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Configure preview and export in the report designer

Neos Studio can apply a dedicated preview and export configuration while you work on a report in the Stimulsoft designer. This configuration is meant for design-time data retrieval: it helps you keep preview responsive, avoid loading too much data, and reuse a known-good setup for preview and portability exports.

Why use a configuration?

A preview and export configuration is useful when:

  • the report datasource is large enough to make preview slow or unstable,
  • the report depends on entity view parameters,
  • you want to keep a tenant-specific or developer-specific setup ready to reuse,
  • you want exported sample data to reflect a controlled subset of business data.

If no configuration is selected, the report designer still works, but preview falls back to the default safety limit used by Neos for report design.

Open the configuration tools

When a report is opened in Neos Studio, the designer header exposes a Preview and export configuration selector.

Use it to:

  • accept the automatically suggested configuration,
  • pick another configuration from the lookup,
  • open the Configurations editor when you need to create, clone, or adjust a sheet.

If the current environment exposes multiple authorized tenants, the Tenant data selector in the header also participates in the preview and export context.

How automatic selection works

Neos Studio can preselect the most relevant configuration for the current report. Matching starts with the report datasource and can then refine the choice with:

  • the report name,
  • the current developer name,
  • the current machine name,
  • the currently selected tenant data identifier.

This lets you keep one broadly reusable configuration, or narrower configurations that only apply to a specific report, tenant, or workstation.

Configure data retrieval

The detail panel of the selected configuration controls how preview and export retrieve data.

Limit the number of retrieved items

Use EntityView max items count when you want to cap the number of rows sent to the report preview.

This is the safest way to keep preview responsive while you are iterating on layout, grouping, or expressions.

Apply an OData filter

Enable the OData filter option when you want preview and export to retrieve only a subset of the underlying entity view.

Example:

Status eq 'Open' and Amount gt 1000

This is especially useful when the full entity view is too large, or when you want deterministic preview data for a specific scenario.

For the option itself, see Filter.

Pass entity view parameters

Enable the entity view parameters option when the entity view behind the report expects input parameters.

The designer stores these values as key/value rows. If the same parameter name appears several times, Neos treats them as multiple values for the same parameter when the configuration is used.

Typical examples include:

  • a business identifier such as CustomerNumber,
  • a boolean flag such as IncludeArchived,
  • a period boundary such as StartDate.

For the underlying feature, see EntityViewParameters option and Use entity view parameters.

Reuse the same configuration for export

The selected configuration is not limited to the on-screen preview.

Neos Studio also reuses it when you launch:

  • Export sample business data (.json),
  • Export template with its sample data (.mrt).

This keeps preview and portability exports aligned, which is useful when you need a reproducible sample for bug analysis, collaboration, or work in the desktop Stimulsoft designer.

  1. Create the report and add its datasource.
  2. Open the report designer.
  3. Let Neos Studio preselect a configuration, or open Configurations to create one.
  4. Set a max item count first.
  5. Add an OData filter if you need a narrower dataset.
  6. Add entity view parameters when the datasource requires them.
  7. Preview the report.
  8. Export sample data or a portable template when you need to share the scenario.

See also