OpenReports: Users Guide
OpenReports: Users Guide
Author: Erik Swenson
Company: Open Source Software Solutions
Revision: Revision: 1.3
Last Modified: Date: 05/24/2004
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OpenReports: Users Guide
Table Of Contents
1. Introduction.......................................................................................................................... 3
2. Installation ........................................................................................................................... 4
3. Getting Started .................................................................................................................... 6
3.1. DataSources ................................................................................................................. 7
3.2. Reports ......................................................................................................................... 8
3.3. Report Parameters........................................................................................................ 9
3.4. Groups and Users....................................................................................................... 11
4. Charts ............................................................................................................................... 12
4.1. Chart Definitions ......................................................................................................... 13
4.2. Report Definitions ....................................................................................................... 15
5. Scheduled Reports ............................................................................................................ 16
5.1. Configuration............................................................................................................... 17
5.2. Scheduling .................................................................................................................. 18
6. FAQ ................................................................................................................................... 19
7. Change History ................................................................................................................. 21
7.1. Version 0.71................................................................................................................ 22
7.2. Version 0.7.................................................................................................................. 23
7.3. Version 0.6.................................................................................................................. 24
7.4. Version 0.5.1............................................................................................................... 25
7.5. Version 0.5.................................................................................................................. 26
8. Upgrading ......................................................................................................................... 27
8.1. Version 0.7.................................................................................................................. 28
8.2. Version 0.6.................................................................................................................. 29
8.3. Version 0.5.1............................................................................................................... 30
9. Open Source Software Solutions ...................................................................................... 31
10. License ............................................................................................................................ 32
11. Credits ............................................................................................................................. 33
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OpenReports: Users Guide
1. Introduction
OpenReports is a web based reporting application that allow users to generate dynamic
reports in a browser and view them as PDF, HTML, XLS, or CSV files. The goal of
OpenReports is to provide a web based reporting solution built upon open source
technologies that will compete against complex and expensive reporting tools such as
Crystal Reports and Cognos.
OpenReports uses JasperReports, an excellent full featured open source reporting engine,
and was developed using leading open source components including WebWork, Velocity,
and Hibernate.
Features include
•
The ability to create groups of reports, and grant users access to reports by group.
•
The ability to generate reports as PDF, XLS, HTML, and CSV files.
•
The ability to generate bar, pie and xy charts for inclusion in reports.
•
The ability to schedule and email PDF, XLS, and CSV reports.
•
The ability to define reusable report parameters. Available parameter types include
Date, Text, and Query Parameters.
•
The ability to create multiple DataSources for use in generating reports. Support for
JNDI DataSources and internal connection pooling via Commons-DBCP is included.
•
The ability to upload and hot deploy new reports.
•
Web based administration of users, groups, reports, parameters, and datasources.
•
Cross platform database support via Hibernate based persistence layer.
•
Available in a preconfigured bundle with Apache Tomcat.
Note: This document contains instructions to install and run OpenReports. If you are using OpenReports for
the first time, it is recommended that you download the OpenReportsTomcat bundle. OpenReportsTomcat is
preconfigured and contains a sample database that should give new users a better understanding of how
OpenReports works.
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2. Installation
Note: If you have downloaded the preconfigured OpenReportsTomcat bundle, and would like to get started
immediately,unzip OpenReportsTomcat to root directory of your hard drive, change to the
'openreports-tomcat/bin' directory, start Tomcat via 'catalina run', open 'http://localhost:8080/openreports' in
your browser, and login using a username of 'admin', and a password of 'admin'
In order to get OpenReports up and running, you must first perform the following steps:
1. Create OpenReports tables in your database.
2. Create OpenReports Admin User.
3. Configure Hibernate to point to your database.
4. Configure upload directory.
OpenReports stores information about reports, users, groups, etc. in database tables.
These tables must be created before first using OpenReports. The SQL scripts for some
common databases are in the docs/database directory.
