Divide any 12 months into group of 3 months

Question

Hi,
I have a report where in my report fetches previous 12 months data. Previous means previous from current month. So if report is run in Feb-2014 it fetches data from Feb-2013 to Jan-2014.
Now, I need to divide this span of Months into group of 3 months. Like:
02/2013 - 04/2013
05/2013 - 07/2013
08/2013 - 10/2013
11/2013-  01/2014
How can it be achieved.. Any inputs please..
I am working on CR for Enterprise 4
Thanks..

Answer 1

If the source wasn't a Universe, here's what you would do:
1) Find out of the Minimum Date from the  records returned by the query. To do this, go to the Database Options on the Top > Show SQL Query > Copy. Let's assume the copied sql looks like this:
Select table.date, table.field1, table.field2 from Table where <condition>
2) Go to the Database Expert > Under the Connection Name, click Add Command > Paste the copied SQL and modify that to:
Select Min(table.date) as Minimum from Table where <condition>
2) Go to the Database Expert and make sure these two tables are Not Joined on any field
3) Create a formula with this code:
If Month({Date}) IN
[Month({Command.Minimum}),Month(DateAdd('m',1,{Command.Minimum})),
Month(DateAdd('m',2,{Command.Minimum}))] then 1
else If Month({Date}) IN [Month(DateAdd('m',3,{Command.Minimum})),Month(DateAdd('m',4,{Command.Minimum})),
Month(DateAdd('m',5,{Command.Minimum}))] then 2
else If Month({Date}) IN
[Month(DateAdd('m',6,{Command.Minimum})),Month(DateAdd('m',7,{Command.Minimum})),
Month(DateAdd('m',8,{Command.Minimum}))] then 3
else If Month({Date})
IN
[Month(DateAdd('m',9,{Command.Minimum})),Month(DateAdd('m',10,{Command.Minimum})),
Month(DateAdd('m',11,{Command.Minimum}))] then 4
Replace {Date} with the Date field from the existing table and {Command.Minimum} with the field from the Command Object that we added
4) Go to the Group Expert > Add this formula to the Group list.
That's it!
If you have access to the Universe, you can create a Dimension Object that gets Minimum Date from the query. You can then create another Dimension object using Case Statements that uses the 'Minimum' object to number each row as 1,2,3 or 4. You can then simply group on this new object inside the report.
Hope this helps.
-Abhilash