Every report column you do not recognize in EDGEBIC by User Solutions has its own definition one click away: click Column Details in the report footer, select the column, and read its plain-English meaning, its formula, its unit and three worked example values. No manual, no colleague, no half-remembered acronym. This is the task, the fastest quality habit in the whole reporting layer.
For the full tour of the feature and how to build the habit, see how to use Column Details, and for why every column carries its own definition at all, why every column carries its own definition. Once you know what each column holds, how to show, hide, freeze, and multi-sort report columns covers reshaping the grid around them. Every task in this library is mapped on the EDGEBIC how-to hub.
Before You Start
- The report is open. Column Details lives inside a report window, so you look up a column from the report that shows it.
- You know which column is puzzling you, or at least its grid header. That header is how the definition list is labeled.
Step 1: Find the Button
With any report open, look at the window footer. Alongside Export to PDF, Export to Excel and Close sits Column Details. It is on every report that has a documented glossary, which is nearly all of them.
If the button is missing or grayed out, that report's columns are not documented yet. Twenty-one reports ship a glossary today and they cover the daily set, so a missing button is uncommon and means "not documented" rather than "broken".
Step 2: Open It and Find Your Column
Click Column Details. A two-pane dialog opens over the report. Your grid is untouched underneath: filters, sorting and layout all stay, and nothing re-queries, so it is safe to open mid-analysis.
The left pane lists every documented column of this report, labeled exactly as the grid labels it. If the grid header reads SPI, the list entry reads SPI. Click it and the right pane fills with the definition.
Step 3: Read the Entry to a Decision
Each entry shows as many of these blocks as apply, and reading them in order gets you to an answer fastest.
| Block | What to take from it |
|---|---|
| Full name and description | What the number means, written for someone who has never met the term |
| Formula | How it is computed, in the notation the engine uses |
| Unit | Hours, pieces, percent, ratio, and so on, so you read the value correctly |
| Examples | A nominal, a good and a bad value, each with a one-line interpretation |
| See also | Related columns on the same report you can jump to |
| Source | Where the value is computed, for anyone who needs to trace it |
The examples are the part to lean on. Because each entry gives a good case and a bad case alongside a nominal one, you can grade your own number the moment you read it, without doing any arithmetic in your head. This is exactly how the earned value indexes get read in practice, so if VAC or SPI is the column puzzling you, how to run the earned value report shows the same definitions applied to real rows.
Step 4: Follow See-Also for the Neighbors
Some numbers only make sense next to their neighbors. SPI means little without CPI; availability means little without performance and quality. The see-also links jump you straight to the related entry, so you can read a small cluster of definitions as a set rather than one at a time. The links are validated, so they never point at a column that does not exist.
What Changes When You Look It Up
Nothing. Opening Column Details is read-only and re-queries nothing. It changes your understanding of the number, not the number itself, which is the entire point: you settle what a column means before you act on it, not after.
How to Check You Read It Right
The definition should reconcile with the value in front of you. If the entry says a negative forecast variance means over budget and your row reads minus 34, that is 34 hours of overrun, and the sign now makes sense. If the entry and the value still seem to disagree, re-read the unit block, because a ratio, a percent and an hour count are easy to conflate and the unit line settles which one you are looking at.
Common Mistakes
- Guessing an acronym from memory. Manufacturing acronyms drift between shops. The in-app definition is the one that matches the number in your grid.
- Ignoring the unit. A value of 0.9 is very different as a ratio than as a percent. The unit block tells you which.
- Reading one metric without its neighbors. Use the see-also links to read paired metrics together, the way they are meant to be read.
- Assuming a missing button means an error. It means that report is not documented yet, not that anything is wrong.
See how these self-explaining reports fit the wider product on the EDGEBIC product page.
Expert Q&A: Deep Dive
Q: A report shows a column labeled VAC h that reads minus 34 and I have no idea if that is good or bad. How do I settle it in two clicks?
A: Click Column Details, then click VAC in the left list. The right pane names it in full, gives the formula, states the unit as hours, and shows example values with one-line interpretations, and the example set is chosen to include a nominal, a good and a bad case so you can grade your own number against them immediately. For a forecast variance a negative value means over budget, so minus 34 is 34 hours of forecast overrun, and the example values confirm that reading rather than leaving you to guess the sign convention. The whole lookup takes longer to describe than to do, and it means you never quote a number in the wrong direction in front of a customer, which is the expensive version of this mistake.
Q: We keep arguing about what our metrics mean because everyone half-remembers a different definition. What is the fix?
A: Make one rule the standard: nobody quotes a number they have not looked up in Column Details at least once. The reason the arguments happen is that manufacturing acronyms travel between shops with slightly different definitions, and half-remembered ones diverge over time. The in-app definitions do not, because they sit with the code that computes the number and each carries the exact formula the engine uses plus a source line naming where it is calculated. When two people disagree, they open the same entry rather than trading recollections, and the disagreement ends. It also makes onboarding a new planner a five-minute rule instead of a training deck, because the reference is in the tool rather than in a folder nobody opens.
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