Technical Reports: Introduction

A formal technical report presents to the reader an extended and formal discussion of a problem, an issue, or a subject, complete with cover pages, a table of contents, illustrations, and more.

Although they might have very different sorts of names, formal types of reports often overlap a great deal. For example, the term “analytical report” can often include the question or study the issue of feasibility.

For our purposes, there are three basic types of formal reports:

• causal analyses,
• comparative analyses or recommendation reports, and
• feasibility analyses.

While the three might have different purposes, they share one common feature: they attempt to persuade their readers. Also, in the producing of one type of formal report, you might find that you are borrowing components from the others.