Those of you who have checked our new post series about “Merlin report templates” know by now…

• How to modify existing reports
• How to edit description or report template names
• How to create your own report templates
• How to localize a Merlin report template
• Further tips for localizing an xslt report template
• How to add  an option in an xslt report template
• How to add  an option in a python / wbl report template
• How to add a property into an existing xslt report
• How to add a property into an existing python /wbl report template

Now let’s do some magic with the reports.

• Map a status or flag information to a graphic file
• Define the size of the project image over the options
• List overdue tasks along with the next activities, in “Next Due Activities” report
• Report planned, actual and planned vs actual work per phase in a chart
• Report expected work costs per role for your resources
• Report expected work costs per resources’ group
• Report the project’s name in the Next Due Activities report
• Modify the “Milestone Trend Report” to show the WBS in the table and in the chart
• Report expected or actual resources’ work per phase
• Report resources work cost per phase
• Report cash flow for expected cost or approved budget
• Report billable costs entered on elements
• Report element costs by type
• Report issues
• Report Events
• Output Project’s WBS

Output Project’s WBS
We have posted here in the past ways to display the WBS of a Merlin project.

If you prefer using a report template instead of AppleScripts, feel free to use following custom report template we present hereafter. It lists per default up to 3 levels of the WBS, ignores assignments and milestones, shows the project objective if existing and  resources. Optional you may enable the view of milestones and limit the shown levels.

You may check contained ‘ProjectWBS.py’, “ProjectWBS.wbl” or “Info.plist” to see how we ask for items on the various levels, or how we iterate in their properties for the output.
Feel free to modify this custom report further as you require for your needs.

Credits for the CSS and other resources used: SlickMap CSS was created by Matt Everson of Astuteo and is licensed for free.
An output sample:

And the report options:

Installation:

• Extract the zip first
• place the contained mrept package under the following path of your mac: ~/Library/Application Support/Merlin/Reports
• (in case you have no “Reports” folder please create it first and pay attention to name it exactly as “Reports”)
• restart your Merlin and
• call File > New Report… to find the new report called “Project WBS”.