In a Web Intelligence document, the following items help identify the reports and report elements:
The unique identifier of a report or report element inside a document. It is an integer.
The identifier of a report element with respect to the report it belongs to. It is a base64 string of the format "X.Y.A.[...]", where X is the report identifier, Y the report element identifier, and A the identifier of an instance of the report element. Instance identifiers are used to identify the same report element used several times in a report, for example a section in a report, or a cell in a table.
Where to Use References?
You use the reference of a report element to get:
<report> <id>1</id> <name>Chart Demo</name> <reference>1.RS</reference> <showDataChanges>false</showDataChanges> ...
In the current document, the report identifier is "1" and the string "1.RS" is the reference of the report in the document.
<elements> <element type="Cell"> <id>3</id> <reference>1.K.3</reference> ...
In addition, the report structure can be viewed as a tree, which means there is a parent/child relationship between reports and report elements. This mechanism allows to add an element in the report structure with accuracy.
<elements> <element type="Cell"> <id>14</id> <reference>1.E</reference> <name>Block 2</name> <parentId>1</parentId> ...
The report element of type "Cell" belongs to the report of which identifier is "1".