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Integrating BIRT Reporting into Applications Virgil Dodson Evangelist Actuate – BIRT Exchange

Overall Presentation Goal Understand some of the reporting requirements you may encounter as you integrate BIRT Reports into Java Applications

Speaker’s qualifications Virgil Dodson is a Developer Evangelist at Actuate Corporation …and Forum Moderator, Blogger at BIRT Exchange community site …and has presented BIRT technology at many conferences including Dr.Dobbs, EclipseCon, EclipseWorld, JAX, JFS, Rational, WJAX, MySQL, User Groups

Agenda BIRT Project Overview BIRT Report Integration Options BIRT Designer BIRT Runtime BIRT Report Integration Options Reporting Requirements to Consider Actuate BIRT Product Line Resources for Integrating BIRT into Applications

Open Source Reporting: Eclipse BIRT Business Intelligence and Reporting Tools Open source initiative as part of the Eclipse Foundation Founded, organized and led by Actuate Corporation Project launched in October, 2004 Project Goals Next generation reporting technology Eclipse-based Report Designer Web-centric design metaphor Open Source with rapid adoption Standards based & highly extensible Open XML design format Build community and ecosystem Over 5 Million Downloads Downloads (1,000s)

BIRT Project Users Audience Features Easy Complex Report Developers Drag & Drop authoring, charting Advanced Report Developers Scripting, Script API Runtime Integration Developers BIRT Viewer and Engine APIs Report Design Integration Design Engine API Extension Developers BIRT Extension Points Core Development Eclipse Development, Open Source 7

High Level BIRT Architecture Report Designer Report Engine Eclipse Report Designer Eclipse DTP, WTP,… Chart Designer Custom Designer Data Transform. Services Charting Engine HTML PDF Excel Word PowerPoint PostScript … Generation Services Presentation Services Report Design Engine Data XML Report Design Report Document Data

BIRT Report Designer What is the BIRT Report Designer? Eclipse plug-in or standalone designer (RCP) What is the BIRT Report Designer? Open source based and highly extensible Modern, web-page design metaphor Easy to use and powerful Library and template components Scripting in Java and JavaScript Leverages the powerful Eclipse IDE

Report Gallery Product Catalog Employee Directory

Report Gallery Crosstab/Matrix Report Form Letter

Report Gallery Sales Invoice Sales Dashboard

Chart Gallery

Chart Gallery

Chart Gallery

BIRT/Google Maps Mashup at EclipseCon

DEMO Quick Look at the BIRT Designer

BIRT Runtime

BIRT Report Engine The BIRT Report Engine allows you to write Java code to read in report designs, apply any parameters etc, and output a report. Used in standalone Java applications RCP applications Batch applications Used in web applications Sample code at BIRT Exchange

Report Engine API Overview REAPI supports the following operations: Discover report parameters Get default parameter values Generate report documents. (rptdocument) Generate report output (PDF, HTML, paginated HTML, DOC, XLS, PPT, Postscript) Fetch images and charts for a report Export report data as CSV Retrieve Table Of Contents, Bookmarks Standalone,servlet, RCP

Engine Task Processes 3 tasks related to report execution and rendering RunTask RenderTask RunAndRenderTask Using RunTask and then RenderTask means multiple processes to generate and view a report. RunAndRenderTask happens in single process so event firing order is different Report Engine can be used in different ways

Engine Task Processes (cont.) Engine Tasks used with the Example Web Viewer ‘frameset’ mapping uses RunTask and RenderTask… export from Viewer uses RenderTask ‘run’, ‘preview’ mapping uses RunAndRender Task Engine Tasks used with the BIRT Designer Web Viewer Preview uses RunTask and then RenderTask Preview tab, plus rest of Preview icons use RunAndRenderTask

