table columns with purely numeric data.
You can override the report-wide number format settings for individual report feature nodes that generate table data. The Settings window for such a report feature node contains a Number Format section where you can specify the Format as either From report (the default) or Custom. The former option gives the number formatting defined in the corresponding section of the parent Report node, whereas the latter allows you to specify dedicated settings.
Edit the Default Report Settings
Open The Preferences Dialog Box and click Reports and Presentations to control some properties for the report generator.
If the Report directory refers to an existing directory, the default filename for a new report will be based on the model’s name. When the report directory is set in this way, a nonabsolute path in the Filename text field in the Format section of the Report Settings window will be interpreted as relative to this directory.
In the Default report style-sheet file field, type the full path and filename to a style sheet (.css-file) that you want to use as the default style sheet for reports in HTML format. Click Browse to browse to the file’s location.
In the Default Microsoft Word template file field, type the full path and filename to a Microsoft Word template (.dotx-file) that you want to use as the default style template for reports in Microsoft Word format. Click Browse to browse to the file’s location. You can also use a Microsoft Word document (.docx-file) as your default template.
In the Logo file field, type the full path and filename for an image file (on PNG or JPEG format) to use as the logo. Click Browse to browse to the logo file. If empty, the COMSOL logo appears in the report.
In the Company field, type the name of a company associated with the report if desired.
From the Default image size list, you can select the default size for report images; choose between Extra small, Small, Medium, Large, and Extra large. Similarly, use the Default image type list to specify the default type for the report images: PNG, JPEG, or BMP.
Select the Prompt for update of table of contents in Microsoft Word check box to make Microsoft Word ask whether you want to update the table of contents when you first launch a report in this format. Such an update is necessary to generate page numbers in the table of contents, but you can choose to do the update after you have opened the document in Microsoft Word. By default this check box is not selected.