Table with variable columns

[eluser]sholnay[/eluser]
You might want to think about table normalization for this issue. The more normalized your database is - the easier it will be to associate data between multiple tables.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Database_normalization

I might not be understanding the question fully - but one approach might be to have say - an attribute column in your reports table, and a corresponding attribute table. In any given report row for attributes you would store an array of attributes the user selected - which you could create subqueries to the attribute table - or something on those lines.

Not sure if that was helpful - maybe showing a snippet of your schema or creating a 'dumbed' down version so we can get a better idea of the issue (not sure if we can be helpful if were looking at 17+ columns of info ).

Good luck!