Templates and themes

IBM Cognos Analytics with Watson includes several basic report templates and color themes that you can choose from when you create a new report.

The templates and themes are stored in the Templates.zip deployment file. If you do not see the list of templates and themes when you create a new report, ask your administrator to import the deployment file into Cognos Administration. After the deployment file is imported, the templates appear in the Templates folder in Team content.

You can also create your own report templates and themes, and make them available to other users. Save the templates in the Templates folder in Team content, and save themes in the Style Reference Reports folder in the Templates folder. When saving your own template or theme, do not use the name of an existing Cognos Analytics template or theme. Otherwise, your template or theme might be overwritten when Cognos Analytics is upgraded to a later version. Any report or theme that is saved in the Templates folder appears in the list of templates or themes when you create a new report.

You can also convert a report to a template by clicking Save > Convert to Template.

Note: When you select a template in the Templates and themes window, you can see a preview of the template in the right pane. The preview applies only for the Style Reference Reports in the template folder. Any styles you apply outside the Style Reference Reports (the default layout style sheet) do not display in the preview pane.

Tip: By default, templates or themes that you create are identified by a blank icon in the list of available templates and themes. You can associate your own icon to a template or theme. Save the icon as an SVG with the same name as the template or theme, replacing any blank spaces in the name with the underscore (_) character. For example, if you create a template that is named My template, save the icon as My_template.svg. Then, ask your administrator to add the icon to the folder install_location\webcontent\bi\pat\images\templateReports for templates or install_location\webcontent\bi\pat\images\themeReports for themes.