bi-publisher a reporting tool

1. Veda

2. Presentation Path
Introduction to BI publisher.
BI Publisher Reporting Architecture.
Installation and configuration of BI Publisher.
Why BI Publisher.
Process flow.
 Migration of Oracle reports to BI Publisher.
BI Publisher Features.
BI Publisher Benefits.
For your Exploration.
 Q & A.

3. Session Objectives
 Overview of XML/BI Publisher
 How to use XML/BI Publisher to create reports.
 Understand how Templates and Data Definitions
are used to declaratively build reports.
 Generate multiple report output formats which
includes RTF and PDF.
 Highlighting the Significances of BI Publisher
over other reporting tools

4. Introduction to BI publisher
Oracle BI Publisher provides a new approach to report design and publishing by
integrating familiar desktop word processing tools with existing E-Business Suite
data reporting.
 It is a template-based publishing solution delivered with the Oracle E-Business
Suite.
The flexibility of BI Publisher is a result of the separation of the presentation of the
report from its data structure.
The collection of the data is still handled by the E-Business Suite, but you can
design and control how the report outputs will be presented in separate template
files.
At runtime, BI Publisher merges your designed template files with the report data
to create a variety of outputs to meet a variety of business needs
 Current version of BI Publisher is 5.10.199

5. Data Sources
Warehouse
Data
Marts/Cubes
Reporting
E
T
L
/
D
a
t
a
F
l
o
w
10%
20%
30%
40%
Impact per module for a
Solution Architecture
Change
Data
Sources
Warehouse
Data
Mart/Cubes
Reporting
Typical BI Solution Architecture

6. Primary Components
•Metadata Backbone
The metadata backbone would contain the complete information regarding how the
application is structured. It will contain the details for the reports such as the
number, name and type of fields in a report. What is the mapping between them
and fields in the warehouse etc.
•Dynamic Extract , Transform and Load (ETL) framework
The ETL framework uses the metadata base to get complete data flow information
such as which tables to pull. Which are the columns and what are their data types?
Is there a sequence to pull the data? What is the frequency of the execution etc.
•Dynamic Reporting framework
The reporting framework uses the metadata base to obtain all information
regarding its reports. All these information is then absorbed by the reporting
framework to be displayed on the on screen reports. This can be implemented
using SQL Server Reporting Services and Report Builder where the framework can
dynamically create RDLs.
•Extensible relational database structures
The database structures which are stored in the database should be extensible.
The ER should be strongly structured. It should facilitate the addition of new
database objects and schema. Such as instead of having direct key relationships
between tables, have a single repository of relationships in the metadata base.
BI Architecture Components

7. BI Architecture Benefits
•Easy and quick absorption of changes to solution
•Automation of change management of the solution
•Enabling business users to realize real-time reporting enhancements
Installation and Configuration of BI
Publisher
• BI server is installed using the oracle installer
• BI client can be install in three versions
o Desktop version called the Template Builder. This is the add-in to
Word (2000,2003 & 2007) or Adobe (4.0,5.0 & 6.0) that allows you to build the
templates.
o Enterprise version of the desktop BI Publisher from OTN (current
version is 10.1.3.4)
o E-Business Suite embedded version as long as you don’t need to use
pivot tables.

8. Why BI Publisher

12. BI Publisher Process Flow

13. BI Publisher Components
Main Components are
Data Definition : It is source of the data that will be merged with your template
layout to create your published report.
Template : It is used to define template layout file , you must assign it a data
definition that already exists in the Template Manager. This associates the two at
runtime. Multiple templates can use the same data definition.
Administration : Used to customize the behavior of XML Publisher by setting
properties in the Administration interface. The Administration interface allows you
to:
• Set configuration properties.
Create a temporary directory by setting a value for the Temporary
directory property.
• Define font mappings.
• Upload font files.
• Define currency formats.

