Release 11g (11.1.1)
Part Number E13881-02
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Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher is a reporting and publishing application that enables you to extract data from multiple data sources, create layouts for report data, and publish the report to numerous output formats. BI Publisher also enables you to schedule reports and deliver the reports to multiple delivery destinations required by your business.
The Oracle Fusion Middleware Report Designer's Guide for Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher describes how to create report layouts and use BI Publisher's report editor to assemble the components of a report. See these other guides for more information about using the product for other business roles:
| Role | Sample Tasks | Guide |
|---|---|---|
| Data Model developer | Fetching and structuring the data to use in reports | Oracle Fusion Middleware Data Modeling Guide for Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher |
| Administrator | Configuring Security Configuring System Settings Diagnosing and Monitoring System Processes | Oracle Fusion Middleware Administrator's Guide for Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher |
| Application developer or integrator | Integrating BI Publisher into existing applications using the application programming interfaces | Oracle Fusion Middleware Developer's Guide for Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher |
| Report consumer | Viewing reports Scheduling report jobs Managing report jobs | Oracle Fusion Middleware User's Guide for Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher |
A report consists of a data model, a layout, and a set of properties. Optionally, a report may also include a style template and a set of translations. A report designer performs the following tasks:
Design the layout for the report. The layout can be created using a variety of tools. The output and design requirements of a particular report will determine the best layout design tool. Options include the Layout Editor, which is a Web-based layout design tool and enables interactive output, Microsoft Word, Adobe Acrobat, Microsoft Excel, and Adobe Flexbuilder.
Set runtime configuration properties for the report.
Design style templates to enhance a consistent look and feel of reports in your enterprise.
Create sub templates to re-use common functionality across multiple templates
Enable translations for a report.
BI Publisher offers several options for designing layouts for your reports. The following formats are supported. Note that the layout type determines the types of output documents supported.
BI Publisher layout (XPT)
BI Publisher's Layout Editor is a Web-based design tool for creating layouts. Layouts created with the Layout Editor support interactive viewing as well as the full range of output types supported by RTF layouts.
Rich Text Format (RTF)
BI Publisher provides a plugin utility for Microsoft Word that automates layout design and enables you to connect to BI Publisher to access data and upload templates directly from a Microsoft Word session. The RTF format also supports advanced formatting commands providing the most flexible and powerful of the layout options. RTF templates support a variety of output types, including: PDF, HTML, RTF, Excel, PowerPoint, zipped PDF, and MHTML.
Portable Document Format (PDF)
PDF templates are used primarily when you need to use a predefined form as a layout for a report (for example, a form provided by a government agency). Because many PDF forms already contain form fields, using the PDF form as a template simply requires mapping data elements to the fields that exist on the form. You can also design your own PDF templates using Adobe Acrobat Professional. PDF templates only support PDF output.
Microsoft Excel (XLS)
Excel templates enable you to map data and define calculations and formatting logic in your Excel workbook. Excel templates support Microsoft Excel (.xls) output only.
If you only need to view report data in Excel, you can also use BI Publisher's Analyzer for Microsoft Excel to download report data to an Excel worksheet. Create a layout for the data in Excel and then upload the spreadsheet back to BI Publisher to save as a report layout.
XSL Stylesheet
Layouts can also be defined directly in XSL formatting language. Specify whether your layout is for FO, HTML, XML, or Text transformation.
eText
These are specialized RTF templates used for creating text output for Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) or Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) transactions.
Flash
BI Publisher's support for Flash layouts enables you to develop Adobe Flex templates that can be applied to BI Publisher reports to generate interactive Flash output documents.
BI Publisher provides a variety of user-controlled settings that are specified via an easily accessible Runtime Configuration page. These include security settings for individual PDF reports, HTML output display settings, font mapping, currency formatting, and other output-specific settings. For more information see Setting Report Processing and Output Document Properties. These settings are also configured at the system-level, but can be customized per report.
BI Publisher provides the ability to create an XLIFF file from your RTF templates. XLIFF is the XML Localization Interchange File Format. It is the standard format used by localization providers. Using BI Publisher's XLIFF generation tool you can generate the standard translation file of your RTF template. You can then translate this file (or send to a translation provider). Once translated, the file can be uploaded to the report definition under the appropriate locale setting so that at runtime the translated report will automatically be run for users selecting the corresponding locale. For more information, see Translating Reports and Catalog Objects.
