I looked at jasper reports, but it seemed difficult to do what i needed (normal structured reports, and some very unstructured stuff)
Firstly i went down the iText route (java pdf library). Wouldnt do the same again with hindsight - not enough control over positioning/margins especially in tables (and with large fonts), so pretty painful experience. After that i moved onto fop (apache) which is much nicer. Put your data into an xml document (at run time). Write an xsl file to add formating info (normally hard coded xsl file). Then at run time you simply apply the xsl file, and use fop to turn it into html/pdf. Daniel. -----Original Message----- From: Phil Warrick [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: 28 April 2004 14:47 To: OJB Users List Subject: Re: Creating Reports Keith, You are not limited to static pre-compiled XML based reports with Jasper. There is also an API to generate reports on the fly. Look at Jasper's NoXmlDesignApp sample. Phil Keith Rogers wrote: > It did not look easy to produce the following report, > > The report details which units in a course a student has passed. The > rows are students, the columns are units (and one for the student id). > The problem here is that the unit columns are retreived from the course, > so it will not be known at runtime how many there are or what their > names are. I undestand that it is possible to programmatically adjust > the report definition, but this would then require me to use two XML > docs for each report - the JasperReport xml and another to define how > this should be modified at runtime. > > My impression (which I hope is wrong) is still that JasperReports is > mainly a report presentation tool, and that producing tabular reports > like the one above that has variable fields produced by a query at > "filling" time would be difficult to do using it. > > Keith > > >>>>[EMAIL PROTECTED] 28/04/2004 12:53:20 >>> > > Keith, > > We ve been using JasperReports with OJB por a while now. Reading your > > requirements, it seems JasperReports deservs a deep look. > Let me quote you > > >>I'd like to be able to write >>a definition of the report in XML > > > Well, this is exactly what you do with JR. Jasper will parser the > report > definition for you, will "compile" the report and will it have it ready > to > be "filled" which means "run" in JR jargon on demand. > > From JasperReports tutorial a simple report definition > (http://jasperreports.sourceforge.net/tutorial/): > > <?xml version="1.0"?> > <!DOCTYPE jasperReport > PUBLIC "-//JasperReports//DTD Report Design//EN" > "http://jasperreports.sourceforge.net/dtds/jasperreport.dtd";> > > <jasperReport name="name_of_the_report" ... > > ... > </jasperReport> > > If you like to try a visual designer for JR try ireports at > http://ireport.sourceforge.net/ > > JasperReports will work with any jdbc datasource and with OJB you will > be > able to pass him a collection of objects. > BTW, we are no related to JR in any form. > > Regards, > Gustavo. > > > > > > "Keith Rogers" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote on 28/04/2004 > 08:18:08 a.m.: > > >>Thanks to all who replied to this! >> >>All of these seem to be report presentation libraries rather than >>report generators, so I think I might try to write something more >>specific to my needs. >> >>Keith >> >> >>>>>[EMAIL PROTECTED] 26/04/2004 14:30:28 >>> >> >>A quick search of sourceforge finds: >> >>OpenReports : http://sourceforge.net/projects/oreports/ >>JasperReports : http://sourceforge.net/projects/jasperreports/ >>JFreeReport : http://sourceforge.net/projects/jfreereport/ >> >>I think all 3 of these tools use an xml based syntax. I have played > > >>around w/ then a little, but not enough to offer any advice. I don't > > >>think any integrate directly w/ OJB, but you could probably write a >>wrapper for the OJB Report Query class for use with the tools. Good >>luck. >> >>Keith Rogers wrote: >> >> >>>I've gotten around to the part of my application that needs to >> >>produce >> >>>reports on various things. Rather than hard-code reports, which >> >>would, >> >>>admittedly make my job more secure :-) , I'd like to be able to > > write > >>a >> >>>definition of the report in XML, and have some parser take this and >>>produce the report automatically on demand. >>>I realise that this is not going to be a trivial task, so my first >>>question is - Has anyone done anything similar for OJB? >>> >>>Assuming the answer is "No", I suppose I'll have to try it > > myself... > >>>Does anyone know of a similar report-from-xml-definition that I > > might > >>>draw ideas from? >>> >>>Keith >>> >>> >>> >> >>-- >> Robert r. 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