Sample Report Format
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Format is the layout and typography of a document. Typography includes the style and size of type for a document. Layout includes the margins, line spacing, paragraphing, and pagination. This web page presents templates for both short reports and long reports. These formats are based on formats created by professional artists at Sandia National Laboratories and discussed in Appendix D of The Craft of Scientific Writing.
Please understand that no universal formats exist in engineering and science. In other words, each company or journal has its own format that suits the needs and desires of that company or journal. However, when formats are not specified, these templates will give you a professional look that rises far above Microsoft Word's weak defaults and above the simplistic look that some companies choose. Having a professional format is important--after all, the format is the attire for your content. Why choose something ugly when for a bit more effort you could have a professional look? Given below is a discussion of the principles that serve as a basis for these formats. |
Format is the typography and layout of a document. Although no universal format exists in engineering and science, the formats of technical documents are specific and based on core principles. |
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Typography
Typography includes the size and style of type for a document. Type sizes are measured in points. In general, twelve point type is used for the text portion of most documents. Larger sizes may be used for headings and titles, and smaller sizes may be used for footnotes and illustration call-outs. As far as the styles of types, two main classifications exist: serif and sans serif. Which typestyle should you use? Here, much depends on the situation, but a serif font of 12 points is generally accepted for the text portion of formal documents such as reports and correspondence. An example of a serif typeface is Times. Why are serif typefaces generally used for the text? The reasons are historical as much as anything. For the headings, illustration call-outs, and online text, professionals often use sans serif typefaces such as Calibri. One reason that professionals use sans serif typefaces for headings and subheadings is that the uniform strokes of letters work well in boldface . Another aspect of typography is the use of initial capitals in titles and headings. One convention, but not the only one, for using initial capitals is that you capitalize the first letter of the first and last words--no matter what the words. Then, you capitalize the first letter of every included word except for articles, conjunctions, and prepositions that have fewer than four letters: a, an, and, as, but, for, in, nor, of, on, or, out, the, to, up, and yet. Besides type sizes, type faces, and initial capitals, there are other typography guidelines that vary from institution to institution. For instance, the following list presents one recommended way to format unusual plurals: IBMs, CDs, 1970s, and 1900s. |
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Layout
Layout includes such things as the type of paper chosen, the margins, the line spacing, the pagination, and the incorporation of equations, illustrations, and references. Table 1 presents general specifications for the page layouts. Table 1. Specifications for page layout of reports. |
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Headings. One format for headings, subheadings, and sub-subheadings follows the pattern shown in Figure 1. In this pattern, all headings, subheadings, and sub-subheadings are in initial capitals. In a short report, the major heading is the report's title. In a formal report, the major heading serves as the name of each section--for example, the "Introduction" or "Conclusion." Note that in a long report (more than 50 pages), these major headings begin a new page, while in a shorter report, these major headings follow one another in a continuous fashion.
Figure 1. Sample format for headings, subheadings, and sub-subheadings in a report.
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Incorporation of Illustrations. There are two classes of illustrations: figures and tables. Illustrations should appear below the end of the paragraph in which that illustration is first introduced. If not enough space is available below the end of the paragraph, then continue the text and place the illustration on the next page. When placing an illustration into a document, leave a space between the illustration and the text (one line skip both above and below the illustration).
Captions for figures appear below the figure. Use Arabic numerals to number figures. A figure caption includes a phrase that identifies the figure and a sentence or two that explains important details in the figure. See the example shown in the Figure 1. When referring to figures, call them by their names: Figure 1, Figure 2, Figure IS-1, Figure A-1, and so forth. Note that Figure IS-1 would appear in an informative summary and Figure A-1 would appear in an Appendix A. Unlike figures, titles for tables appear centered above the table. Number tables using Arabic numerals. Use initial capital letters for table titles. In the text, call tables by their names: Table IS-1, Table 1, Table A-1, and so forth. 
Figure 2. Eruption of Mount St. Helens [US Geological Survey, 1980].
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Incorporating illustrations into a report. Presenting in this film in Mary Duncan (B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, Virginia Tech, 2021). |
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Unlike figures, titles for tables appear above the table. For an example, see Table 2. In the text, call tables by their names: Table 1, Table 2, and so on. Note that another common table format has the title centered above the table.
Table 2. Physical characteristics of the planets [Handbook, 1969]. 
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References. When incorporating the opinions, data, and illustrations of other sources into your writing, you must give credit to those sources. For information of how to paraphrase and quote sources, see Appendix B. In these writing guidelines, the format for bestowing that credit is an author-year referencing system. Within the text of the article or report, references should be cited by giving in brackets the last name of the author(s) and the year of publication of the reference. The year should always be enclosed in brackets; whether the name of the author(s) is enclosed depends on the context. The two possibilities are illustrated as follows:
For three or more authors, just list the first author's name as follows: [Lee and others, 1972]. If there is no author listed, give the first word (not articles, conjunctions, or prepositions) of the document: [Manual, 1983] or ["Plastic", 1989]. If you have two documents with the same author and year (for example, two documents by Jones in 2003), then assign the reference listings as follows: [Jones, 2003a] for the citation that alphabetically appears first at the end, and [Jones, 2003b] for the citation that appears second at the end.
The full reference citations will appear in an alphabetical list at the end of your document. When the format for citations is not specified, you should consider selecting one that is common in your field. Otherwise, you might consider the following common format in engineering and science:
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