Book Image

JasperReports for Java Developers

Book Image

JasperReports for Java Developers

Overview of this book

JasperReports is the world's most popular embeddable Java open source reporting library, providing Java developers with the power to easily create rich print and web reports. This book shows you exactly how to get started, and develop the skills to get the most from JasperReports. The book steers you through each point of report setup, to creating, designing, formatting, and exporting reports with data from a wide range of datasources, and integrating JasperReports with other Java frameworks. Starting with the basics of adding reporting capabilities to your application, and creating report templates you will first see how to produce your reports through the use of JRXML files, custom ANT targets, and then see preview them in both the browser and the native browser of JasperReports. Getting data into your reports is the next step, and you will see how to get data from a range of datasources, not only databases, but XML files, and Java Objects, among others. You will create better looking reports with formatting and grouping, as well as adding graphical elements to the report. You will export your reports to a range of different formats, including PDF and XML. Creating reports will be made even easier with a walkthrough of the iReport Designer visual designing tool. To round things off, you will see how to integrate your reports with other Java frameworks, using Spring or Hibernate to get data for the report, and Java Server Faces or Struts for presenting the report.
Table of Contents (13 chapters)
12
Index

Elements of a JRXML Report Template

In the previous example, we used the<detail> element of the JRXML report template to generate a report displaying some static text. The<detail> element is used to display the main section of the report. However, JRXML templates can contain many other elements that allow us to display secondary data on the report, or allow us to do some other tasks like importing Java packages, or setting the report font. Unless stated otherwise, each element can be used any number of times in the template. The following sections outline all the sub-elements of the<jasperReport> root element.

<property>

This element is used to put arbitrary information in the report template.

<property name="someproperty"
value="somevalue"/>

Properties can be retrieved by a Java application loading the report by invoking the JasperReport.getProperty() method.

A JRXML template can contain zero or more<property> elements.

<import&gt...