Once you have created the OpenReports tables in your database, you must insert a record
into the REPORT_USER table in order to create an Admin user that you can use to log into
and administer the application.
The following example creates a user with the name 'admin', a password of 'password' and
Administrative rights:
INSERT INTO REPORT_USER (NAME, PASSWORD, ADMIN, EXTERNAL_ID,
EMAIL_ADDRESS, PDF_EXPORT_TYPE)
VALUES ('admin','password',1,'','',0)
Note: The value of the ADMIN field in the INSERT statement may be 1 or 'true' depending on how your
database handles boolean fields.
The last step in the configuration process is to configure Hibernate so that OpenReports
can connect your database.
In order to configure Hibernate you must set the SQL Dialect, and connection properties in
the hibernate.properties file that is located in the WEB-INF/classes directory.
Here are some common examples:
HSQL
hibernate.dialect=net.sf.hibernate.dialect.HSQLDialect
MySql
hibernate.dialect=net.sf.hibernate.dialect.MySQLDialect
SQL Server
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OpenReports: Users Guide
hibernate.dialect=net.sf.hibernate.dialect.SybaseDialect
PostgreSQL
hibernate.dialect=net.sf.hibernate.dialect.PostgreSQLDialect
The next step is to set the connection properties. If you are going to use a JNDI connection,
the only property you need to set is "hibernate.connection.datasource". For
example:
hibernate.connection.datasource=java:comp/env/jdbc/OrDb
If you are not using JNDI, you must supply all the properties needed to create a connection
such as the URL and Driver. Examples of these properties are included in the
hibernate.properties file.
The final configuration step is to set the webwork.multipart.saveDir property in the
WEB-INF/classes/webwork.properties file. This is the directory where you will
upload your compiled JasperReport files to. This property must be set to the full path of the
openreports/reports directory, for example:
webwork.multipart.saveDir=
c:/jakarta-tomcat-4.1.27/webapps/openreports/reports
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3. Getting Started
In order to use OpenReports, you must add DataSources, Reports, Users, Groups, Etc. to
the application through the Adminstration pages. The Adminstration pages are available
though the Admin link on the top right section of the page.
3.1.DataSources
3.2.Reports
3.3.Report Parameters
3.4.Groups and Users
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OpenReports: Users Guide
3.1. DataSources
DataSources are used by reports to gather data. You can define multiple datasources,
either as JNDI datasources, or internal connection pools. You must create at least one
datasource before you can run a report.
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3.2. Reports
In order to deploy a report in OpenReports, you must first upload the report using the
upload link. After uploading your report files, you define each report by giving it a name and
description, and specifying the datasource and JasperReport file used to generate the
report.
Optionally, you can add any Report Parameters you have defined to the report.
Query Reports A new feature of OpenReports is the ability to create reports from queries
without the need to create a JasperReport. Query reports are displayed as a HTML table
and support exporting to XLS, CSV, and XML.
A query report is added to OpenReports in the same manner as other reports. The only
difference is that you must enter a valid query in the query field instead of choosing a report
file.
Note: OpenReports uses JasperReports as the reporting engine, and can only run compiled JasperReports
files. The version of JasperReports used to compile your reports must be in sync with OpenReports. If you are
having problems running reports, verify that your reports were compiled with the same JasperReports jar file
that is in the openreports/WEB-INF/lib directory.
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OpenReports: Users Guide
3.3. Report Parameters
In order to pass parameters to your reports, you must first define your report parameters
and then add the parameters to the report through the report admin page.
In order for JasperReports to recognize the parameters, the name of the Report Parameter
must match the name of the parameter defined in your JasperReport file.
Parameter steps, sort order, and compound parameters.
A powerful feature of OpenReports is the ability to divide reports parameters into multiple
steps and sort the parameters within each step.
Compound parameters are parameters that are built from the values of previously choosen
parameters. For example, compound parameters can be used to present the user with a list
of Countries and then a list of cities based on the selected Country.
