Exporting output to HTML

[2001 JI Open Discussion]

By: Rico Yan - ricoyan

Exporting output to HTML

2002-06-10 02:12

hi :)

 

Are there plans on exporting the generated reports to HTML? If yes, when is it going to be released?

If no, can you suggest on how can it be done, I'm thinking of using the generated xml and incorporating an xsl to output it as html...

 

thanx!

 

 

By: Teodor Danciu - teodord

RE: Exporting output to HTML

2002-06-10 05:31

 

Hi,

 

The problem with the HTML output format is not

about "how can we create a HTML document".

 

It's more about the structure and the quality

of the resulting content.

 

There are two approaches I see for the moment:

1) Using CSS for absolute positioning of elements on the page;

2) Creating an algorithm that would identify table

patterns within the elements (Alex Parfenov approach).

 

I haven't engaged myself in this because there are

other priorities for the moment.

Any solution is welcomed.

 

However, there are other questions to ask:

Do we need to generate page and column headers

and footers in a HTML document?

Do we have to keep the page-oriented aspect

of the document?

If not, what is the meaning of text fields that use

in their expressions the PAGE_NUMBER variable?

 

Thank you,

Teodor

 

 

 

By: Rico Yan - ricoyan

RE: Exporting output to HTML

2002-06-10 08:25

Thanks for your reply Teodor. About your questions I think you really need to figure out first the business need.

 

In my case, in our development (Intranet, Internet application), we chose JasperReports as our reporting tool so that we don't overkill the use of EJB-CMP for reporting (we only use ejb for transactions).

 

As an Internet application, we want to output reports in HTML format or PDF format embedded on the browser, so obviously it is not possible for the browser to use the JasperPrintManager so we have no choice but to use javascript or directly the acrobat reader for printing. Which means we can't use other useful features of JasperReports on HTML format since some of those such as margins and orientation can be configured on the browser.

 

But it will be very helpful for us if you can output it similar to the output of PDF format.

 

cheers! :)

rico

 

 

By: Henri Chen - henrichen

RE: Exporting output to HTML

2002-06-10 19:22

Hi,

 

I am not familiar with this, but didn't iText output HTML? I mean, JasperReport already use iText to output the pdf, then why not just leveraging the iText to do this job.

 

Henri

 

 

 

By: Rico Yan - ricoyan

RE: Exporting output to HTML (iText)

2002-06-10 21:37

hi,

 

i think iText's HTML writer is not recommended for production sites, it's for debugging purposes only.

 

thanks,

rico