21.1 Customization Overview

By using the Oracle Reports XML tags, you can customize reports created using Oracle Reports Builder.

Note:

Although it is possible to create an entire report manually using the Oracle Reports XML tags, only manually created customizations and data models are documented and supported.

Creating and applying an XML customization is a three-step process:

Create a customization file using Oracle Reports XML tags.

You can create this customization by building a report using Oracle Reports Builder then saving your report as XML. You can also build the customization manually, with any sort of text editor or a sophisticated XML editor, as long as you include the XML tags that are required for the particular Oracle Reports customization.
Store the XML customization in a location that is accessible to Oracle Reports Services.
Apply the XML customization to another report with the CUSTOMIZE command line keyword or the SRW.APPLY_DEFINITION built-in procedure, or run the XML customization by itself (if it contains a complete report definition) with the REPORT (or MODULE) command line keyword.

See Also:
Section A.5.21, "CUSTOMIZE"

Note:
For a description of the SRW built-in package, including the SRW.APPLY_DEFINITION built-in procedure, see the Oracle Reports online Help.