Multi-Select parameters
A Multi-Select parameter will display a list of possible values and allow the user to select
more then one value. The selected values will be passed to the report as a String. For
example:
'Austria','Canada','France'
This value can be used in the report query, for example:
select orderid, employeeid, freight, shipcountry
from orders
where shipcountry in ($P!{CountryList})
order by shipcountry
The following examples illustrate the use of the four parameter types in OpenReports.
Query - creates a combobox containing the values returned from the query.
Type: Query
Class: java.lang.String
Data: select distinct shipcountry from orders order by shipcountry
Datasource: your datasource...
Note: If your query contains two columns, OpenReports will display the value of the second column as the
parameter on the web page, but send the value of the first column to the report. For example, the query
'select statecode, statename from states' will show the list of state names as available parameters, but send
the state code of the choosen state to the report.
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List - creates a combobox containing the values from the pipe delimited data String.
Type: List
Class: java.lang.Integer
Data: 10000|11000|12000|13000|14000|15000
Text - creates a textfield for String parameters
Type: Text
Class: java.lang.String
Date - creates a datepicker component
Type: Date
Class: java.util.Date
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OpenReports: Users Guide
3.4. Report Groups and Users
The last two things that need to be created are Report Groups and Users. Report groups
are groups of reports that you can assign to your users. Users can be given multiple reports
groups. If you check the Administrator box, the user will be given access to the Admin
screens.
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4. Charts
Note: Chart are new to this version of OpenReports. The charting interface and capibilites are subject to
change.
OpenReports uses JFreeCharts, the leading open source charting package, to provide the
ability to include dynamically generated charts in your reports without the need to write any
code.
To include a chart in a report, you must follow three steps
1. Define the chart.
2. Add the chart and chart query parameters to your report.
3. Include a ChartImage parameter in your JasperReport definition.
4.1.Chart Definitions
4.2.Report Definitions
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OpenReports: Users Guide
4.1. Chart Definitions
OpenReports charts are defined via the Chart link on the Administration page. You can
create any number of charts, and the charts you define can be used in multiple reports.
To create a chart you must enter a name, title, and a number of other properties. The most
important properties are chart type, query, and datasource. These properties are used to
generate the chart dynamically at runtime via a query. Each chart type requires a specific
query format to generate a valid dataset for the chart. The chart queries can include
parameters to be selected by the user at runtime.
OpenReports currently supports three types of charts, Bar, Pie, and XY charts. The
following examples illustrate the query format required for each chart.
Bar Chart
The query format for Bar Chart reports is
SELECT value, series, category FROM ... WHERE... GROUP BY... ORDER
BY...
For example:
The following query produces are bar chart of the number of orders by city and country:
select count(*), shipcity, shipcountry
from orders
where shipcountry like 'A%' or
shipcountry like 'B%'
group by shipcity order by shipcountry, shipcity
This query produces a bar chart of the number orders by city for a given country. To use a
parameter with a chart query, the matching report parameter must be added to the report
via the Report admin page.
select count(*), shipcity
from orders
where shipcountry = $P{Country} group by shipcity
Pie Chart
The query format for Pie Chart reports is
SELECT value, key FROM ... WHERE... GROUP BY... ORDER BY...
For example:
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This query produces a pie chart displaying the allocation of address for each city in the
address table
select count(*), city from address group by city
XY Chart
The query format for XY Chart reports is
SELECT series, value1, value2 FROM ... WHERE... GROUP BY... ORDER
BY...
For example:
This query produces a XY chart comparing the position vs quantity for two different
products.
select name, position, quantity from position, product where
productid in (1,2) and productid = product.id order by productid
Time Chart
The query format for Time Chart reports is
SELECT series, time, value FROM ... WHERE... GROUP BY... ORDER
BY...
For example:
This query produces a time chart that plots the amount of orders over time.
select 'Orders', count(*), orderdate from orders group by orderdate
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OpenReports: Users Guide
4.2. Chart Reports
Report Definition
Once you have defined your chart, you must modify your report definition in OpenReports
to include your chart. This is done by selecting the desired report from the chart dropdown
box on the Edit Report page. Also, if your chart query included any parameters, you must
selected the matching report parameters on the Edit Report page in order for the user to be
prompted to enter the parameter.
