Apparatus and method for manipulating report segments

1 . A computer readable medium includes executable instructions to:

display a report as a set of report segments;

facilitate the expansion and collapse of individual report segments; and

coordinate drag and drop operations between individual report segments.

2 . The computer readable medium of claim 1 , wherein the executable instructions to coordinate drag and drop operations include executable instructions to expand a report segment when content is being dragged into the report segment.

3 . The computer readable medium of claim 1 wherein the set of report segments includes at least one area segment and group segments.

4 . The computer readable medium of claim 3 wherein group segments are a subset of an area segment.

5 . The computer readable medium of claim 3 wherein each area segment corresponds to a fixed structure section of a report.

6 . The computer readable medium of claim 3 wherein each group segment corresponds to data within a report.

7 . The computer readable medium of claim 3 wherein the executable instructions to coordinate drag and drop operations between individual report segments include executable instructions to drag and drop group segments.

8 . The computer readable medium of claim 1 wherein the executable instructions to facilitate the expansion and collapse of individual report segments include executable instructions responsive to the activation of a tab on a graphical user interface.

9 . The computer readable medium of claim 8 wherein the executable instructions responsive to the activation of a tab include executable instructions to expand a report segment on a first activation of the tab.

10 . The computer readable medium of claim 8 wherein the executable instructions responsive to the activation of a tab include executable instructions to collapse a report segment on a second activation of the tab.