Edit Dashboard Component Report
Have you ever wanted to edit the underlying report for a dashboard component and found it cumbersome? A dashboard executes with a ‘running user’ and this user feeds into all of the underlying reports. This is great, because it means that you can create a single set of reports and not have to edit the reports for the dashboard to provide useful data to an entire set of your users.
The Problem – Edit Dashboard Component Report
Because your user is likely placed very high up in the role hierarchy (so that you have access to all or most of the Org’s records) when you click on a dashboard component to view the underlying report, it can take many minutes (or even timeout). Your users don’t have this issue, they click the dashboard component and the user running the report would only see records at or below them in the role hierarchy – likely running quickly. You as the admin, however, can only finally click “Customize” to edit the report after waiting a long time (and that’s if it doesn’t timeout).
The other option to avoid the above dilemma (and wait) is to navigate to “Reports” and locate the report you want to edit. Instead of running the report, click the arrow and “Customize.” The issue here is that you have to know which report you want to edit, which probably requires “Editing” the Dashboard to view the exact name of the report for the specific component. This can be time consuming and cumbersome as well.
A Better Solution – Salesforce Quick Tip!
I present to you a better solution. Simply right click the Dashboard Component you would like to edit the underlying report for and copy the URL. Paste the URL into your browser (probably a new tab) it should look something like this: https://[YOURSERVERURL].salesforce.com/00O61000003p9Nj if it happens to have anything after the Report ID – just remove it so it looks like the above. Now add “/e?” to the end of the URL.
Final URL: https://[YOURSERVERURL].salesforce.com/00O61000003p9Nj/e?
Problem Solved
Now just hit Enter and you will be taken directly to editing the underlying report – and it will load quick. Never get stuck waiting for a report to load just to edit it!
What quick tips do you have related to Dashboards or Reports? Feel free to post in the comments or on Twitter!