JasperReport Definition
Charts generated by OpenReports are passed to your reports as a parameter named
'ChartImage'. In order for the chart to appear in your report, you must modify the
JasperReport definition to include the following parameter:
<parameter name="ChartImage" class="java.awt.Image"/>
Here is an example of an image tag that can be used in a JasperReports definition to
display the ChartImage:
<image scaleImage="RetainShape" hAlign="Center">
<reportElement x="0" y="40" width="545" height="752"/>
<imageExpression
class="java.awt.Image">$P{ChartImage}</imageExpression>
</image>
Note: The OpenReports Tomcat distrubiton includes a number of example charts, and an example chart
report to help you get started. Also, visit the JFreeChart website at http://www.jfree.org/jfreechart/index.html
for more information about the chart types used in OpenReports.
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5. Scheduled Reports
OpenReports uses Quartz, an open source enterprise-class Job Scheduler, to provide the
ability to schedule PDF reports to be sent via email.
Note: The scheduling feature is new to this version of OpenReports. The scheduling interface and capibilites
are subject to change.
5.1.Configuration
5.2.Scheduling
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OpenReports: Users Guide
5.1. Configuration
The scheduling feature of OpenReports can be enable or disabled by uncommenting or
commenting out the following lines in the components.xml file.
<component>
<scope>application</scope>
<class>org.efs.openreports.providers.impl.SchedulerProviderImpl</class>
<enabler>org.efs.openreports.providers.SchedulerProviderAware</enabler>
</component>
The mail.smtp.host and baseDirectory properties in the
openreports.properties file must also be set to a valid mail host, and the full path of
the OpenReports web application directory in order to generate and email scheduled
reports.
OpenReports is currently configured to use a Quartz RAMJobStore which stores all jobs in
memory. All scheduled jobs will be lost if OpenReports is reloaded or shutdown. Quartz can
be configured, in the quartz.properties file, to persist jobs to a database via a
JDBCJobStore. For more information on configuring Quartz, visit the Quartz project site at
http://sourceforge.net/projects/quartz
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5.2. Scheduling
To scheduling a report, click on the schedule report link after you have choosen the report
and entered any parameters. The Schedule Report page allows you to select schedule
type, start date, and start time. Enter the email addresses of the report recipients in the
recipients field. The 'scheduler' link at the top of the page allows you to review your
scheduled reports and remove any scheduled reports that are no longer needed.
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OpenReports: Users Guide
6. FAQ
Common Problems
1) Error loading object from file (or reports not being generated):
JasperReports requires that you compile your reports using the same version of the
JasperReports jar file as the application you are using to run the reports (in this case
OpenReports) is using.
To fix this problem, recompile your JasperReport files using the same version of the jar file
that is in the openreports/WEB-INF/lib directory.
Another possible solution is to replace the JasperReports jar file in
openreports/WEB-INF/lib with the jar file you are using to compile your reports. In
most cases they should be compatible, but backwards compatiblity is not guaranteed.
2) java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError on Linux:
The JasperReports library will generate java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError
exceptions when running on a Linux machine without an X-Server running. The easiest
solution is to run in headless mode, which is available in JDK 1.4+. For example, if you are
using Tomcat, add the following to your catalina.sh file:
CATALINA_OPTS="-Djava.awt.headless=true"
For more information, search the JasperReports forums on SourceForge for 'headless' or
'NoClassDefFoundError'.
Database Schema Help
OpenReports uses Hibernate to provide cross platform database support and the
OpenReports distribution includes the DDL for a number of databases. OpenReports also
includes two utility classes that can be used to create or update the OpenReports schema.
These two classes can be run by ANT using build.xml file included with OpenReports.
1) ant schemaExporter - this target will create the entire OpenReports schema in the
database indicated in the hibernate.properties file.