14. Design and Register Concurrent Program For Generating
XML report
• Navigate as Application Object Library >Concurrent->Program->Define
• Set Output Format to XML and save
• Run the report.
• Click on output and save the XML output to a file

15. Generate .XML Output file

17. Formatting Tags And Their Usage
 for-each loop
Define groups to notify XML Publisher to loop through repeating information
•Insert the following tag before the first element
<?for-each:XML group element tag name?>
•Insert the following tag after the last element
<?end for-each?>
•E.g. The XML group element
 Data fields
 Placeholders map the template field to the XML data field
 Syntax -< ?XML element tag name?>
 Page header/footer
• Enclose the body area of the report within the following tags
<?start:body?>
<?end body?>
 Page numbering
• Use Microsoft Word page numbering
 Sorting
•Insert sort tag within the group
•<?sort:element name?>, for example to sort by transaction number
–Enter the following after the <?for-each:G_INVOICE?>
<?sort:trx_number?>
•No end tag
•Sort on multiple elements possible, use multiple sort tags
–Example: <?sort:trx_number?><?sort:trx_date?>
 Page breaks
Just before the <?end for-each?> tag either…
–Insert a Microsoft Page Break
•<Ctrl> + <Enter>
•<?split-by-page-break:?>

18.  Calculated fields
•Use field names and operand(s)
•Example <?field1 + field2?>
 Extended functions
•Some SQL functions can be used in template eg : RPAD, LPAD, REPLACE etc
•Usage is <?xdofx:function_name(params)?>
 Conditional logic
Support for IF and CASE statements
•IF–<?if:boolean_test?>
<?end if?>
•CASE
<?choose?>
<?when:boolean_test?>
<?end when?>
<?otherwise?>
<?end otherwise?>
<?end choose?>
 Images/logos
•Use a table for complete control of image behavior
•Static Images
•Paste the image directly into layout template
•URL
•Dummy image on template
•Specify URL in alternative text section
•Double click on image, go to web tab, alternative text field
•url:{‘www.myspace.com/xml_example/myimage.gif’}
 Dynamic data columns
•Dynamic data columns
•Dynamic Column Header :<?split-column-header:group element name?>
•Dynamic Column Data :<?split-column-data:group element name?>

19. Template Design In RTF
Using BI plug-in XML tags Ms- Word to design the Template
Navigate to DataLoad XML data. Using .xml file generate using the
concurrent program you registered.

20. Navigate to InsertField / Table /Form to map the data

21. UST Global Services
Design the Layout

22. Register Data Definition

23. Register Template

24. Submitting XML /BI publisher report.
Navigate to the responsibility in which you have attached the report.
Submit the report : Invoice Register to XML

25. You have two options when creating the form fields in Adobe:
1. Create the fields with your own “friendly” names. If you choose this option, you
must map them to the XML elements in your concurrent request’s XML file.
2. Create fields with the same names as the XML elements in your concurrent
request’s output XML file. For this option mapping is not required.
For those PDF templates that do not contain fields, you must use the full Adobe
Acrobat product to add the fields.
Registering a template in the Template Manager
You can upload multiple templates for different language/territory combinations.
For PDF templates, the Template Manager provides the option to enable mapping
of the template fields to the data. The mapping page presents you with a list of the
template field names and a drop down list of the data source field names from
which to choose the appropriate element from the XML file
Design Template In PDF

26. PDF Documents
• Custom-ready PDF documents such as financial statements, marketing
materials, contracts, invoices, and purchase orders utilizing colors, images, font
styles, headers and footers, and many other formatting and design options.
• Filled-out" third-party provided PDF documents. You can download a PDF
document, such as a government form, to use as a template for your report. At
runtime, the data and template produce a "filled-out" form
• PDF template is appropriate for forms that will have a fixed layout, such as
invoices or purchase orders