BIRT Pipeline with respect to the APIs Report Designer Chart Builder Report Engine Optional Java Events Design Engine Chart Engine Paginated HTML PDF CSV WORD XLS PostScript PPT JavaScript Events RptDesign XML Design File Generation Phase Presentation Phase Report Engine RptDocument Report Document optional

DEMO Quick Look at REAPI example

BIRT WebViewerExample The BIRT Web Viewer is an open source example implementation of a web application for running and viewing BIRT reports and uses the Report Engine API To view the report in the viewer complete with toolbar, navigation bar and table of contents features, use: http://localhost:8180/birt23/frameset?__report=sales.rptdesign To view the report without the toolbar, navigation bar and table of contents features, use: http://localhost:8180/birt23/run?__report=sales.rptdesign Other included Servlets are preview, document, output, extract Deploy as WAR file, talk about toolbar features

BIRT WebViewerExample (cont.) To go directly to an output format like PDF, use: http://localhost:8180/birt23/run?__report=sales.rptdesign&format=pdf To get only a chart or table displayed as a reportlet, use: http://localhost:8180/birt23/run?__report=sales2.rptdesign&__bookm ark=birtchart&__isreportlet=true Deploy as WAR file

with toolbar without toolbar

as reportlet as PDF

Evolution of an Application “Just give me a list of customer sales and the best performing city and state.” 1

Evolution of an Application “We also need to dynamically link the customers’ to another report” 2 1

Evolution of an Application “We’d like to slice this by sales rep, too, grouped alphabetically.” 3 2 1

Evolution of an Application 3 4 2 1 “Actually, we’d like to be able to produce a completely separate report for each rep.”

Evolution of an Application 3 4 2 1 “Maybe they should be able to change their view by themselves.” 5

Evolution of an Application “We have quite a few users using this system now and there’s some fairly sensitive data in there...” 3 4 2 1 6 5

Evolution of an Application “We need to schedule these reports to run every other week.” 7 3 4 2 1 6 5

Evolution of an Application 8 “We need to track which users have used the system.” 7 3 4 2 1 6 5

Evolution of an Application 8 7 3 9 4 “They need to set up their own reports with new data.” 2 1 6 5

Evolution of an Application 8 “We need a single version of the truth” “We need these dashboards linked to our business process” “We don’t want to be re-typing information from these dashboards into our other applications…can we export?” “We need to easily find stuff within the dashboard” “We need the output as Excel” 7 “We need to be able to approve or reject the changes” 3 “We need to be able to see the underlying detail” 9 “We don’t want to be waiting around for the results” 4 “We need to analyze the information in Excel” “We need Flash charts” 2 1 “We need a simple way to see the entire contents of the detail report” 6 “We need to know who’s looked at the information” “We need these dashboards in multiple languages” “We need a view that looks like an existing flow chart” “We need to print the dashboard out to take into meetings” 5

Report Integration and Deployment User Requirements Report browsing and management Easily add additional reports Folder based storage and management of reports Search and filtering lists of reports Report versioning and automated deletion Report descriptions and “headlines” Report generation and scheduling On-demand, “run now and I’ll wait” report generation On-demand, “run now in background” report generation Scheduled report generation (one-time, recurring…) Event-based scheduled report generation Sequenced (daisy-chained) scheduled report generation Easy to use parameter collection Report sharing, distribution and notification Automatic notification when report is completed Attached report to email notification Share reports in any folder with other users Notification subscriptions (channels)

Report Integration and Deployment Integration Requirements Report browsing, generation and scheduling User interface integrated into application experience Reports and integration are branded with application Parameter collection and management Security Secure reports individually or in folders User and role-based security support Integration with application single-signon Integration with application security model Scalability and high availability Scalable for large reports (many pages) Scalable for large numbers of reports Scalable for large numbers of users Clustering support High availability and failover