2) ant schemaUpdater - this target can be run to update the OpenReports schema in the
database indicated in the hibernate.properties file to the latest version.
If you are having problems with the DDL included in the OpenReports distribution, it may be
easier to export or update the schema directly using the ANT targets.
Also, make sure that the hibernate.dialect in the hibernate.properties file is set
to the proper dialect for your database.
More information on Hibernate can be found at:
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http://www.hibernate.org
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OpenReports: Users Guide
7. Change History
7.1.Version 0.71
7.2.Version 0.7
7.3.Version 0.6
7.4.Version 0.5.1
7.5.Version 0.5
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7.1. Version 0.71
NEW FEATURES
1.
Report Parameter Enhancements
- Made standard parameters (user id, name, and external id) available to parameter
queries.
2.
JasperReports
- Upgraded to JasperReports 0.53
3.
Misc
- Changed Report.REPORT_QUERY, ReportChart.CHART_QUERY, and
ReportParameter.DATA to text types in order to support queries longer then 255
characters.
- Replaced 'select date' with calendar icon on report schedule page.
CHANGE LOG
1.
Bug Fixes
- Changed ReportUser.ADMIN and ReportUser.PDF_EXPORT_TYPE fields NOT
NULL
- Moved Velocity pages up a level to fix compatibility problems with some app servers
(Tomcat 5...)
- Added jta.jar.
2.
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Updated installation documentation
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OpenReports: Users Guide
7.2. Version 0.7
NEW FEATURES
1.
Report Parameter Enhancements
- Multi-select parameters (Based on code contributed by David Glick)
- Parameter Steps and Sort Order
- Compound Parameters
2.
Charting
- Time Series Chart (Latie)
3.
Scheduled Reports
- Added support for scheduling XLS and CSV reports
4.
Report Administration
- Added simple query based reports
5.
JasperReports
- Upgraded to JasperReports 0.52
CHANGE LOG
1.
Bug Fixes
- Fixed UserPersistenceProvider (Latie)
- Fixed DeleteChart bug (Steve Peterson)
- Objects serializable now implement Serializable
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7.3. Version 0.6
NEW FEATURES
1.
New User Interface
- Single CSS file for easy customization
- Administration Navigation Panel
- All tables are now sortable
2.
Charting
- Create bar, pie, and xy charts
- Chart data created via SQL statements that can include parameters
- No coding required to create dynamic database driven charts
- Uses JFreeCharts
3.
Scheduled Reports
- Schedule PDF reports to run on a one time, daily, or weekly basis
- Email scheduled reports to multiple users
- Uses Quartz Scheduler
4.
User Admin Page
- Users can now changed their own username, password, and email address
5.
Export types for report
- Valid export types are now set at the report level
6.
Delete confirmation pages
- added delete confirmation pages for all OpenReports objects
CHANGE LOG
1.
Security
- Fixed admin security problem
- Report groups and reports are now validated
2.
3.
All Velocity page footers are now parsed.
PDF Export
- Added content-disposition header to PDF export
- Allow users to choose between default and single request PDF export types
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OpenReports: Users Guide
7.4. Version 0.5.1
NEW FEATURES
1.
2.
3.
Added MaxWait to Edit DataSource Page.
Added Description to Report Parameters.
Added Required to Report Parameters
4.
- Required Parameters must be filled in before running reports.
Added ReportParameterValue object
5.
6.
- For parameters with Id and description. See Report Parameter Help Page...
Added ExternalId and Email fields to ReportUser object.
Automatically passing the following parameters to all reports.
- OPENREPORTS_USER_ID
- OPENREPORTS_USER_EXTERNALID
- OPENREPORTS_USER_NAME
- OPENREPORTS_IMAGE_DIR
7.
8.
Added report logging that stores report, start and end time, and status of each report
run.
Added support for empty datasource reports
CHANGE LOG
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
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Fixed issues that allowed users direct access to some pages without being logged in.
