Apps To Fusion

XML Publisher (release 10.1.3 now BI Publisher) uses templates (data and layout both) to define a BI publisher report.
The good news is that existing custom RDF (oracle designer) reports can be converted into BI reports easily using utilities available online.
Below are the various steps listed for a custom report:

1. From the web address: http://bipublisher.blogspot.com/, download and install the BIP conversion utility (link on the top right of the page) by clicking on the link under ‘Code’. After downloading, click on the Video link next to the code link to understand how to use this utility. To include the BLOB image, which is stored as LONG RAW in the database, make sure it’s location is selected in the report data group.


2. At the end of the conversion process you will have file like: .xml file and the .pls files for the triggers and such that you have in your report. This utility also converts the format/layout to a RDF/word format, which you may use as such or not. I needed a different format than the report layout, so I did not use it.
Listing of the files that will be created. You will need to execute the .pls and .plb files in the database.



3. Now you are going to register the data template and the layout file generated above, in the application. Give yourself the XML Publisher Administrator and system administrator responsibilities.


4. From the system administrator responsibility, query the concurrent program that you used to run the report earlier. Navigation:

Change the format to XML:

Remember the short name of the concurrent program since you will be needing it later. Save the changes.


5. Log into the XML Publisher Administrator responsibility. And click on Data Definitions. Click on the Create Data Definition button. Give it a name and the Code should be the same name as the concurrent program short name. Enter the rest of the values and click on apply. On the confirmation page, click on the Add file button next to the Data template button at the bottom of the page:
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Choose the data template file that was created in step2 above: xxxHREMPPRFTM_template.xml, and click on apply. At this point the data template is created. Remember the name and code for this data template as it will be needed later. You can modify this data template anytime and the file associated with it, but the code you cannot. At this point the data template is associated with the concurrent program.


6. Click on the Templates tab at the top of the page or from the home page, choose the Templates function. Click on Create a Template button. Enter the Name and Code, the data denfinition is name of the data definition that you created above in step5, under Type choose RTF. Under the template file, enter the layout template file that was created above (xxxHREMPPRFTM.rtf) or the one that you created. Review and click on apply to save the changes. At this point, template is connected to the data definition and hence to the concurrent program.


7. If you are using the layout template: xxxHREMPPRFTM.rtf, (if not see step8) then from the responsibility that the concurrent program was run from, run the concurrent program, enter any parameters, if any, as needed, click on options and you will see something similar to this:

This is the template that you had created in step6. You can associate more than one layout template with a data definition. Change the format to RDF and run the report. Click on output to see the RTF/word document.


8. If you are not using the template created by the conversion utility, then download the oracle BI publisher desktop utility from metalink/oracle web site. This will enable you to create a layout template from your MS word application.


9. Query up the template that you created in step5 above and enter an end date to it that is after the start date and is before system date. At this point you are disabling the template from the concurrent progam. The reason for this is: if you are going to use a custom layout for your report, you will need a data xml file that has you will use to create the fields in word.


10. Run the concurrent program and click on output, you will get an XML file that you have to save to your local drive:



11. Open up a new word document, you should see the Oracle BI Publisher menu option at the top:



12. Select the BI Publisher menu and choose data->load sample xml data and choose the XML file created in step10. The file should load successfully, if not then the XML tags are not created properly or there is some other issue with the file.  Choose insert field and give it a name, under Add Help text button enter text as shown below. Here we are creating a repeating group. Similarly create others groups/data fields. When done click on preview to make sure that the file works fine. Fix any issues. Associate this file with the template definition created in step6 and remove the end date from the template definition.

 

Steps for displaying dynamic BLOB Images:

 

Make sure that the images that you want to display, are stored in a dir in operating system. For UNIX, put them under $OA_MEDIA dir or any dir under that. Make sure that the original RDF report has this element queried from the database so that each image is connected to the right record in the database. See image url xml tag in step10 above. Once you have upload the data xml file as in step12 above, create a placeholder for your image/blob file by choosing Insert menu option in word and then choose Picture->From File and choose a dummy file. Insert a picture and size it as you want. Once you are done, double click on the image and under the web tab do this:

 

IMAGE_URL is the XML tag name in the data xml file. The image_url has to be a web address location that the server can access. It cannot be your c:\ or something like that. That won’t work.

This is the only way that I could get the BLOB to appear in my BI report. There are more details on this step in the XDOUSerGuide.pdf document that you downloaded with the BI Publisher desktop utility. Search for image/blob in the PDF.

 

Good Reference: http://oracle.anilpassi.com/xml-publisher-concurrent-program-xmlp.html

 

Metalink docid: 551013.1

http://apps2fusion.com/at/51-ps/262-xml-publisher-and-data-template-sql-query-to-develop-bi-publisher-reports

 

There is also Tim Dexter’s blog as well: http://blogs.oracle.com/xmlpublisher/