Release 3.5

In order to better meet our customers’ reporting and analytics needs, we added dashboards, views, and charts to each Cobalt module. While these are geared towards the Unified Interface app experience, they have been added for all supported Dynamics 365 versions including those without the UCI.

Each module is now equipped with one or more “anchor dashboards,” listed below. As is standard for system dashboards in Dynamics 365, all charts and views making up the dashboards are also available for use elsewhere, including personal dashboards.

• The Cobalt Certification app has two dashboards:
  • Certification Overview displays the following metrics with corresponding visualizations:
    • Certification by Type
    • Certifications Granted by Month by Type
    • Exam by Status Reason
    • Initial Applications by Month by Type
    • Continuing Applications by Month by Type
  • Apps Pending Action displays the following metrics with corresponding visualizations:
    • ​Initial Applications with Pending Audit Requirements
    • Initial Applications with Pending Manual Requirements​
    • Continuing Applications with Pending Audit Requirements
    • Continuing Applications with Pending Manual Requirements​
• The Cobalt Core app includes several dashboards, most of which are also available in other apps: Classes Overview, Elections Overview, Engagement – All Time, Engagement – This Year, ​Meetings Overview, Orders & Payments, and Revenue & Receivables. The only dashboard available only in the Cobalt Core app and nowhere else is ​Subscriptions Overview, which displays the following metrics and corresponding visualizations:
  • • ​Subscriptions by Publication by Fee
    • Subscriptions by Month
    • Actual Revenues by Month (Subscription Orders)
    • Most Active Contacts (Publication Subscriptions)
• The Cobalt eCommerce app includes two dashboards:
  • Revenue & Receivables displays the following metrics with visualizations:
    • Amount by Month and Category
    • Aging Summary –  this report segments accounts receivables into three aging groups: 0-30 days, 31-60 days, 61-90 days)
    • Revenue Recognition by Month and Category (Deferred Revenue)
    • Accounts Receivable
  • Orders & Payments  displays the following metrics with visualizations:
    • Open Orders by Month
    • Payments by Month (sum and count)
    • Partially applied Payments
• Elections Overview is the anchor dashboard for the Cobalt Elections app and displays the following metrics with visualizations:
  • ​Nominations by Month and Election
  • Votes by Election
  • Most Active Nominators
  • ​Submitted Nominations
• The Cobalt Engagement app includes two dashboards:
  • Engagement – All Time displays the following metrics with corresponding visualizations for engagement activities:
    • ​​Engagement Activities by Type
    • Most Engaged Contacts
    • Most Engaged Accounts
    • Engagement by Month
  • ​Engagement – This Year displays the same metrics and visualizations listed above for Engagement – All Time, but with filters for the current year​
• The Cobalt Events app includes two dashboards:
  • Classes Overview displays the following metrics and visualizations:
    • Registrations by Meeting by Fee
    • Registrations by Month
    • Actual revenues by Month
    • Most Active Contacts (most registrations)
  • Meetings Overview displays the same metrics and visualizations listed above for Classes Overview, but for Meeting Registrations vs. Class Registrations
• Membership Overview is the anchor dashboard for the Cobalt Membership app and includes the following:
  • Current Memberships by Member Type
  • New Members by Join Date
  • Applications by Year by Type
  • Renewals by Month and Member Type
  • Pending Renewals by Expiration Date and Member Type

The charts driving Cobalt’s anchor dashboards are also available for in-line business intelligence on views and forms. We added the following additional charts for in-line BI. Please note that Microsoft also provides out-of-the-box charts for native entities such as Accounts and Contacts; we’ve only listed the charts we added for Cobalt entities that are not already included in the list of anchor dashboard visualizations, above.

Views

• Classes: Most Popular Classes – stacked bar chart showing the top 20 classes (by number of registrations) and omitting classes with no registrations
• Invoices​:
  • Balance by Month – stacked bar chart
  • Invoices by Customer​ – list with invoice count
  • Invoices by Owner – list with invoice count
  • Invoices by Pricelist – list with invoice count
  • Invoices by Status Reason – list with invoice count
• Meetings​: Most Popular Meetings – stacked bar chart showing the top 20 meetings (by number of registrations) and omitting meetings with no registrations​
• Meeting Registration​s: Top 20 Most Waitlisted Meetings – pie chart
• Payments: Payments (Amount) by Type: pie chart segmenting payments made by cash, check, or credit card

Forms

• ​Publication:
  • Subscriptions by Fee
  • Subscriptions by Month
• Meeting:
  • ​Current Registrations – count
  • Current Companion Registrations – count
  • Current Waitlist Registrations – count
  • Registrations by Meeting Activity – stacked bar chart showing the count of registrations by activity
• Class:
  • ​​Current Registrations – count​
  • Current Waitlist – count

Custom Reports

A new custom report was added in response to customer feedback. We created a wizard that allows users to launch a report that contains a list of activity, session, and class registrations by meeting registration (since this cannot be accomplished easily with existing Dynamics 365 capabilities). To run this wizard, you will need to have a meeting registration view set up. Navigate to the parent meeting and in the toolbar click the Run Sub Report button. The wizard will open, select the meeting registration view you set up earlier and click Download Excel File. The file will include: Meeting Name, Meeting Registration Fee, First Name, Last Name, Email, Badge Name, Badge Job Title, Sub-Meeting Type (Activity, Session, or Class), Sub-Meeting Name, Start Time, End Time, Location, RegisteredBy, Waitlist Number, Created On, Status.

​​Implementation Notes