Inter Access Belgium presentation about the possibilities regarding reporting in Oracle APEX, presented at the OBUG APEX SIG on may 24 2011, at Oracle Vilvoorde, Belgium.
4. Cluster 1 – PL/SQL PL/PDF License fee $600 Supportedformats: PDF Documents are buildusing PL/SQL Integratedwith the Oracle database A lot of custom PL/SQL code is needed to createdocuments
5. Cluster 1 – PL/SQL SQL WORD Documents are buildusing PL/SQL and ‘scriplets’ (Oracle PL/SQL Server Pages) in SQLWordDeveloper Supportedformats: RTF License fee ??? Runs on Oracle HTTP Server withmod_plsql Outdated architecture
6. SQL Word - architecture Database Oracle HTTP Server mod_plsql
7. Cluster 2 – Apache FOP Apache FOP (FormattingObjects Processor) Free Open Sourcelicense Supported formats: PDF, RTF, XML and TXT Documents are build in XML and XSL-FO Usesan XML basedstandardwhichcouldbeused in othertechnologies Runs on most application servers (Tomcat, Glassfish, etc.) XSL-FO enablessolutionsforproblemswhich are impossible to solve in othertechnologies (e.g.: Dynamic columns in a table) RTF2FO canbeused to convert a word document to XSL-FO formatwhichspeeds up initialdevelopment time A lot of custom coding is required to create and adjustdocuments Standard FOP librariesneed to bechangedsoitcanbecalledfrom Oracle APEX
9. Cluster 2 – Apache FOP Oracle BI Publisher Documents are built in Microsoft Word Supported formats: PDF, RTF, Microsoft Excel and HTML Runs on Oracle Weblogic Server Easy to use, even forend-users Easy to integratewith Oracle APEX License fee € 36.308 + € 7.987,72 maintenance per year
11. Cluster 3 – JasperReports JasperReports Free Open SourceLicense Supportedformats: PDF, HTML, Microsoft Excel, RTF, ODT, CSV and XML Documents are build in IReportusing Java and Groovy Runs onJasperServer, a webapplicationwhichcanbeinstalledonanyapplication server Relatively easy to create and adjustdocumentsusingIReport Easy to integratewith Oracle APEX Advanced features (eg. dynamic columns) notsupported Knowledge of Java & Groovymightbecomenecessary
15. Conclusion Oracle solution => Oracle BI Publisher 11g Easy to use Lots of output formats Uses the Oracle Weblogic platform Comes with OBI Goodintegrationwith APEX License fee
16. Conclusion Open sourcealternative => JasperReports Suitablealternativefor most reports Open source and free to use JasperReports server Goodintegrationwith APEX Good report designer Notfor end users Additionalknowledge of Java mightbecomenecessary