# Forecasting With Inforiver, you can easily generate a rolling forecast using methods like period range, average of period range etc. to initialize the forecast. You can leverage the integrated time intelligence and time extension features as well. ## 1. Forecast settings Inforiver allows you to generate a forecast for up to 5 years, starting from the current year.

#### Configuring the Forecast Time Range In the Forecast settings dialog box, set the start and end periods. E.g. if we are creating a forecast from July 2023 onwards: 1. To generate a forecast for the rest of the year, choose July 2023 to December 2023. 2. To generate a forecast for the next quarter, choose July 2023 to September 2023. 3. To generate a forecast for the next year, set the year dropdown to 2024. 4. To generate a forecast for the next 5 years, set the year dropdown to 2028.

Click on the 'Next' button to configure the forecast. ## 2. Generating a forecast The Forecast dialog box has the following configurations: **1. Title**: By default, the forecast measure is named ‘Forecast’. This can be updated to a relevant column name. **2. Select Forecast Period**: The starting period for which a forecast is being created. By default, this is set to the current month and year. It can be set to any month in the future. **3. Closed Period:** This is a static message that indicates the date range available in the input dataset. The dataset used in this example has data from January to December 2022.

**4. Copy from:** The new forecast measure will be created for past or closed periods as well. The Copy From option allows you to select the series to be used as the data source. If Actuals is selected, then the forecast measure for 2022 will be populated from Actuals. If Plan is selected, then the forecast measure for 2022 will be populated from Plan.

Forecasts created for closed/past periods would be as shown in the image below. These are greyed out and cannot be edited. When column subtotals are enabled, the forecast for subtotals will also be greyed out for closed periods.

Static forecast for 2022 created from Actuals

**5. Period:** The time frame of the forecast. In this example, we are creating a forecast for a year - from August 2023 to August 2024.

You can also split the forecast period into multiple time frames and use different options for each period. To create a rolling forecast, you need to define the settings for the entire forecast period. To demonstrate this feature, let us consider an example wherein: * The forecast from August to September 2023 should be based on the Actuals from the previous year i.e. August to September 2022. * The forecast from October to December 2023 should be based on the average of Actuals from the previous year i.e. January to December 2022. * The forecast for the next year, 2024(January to August) should be based on the Plan from December 2022. This can be achieved using the configuration shown below.

Rolling forecast created using multiple period ranges

The forecast created is shown in the images below. * The forecast for August to September 2023 has been created from the Actuals from the previous year i.e. August to September 2022.

First period of rolling forecast with period range as copy method

* The forecast from October to December 2023 has been created from the average of Actuals from the previous year i.e. average from January to December 2022.

Second period of rolling forecast with average of period range as copy method

* The forecast for the next year, 2024(January to August) has been created from the Plan from December 2022.

Third period of rolling forecast with single period as copy method

**6. Source series:** Choose the measure which will be the data source for the forecast. To manually enter all the forecasts, select the Blank option.

**7. Copy Method:** Method used to initialize the forecast. There are 3 methods that can be used to populate the forecast: **a) Period Range:** A range of months will be used to populate the forecast. Consider creating a forecast for the next quarter i.e. October 2023 to December 2023. Any period range of 3 months can be used to initialize the forecast, in this case, we will use data from Q1, 2022 as shown in the images below.

**b) Single Period:** The data for any particular period will be used to initialize the forecast. In this case, the Plan from December 2022 is used to initialize the data for the entire forecast from August 2023 to August 2024.

**c) Average of Period Range:** The average value of a measure, over a user-defined range of time is calculated and used to initialize the forecast. In this case, the average of Actuals from October to December 2022 will be used to create the entire forecast.

Forecast created using average of period range

**8. Period Selection:** This is used to create rolling forecasts and split the forecast period into multiple time frames. ## 3. Time intelligence settings Inforiver's built-in time intelligence automatically detects date formats when the data source does not contain Power BI date formats. In the image below, notice how Inforiver identifies the formats when the quarter is denoted in numbers and months are denoted as short names.

To view the date format or to override it, in the Insert ribbon, click on 'Manage Columns'. In the 'Inserted Columns' side pane, navigate to the Settings tab -> 'Time Interval Mapping'. {% hint style="info" %} Hover over the bulb icon near Format to view the format models supported by Inforiver. {% endhint %}

## 4. Month-end date rollover Once the actual monthly data is available for a particular forecasted month, the report needs to reflect the actuals instead of the forecast. Consider the case below, wherein a forecast has been created from August to year-end.

To roll over the forecast start period from August to September, in the Insert ribbon, click on 'Manage Measures'. In the 'Inserted Columns' side pane, select the forecast measure and click on the edit icon.

In the Data Input side pane, select September from the dropdown.

Notice how the Sales and Revenue measures are now available for August and the forecast starts from September onwards.

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