Final answer:
To get the order total by date from an Orders table with 30 columns, perform a transformation to group the data by date and sum the total amounts. This simplifies the data explicitly for the report's needs, allowing easy analysis of trends over time.
Step-by-step explanation:
If the Orders table has 30 columns, but the report only requires the order total by date, you should perform a data transformation that aggregates the data. This transformation involves selecting just the total amount and date columns, and then summing the total amount for each date, effectively reducing the dataset to only the information necessary for the report.
You could group the data by the date column, using a SUM function for the total order amounts. For instance, a SQL query that groups order totals by date could look like SELECT Date, SUM(TotalAmount) FROM Orders GROUP BY Date. This approach offers the advantage of simplifying the data and focusing on the key metrics of interest for the report, making it easier to analyze trends over time.
Index Numbers are important in situations where you are dealing with a variety of product prices and quantities. They serve to simplify the analytical process and provide cleaner data for reporting purposes. Although gathering data from a supermarket as suggested involves collecting real-world data, it's a separate process from transforming data within an existing Orders table.