Actuate BIRT Product Line Actuate BIRT Designer Desktop tools for professional IT developers and power users Open Source BIRT plus Flash charts and gadgets, one-click installer and data adapters Actuate Java Components Components that provide end user interactivity, ad-hoc BIRT reporting, report browsing, etc. iServer Express Ready-to-go deployment servers for BIRT Reports Scheduling, security, email notifications, report management, …

Actuate BIRT Designer

Actuate Java Components A Web Application (WAR file) that contains: Actuate BIRT Viewer – enables end users to view BIRT reports (**included with Actuate BIRT Designer License) Interactive Viewer – enables end users to view BIRT reports, as well as analyze and personalize a BIRT report to meet their own needs BIRT Report Studio – empower business users to use a browser to design ad-hoc reports and view BIRT reports Actuate BIRT Deployment Kit – enables end users to view BIRT reports and provides file/folder browsing, configurable caching

Actuate BIRT Viewer Runtime support for BIRT reports with Flash content, Report documents as data sources Repository authorization integration, Authentication (IPSE based) integration, Client side scripting Progressive Viewing, Temp file/transient store management

Actuate Interactive Viewer Simple and advanced filters Modify labels Toolbar Table of contents Page navigation Printing Export data Save Grouping Sorting JSAPI integration Custom calculations Show/hide columns Hide/show elements Formatting text and currencies Conditional formatting

Actuate BIRT Report Studio Easy to use… end-users do not know SQL… iterative development Toolbar Cut/Copy/Paste Delete Undo/Redo Chart Table Insert Group Filter Prompt Format Run Print Export User-selected Information Object Drag- and-drop palette Data styles Template objects Grouping and sorting Format text and currencies Calculated column

Actuate iServer Express Deploy, Manage, Schedule, Run and Share BIRT Reports Quickly and Easily Web-based user interface to run, view and share reports On-demand, time and event based scheduling Automated email distribution of reports User interface to collect report parameters Secure reports with User and Role security Report management, versioning and control Variety of application integration options Web Services Interface

Report and Chart Examples View Windows  Show View  Other… Report and Chart Design  Report Examples

New and Updated Publications Second Edition Revised and Updated Second Edition Revised and Updated New Book

http://www.eclipse.org/birt

BIRT Exchange Community Site Centralized Knowledge Hub for BIRT Developers Access Downloads, Demos, Tutorials, Tips & Techniques, Webinars Easy for users to contribute content, share knowledge Enables developers to be more productive and build applications faster www.birt-exchange.com Download Documentation Software Share Knowledge Reports, Code, Tips Forums Find Search, Sort Rate, Comment

BIRT Exchange DevShare Data Integration BIRT Scripted Data Source Example BIRT Connection Pooling Web Services Data Application Integration Java Event Handler Placing Java Classes Run BIRT Reports at Command Line Batch Files to Schedule BIRT Reports Please contribute examples you think will be helpful for others

BIRT Exchange DevShare (cont.) Report Engine API Using the BIRT Report Engine API Calling the BIRT REAPI Execute BIRT Reports from Java class API – Examples Web Viewer Exploring BIRT Deployment Options Deploying BIRT WebViewerExample in Tomcat Birt Viewer 2.3 User Reference BIRT URL Security Custom Parameter page Please contribute examples you think will be helpful for others

BIRT Exchange DevShare (cont.) Additional Integration Examples JBoss BIRT Portlet Integrating BIRT with Hibernate and Struts BIRT 2.2.2 and Stripes 1.5 Using BIRT with JBoss Seam Integrating BIRT with Spring Deploying BIRT RCP App through Java Web Start Deploy BIRT on GlassFish Please contribute examples you think will be helpful for others

BIRT Exchange DevShare (cont.) Actuate Viewer JSAPI Customizing Security in Deployment Kit iServer Express iServer Express Integration Technology download Java client for the IDAPI Implementing iServer Express security with Java Report Server Secruity Extension Please contribute examples you think will be helpful for others

Q&A

Thanks for your attention! Virgil Dodson vdodson@birt-exchange.com