A style template is an RTF template that contains style information that can be applied to layout templates. The style information in the style template is applied to report layout templates at runtime to achieve a consistent look and feel across your enterprise reports.
For more information, see Creating and Implementing Style Templates.
A Sub Template is a piece of formatting functionality that can be defined once and used multiple times within a single layout template or across multiple layout template files. This piece of formatting can be in an RTF file format or an XSL file format. RTF subtemplates are easy to design as you can use Microsoft Word native features. XSL subtemplates can be used for complex layout and data requirements.
For more information, see Creating and Implementing Sub Templates.
This section describes new features in Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher 11g Release 1 (11.1.1). If you are upgrading from a previous release, read the following for information about new features, tools, and procedures.
This section includes the following topics:
New Features for Oracle BI Publisher 11g Release 1 (11.1.1.5)
New Features for Oracle BI Publisher 11g Release 1 (11.1.1.3)
New features in Oracle BI Publisher 11g Release 1 (11.1.1.5) include:
An Excel template is a report layout that you design in Microsoft Excel for retrieving your enterprise data in Excel. Excel templates provide a set of special features for controlling the display of data and providing specific formatting instructions. Excel templates support the following features:
Define the structure for your data in Excel output
Split hierarchical data across multiple sheets and dynamically name the sheets
Create sheets of data that have master-detail relationships
Use native XSL functions in your data to manipulate it prior to rendering
Use native Excel functionality
For more information, see Creating Excel Templates.
BI Publisher provides a downloadable add-in to Excel that enables you to preview your Excel template with sample data. This facilitates design by enabling you to test and edit your template without having to upload it to the BI Publisher catalog first. The Template Builder for Excel is installed automatically when you install the Template Builder for Word. The tools can be downloaded from the Home page of Oracle Business Intelligence Publisher or Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition as follows:
Under the Get Started region, click Download BI Publisher Tools.
For more information, see Creating Excel Templates
The list component displays all values of a data element in a vertical or horizontal list. When viewed in interactive mode, clicking an item in the list updates the results shown in the linked components of the report. The list enables the report consumer to quickly see results for each item in the list by clicking the list entry. For more information see About Lists.
The formula dialog in the BI Publisher layout editor has been redesigned for better usability. For more information, see Setting Predefined or Custom Formulas.
New features in Oracle BI Publisher 11g Release 1 (11.1.1.3) include:
The user interface has undergone major improvements in several areas, including a new Home page and redesigned editors and panes. These improvements are intended to make working with Oracle BI Publisher easier and more consistent. This guide provides detailed information on working with the various pieces of the user interface.
For installations of BI Publisher with the Oracle BI Enterprise Edition, BI Publisher now shares the same catalog with Oracle BI Presentation services.
This release introduces a new type of layout template and design tool. The Layout Editor is launched from within BI Publisher and provides an intuitive WYSIWIG drag-and-drop interface for designing report layouts.
For reports created with the new BI Publisher layout editor, a new interactive output type is available. The interactive viewer enables pop-up chart details, scrollable tables, table filtering, table sorting, and propagated filtering across different components of the report. This interactivity is achieved simply by designing the report in the layout editor, no additional coding is necessary.
Previously subtemplates had to be stored outside of the BI Publisher catalog and called at runtime from the external directory. In this release your RTF and XSL subtemplates can be saved and managed as objects in the BI Publisher catalog.
A style template is an RTF template that contains style information that can be applied to RTF layouts. The style information in the style template is applied to RTF layouts at runtime to achieve a consistent look and feel across your enterprise reports. Style templates are saved and managed in the BI Publisher catalog.
This release introduces a feature to split a large PDF output file into smaller, more manageable files, while still maintaining the integrity of the report as one logical unit. When PDF output splitting is enabled for a report, the report is split into multiple files generated in one zip file. The output type is PDFZ. For easy access to the component files, BI Publisher also generates an index file that specifies from and to elements contained in each component PDF file.
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