How to enable SharePoint 2010 Web Analytics "Custom Report"

After we evaluated and put the design together to enable SharePoint 2010 web analytics reports in November 2010 as described in previous blog, we have seen many power users try to use the reports. However, we have identified several issues that is preventing end users to get meaningful reports.

The first mystery to us is SharePoint 2010 provides a "Custom Report" users could schedule to generate the customized reports based on users criteria.  However some site collection reports such as "Top Pages" is missing "Custom Report" button on the ribbon. We have identified this is only happening on some sites for some environments not all sites. You could refer the two pictures with and without "Custom Report" button. listed in previous bog.

While debugging this inconsistent issue across different environments and different sites, we have finally identified the issue. Here is the summary of root cause, procedure to verify, and command to to fix it.

1. Root cause: The root cause is there is hidden site feature named WACustomReports needs to be enabled in order for users to see "Custom Report" button. You could check this from 14 hive directory
C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\14\TEMPLATE\FEATURES\WACustomReports.

<Feature  Id="AF6D9AEC-7C38-4dda-997F-CC1DDBB87C92"
          Title="$Resources:wacore,WACustomReportsFeatureTitle"
          Description="$Resources:wacore,WACustomReportsFeatureDesc"
          Version="14.0.0.0"
          Hidden="TRUE"
          Scope="Site"
          SolutionId="7ED6CD55-B479-4EB7-A529-E99A24C10BD3"
          ReceiverAssembly="Microsoft.Office.Server.WebAnalytics.UI, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c"
          ReceiverClass="Microsoft.Office.Server.WebAnalytics.CustomReportsFeature"
          xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/sharepoint/">
</Feature>

 2. Procedure to check. You could use the following powershell commend to verify whether you have this feature enabled on site collection.


Get-SPFeature -Site http://sitecollectionurl

If you have the feature enabled, you will see the following entry.
DisplayName                                               Id                                              Scope
-----------                                                   --                                               -----
WACustomReports                af6d9aec-7c38-4dda-997f-cc1ddbb87c92     Site


3. Commend to fix this if not already activated. Here is the commend to enable this feature so users could have the "Custom Report" button.


Enable-SPFEATURE WACustomReports –URL http://sitecollectionURL


Now you should have the "Custom Report" you could enjoy to use. We were working with Microsoft how we could enable this for all sites automatically. There is a thread on this already from MSDN.

I looked at issue again this week  April 26 2011, I realized that this feature is automatically enabled for sites created from OoB site definition. However, if you have your own site definition or template, you need to add this feature to the feature stapling to enable it after site created.