Fixed problem with application not throwing exception when testing datasources that
contain invalid settings by upgrading connection pooling to use commons-dbcp-1.1
and commons-pool-1.1.
Removed NOT NULL contraints from fields (DRIVER, USERNAME, PASSWORD...) in
REPORT_DATASOURCE table to support both Commons-DBCP and JNDI
datasources.
Fix groupId bug in ReportListAction
Fixed problems with images in HTML exports
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7.5. Version 0.5
NEW FEATURES
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Cross platform database persistence via Hibernate
Added JNDI lookups of datasources
Added Long, BigDecimal and Timestamp parameter types
Added ValidationQuery to datasources
Added Help on Param page
CHANGE LOG
1.
2.
3.
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Upgraded to JasperReports 0.5
Fixed URLs in actions.xml and various pages
Fixed Login.vm so username/password do not show in URL
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OpenReports: Users Guide
8. Upgrading
This section contains a list of the database changes that must be made in order to upgrade
to the latest version of OpenReports from previous versions.
Note: For more information about table definitions, refer to the Hibernate mapping files and to the DDL scripts
in the docs/database directory. Also, the schemaUpdater ANT task can be used to upgraded an existing
OpenReports Schema to the latest version.
8.1.Version 0.7
8.2.Version 0.6
8.3.Version 0.5.1
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8.1. Upgrading to OpenReports 0.7
1) Add the following fields to the OpenReports tables:
Table
Name
Java Type
REPORT
REPORT_QUERY
String
REPOR_PARAMETER
MULTI_SELECT
boolean
REPORT_PARAMETER_MAP
REQUIRED
boolean
REPORT_PARAMETER_MAP
SORT_ORDER
int
REPORT_PARAMETER_MAP
STEP
int
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OpenReports: Users Guide
8.2. Upgrading to OpenReports 0.6
1) Add the following fields to the OpenReports tables:
Table
Name
Java Type
REPORT
PDF_EXPORT
boolean
REPORT
CSV_EXPORT
boolean
REPORT
XLS_EXPORT
boolean
REPORT
HTML_EXPORT
boolean
REPORT
CHART_ID
Integer
REPORT_USER
PDF_EXPORT_TYPE
Integer
2) Create new REPORT_CHART table.
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8.3. Upgrading to OpenReports 0.5.1
1) Add the following fields to the OpenReports tables:
Table
Name
Java Type
REPORT_PARAMETER
DESCRIPTION
String
REPORT_PARAMETER
REQUIRED
boolean
REPORT_USER
EXTERNAL_ID
String
REPORT_USER
EMAIL_ADDRESS
String
2) Remove NOT NULL contraint from the following fields in the REPORT_DATASOURCE
table in order to support both Commons-DBCP and JNDI datasources:
DRIVER, USERNAME, PASSWORD, MAXIDLE, MAXACTIVE
3) Create new REPORT_LOG table.
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OpenReports: Users Guide
9. Open Source Software Solutions
OpenReports is sponsored by Open Source Software Solutions. We specialize in Java
development using open-source software. If you are interested in support or customization
of OpenReports please visit us at: http://www.opensourcesoft.net or email
solutions@opensourcesoft.net.
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10. License
OpenReports is distributed under the GPL License
For alternative licensing, contact solutions@opensourcesoft.net
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OpenReports: Users Guide
11. Credits
OpenReports uses the following open-source projects:
JasperReports - Java report-generating library
http://jasperreports.sourceforge.net
WebWork - MVC web application framework
http://sourceforge.net/projects/opensymphony
Hibernate - a powerful, ultra-high performance object/relational persistence and query
service for Java
http://sourceforge.net/projects/hibernate
Quartz - a Java open source enterprise-class Job Scheduler,
http://sourceforge.net/projects/quartz
JFreeCharts - a Java charting library
http://www.jfree.org/jfreechart/index.html
OpenReports also uses a variety of other open-source software including software
developed by the Apache Software Foundation (http://www.apache.org)
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