Report Studio (All versions) - Using the Solve Order feature

When performing calculations in a cross-tab, sometimes report studio will not calculate correctly
when an intersection in a cross-tab contains a value that is derived from multiple calculations.

A classic example of this is an aggregation of Gross Margin %, which is calculated as Gross

Margin/Revenue. The aggregation of this calculation in a cross-tab simply adds each of the
individual Gross Margin %s for each row to get a total Gross Margin %. Clearly this is the
incorrect result.

We want report studio to calculate the GM% after totalling the Revenue and GM columns.
Defining the Solve Order on the Cross Tab Node Member allows us to calculate the GM%
correctly. The Solve Order is defined via the properties pane after selecting the Cross Tab Node
Member (see below)

By default, the Solve Order is set to NULL for both column and row items. In the case of
NULL, or when both have the same value, the column items are calculated first, and row items
second. This is the current behaviour of our report and the current settings are returning the
wrong value for total GM%.

The data item with the highest solver order is calculated last. Therefore, in order to get
GM% to calculate correctly, we need to edit the solve order for the GM% Cross Tab Node
Member (Column) to be higher than the Total Cross Tab Node Member (Row). In this case,
we change the GM% solve order to 1, and leave the Total as NULL

This will provide the desired result when running the report