[SLUG] outputting .pdf format from servlets, and authentication of users in apache

[Matthew Taylor]

I've been mucking around wiht this for some time and hitting head on brick wall at moment. I have developed a system that produces various reports thru a html interface. Printing html isn't really that great since control of the output to produce page breaks etc isnt there I can produce .xls type format using http headers and that provides users access to the print formatting tools on their side. Has anyone used a report writer tool in a web development environment? I've heard of crystal reports but not having used it I'm a bit dubious of it being the answer to everything. the other query I have relates to authenticating users in apache. I have servlets that use session parameters to track a user after login. also have static files that i can controll access to using htpasswd.  Is there a way of combining the two? someone mentioned 'realms' could do this sort of thing. anyone with experience in this??