27. Adobe Form Fields Embedded In The Document
 XML Publisher provides a mapping facility to map these fields to the
XML elements in your concurrent request data.
 When you register a PDF template in the Template Manager you are
given the option to Enable Mapping for the template.
For those PDF templates that do not contain fields, you must use the full
Adobe Acrobat product to add the fields

28. Registering a template in the Template Manager

29. Migrating Oracle reports to BI Publisher

30. Pre-requisites
1. During the conversion process, the source reports must eventually be in Oracle
reports xml format.Oracle reports xml format is supported in oracle reports9i and
above.
If your source reports are not in Oracle Reports XML format the conversion utility
will do this conversion automatically. However , this requires Oracle reports
designer 9i or later on the same machine where you will do the conversion so that
the oracle BI Publisher conversion utility can call the rwconverter executable to get
the reports into Oracle Reports XML format
If you are an EBS11i customer your oracle reports will be version 6i these need to
be converted to at least the 9i version. So you will need to install 9i or above
somewhere on your system that is accessible

31. 2. Conversion libraries added to the classpath
- collections zip
- xml parserv2-904.jar
-xdocore.jar
-aolj.jar
These can all be found on your BI server install under
&j2ee_home/applications/xmlpserver/xmlpserver/WEB_INF/lib
3 . JDK version
The documentation states that you need at at least JDB 1.1.8 . Use the version you
have installed with your J2EE container.

32. Convert The Oracle Report To XML Report By Using
Utility In Oracle Reports 9i

33. Using Conversion.bat File To Generate Objects

34. Now we have either our rdf file or the converted xml file. We can run the converter. The
converter can process multiple report files, it just needs to be pointed to a directory that
contains the reports and it will process all of them in a batch. Looking at the batch file above
Line1 : Calls the java executable this should be the java.exe in the jdk used for the the j2ee
container in which you are running the bip server
Line2 : This sets the Classpath parameter to the libraries mentioned in the pre-requisities.
Here I have relative paths because i copied the libraries into a lib directory under the directory
where the rdf file is located
Line3 : Is the call to the provided conversion class
Line4: This defines the source directory for the rdf or rdf xml files
Line 5 : This defines the output directory for the generated BIP files. Each processed report
will have its own directory
Line 6: This specifies the directory location of the oracle reports home. this is not requiredif
you have already converted the rdf files to the rdf xml it finishes with a debug flag.

35. Executing The Conversion.bat File

36. UST Global Services
Files Generated After Conversion

37. .RTF File Generated After Conversion.

38. Modifying Using BI Plug-in Ms-Word Features And
XSL-FO Language

39. UST Global Services
Using Enterprise Version Can Define The Data
Template

40. UST Global Services
Using Enterprise Version Define The Template

41. Generate The Output

42. BI Publisher Features
•The majority of all BI Publisher templates are RTF templates.
•Very popular because end users can change the format in Microsoft Word.
•An Microsoft-Word Add-On - the Template Builder for Word is available in
the BI Publisher Desktop application.
•PDF forms can be modified to map XML data fields to PDF form fields.
•Government forms are often provided as PDF forms and can be easily filled
out with BI Publisher.
•Adobe Flash templates can be used to format data in an interactive
attractive way.
• BI Publisher converts RTF documents into XSL-FO style sheets and
allows to insert XSL-FO commends into RTF templates. Hence there is
less need to code the complete stylesheet manually.
•Third party XSL-FO editor can be used to create XSL-FO style sheets for BI
Publisher

43. BI Publisher Benefits
• Create ONE template for any of 185 languages and 244 territories
• Single Global Instance – Translated User Interface
• BI Publisher ships with full set of Unicode Fonts
• No need for expensive language-specific printers
• BI Publisher is alone in supporting Chinese, Japanese, Korean
• Bidirectional Languages
• Unicode
• Multiple Language Support.
For your Exploration
• XML Technologies such as XML, XSD, XSL, XPATH.
• Multi-Language/Translation Support Architecture.
• BI Publisher Java Developer.