Xml Publisher And Reporting To Excel

XML Publisher and Reporting to Excel

Duncan Davies, Jay Jorgensen and Adam ClarkAllinity

Who are we?

Duncan Davies - Technical Consultant (Allinity)Email: [email protected]

Adam Clark - Technical Consultant (Allinity)Email: [email protected]

Jay Jorgensen - External ConsultantEmail: [email protected]

What are we covering today?

1. XML Publisher - Duncan

2. Reporting to Excel Overview - Adam

3. Reporting to Excel Deep-Dive - Jay

4. Questions

What is XML Publisher?

“Publisher is the only Reporting Platform for Fusion Apps”

XMLPublisherEngine

How does it work?

XML Data Source

Technical Task

TemplateLayout

Business TaskReportOutput

Step 1

Create an App Engine to supply:

1. XML Sample Data File

2. XSD Schema File

Step 1 Code – Populate Rowset

Step 1 Code – Output Files

Step 2

Create an RTF template in Word using the XML Sample data file.

Step 3

Within PeopleSoft, create:

1. Data Source Defn

2. Report Defn

3. Process Defn

Step 3 – Data Source Definition

Step 3 – Report Definition

Step 4

Update your App Engine to output full data, then run it.

Step 4 Code – Code Changes

Advanced Use

• Bursting

• Content Library

• Translations

What’s good?• Single Toolset

• Business users don’t need a techie to layout a report

• Highly Flexible

• Easier upgrade to Fusion

• Quick and easy

What’s not good?• XML/XSL knowledge needed for complex reports

• Excel output very basic

• No update until 2008 (Tools 8.50)

• Need to useReport Mgr

What other tips can we give?

• Make sure all rowset levels are filled in sample data.

• RTFs not shown in Process Monitor, so set up Report Manager.

• Limit the size of the

rowset for sample data.

• Sort data in Code

AEXLSOverview

Why?

• Client required a reporting solution

– Output to Microsoft Excel

– Must be a PeopleTools solution

• Output onto Multiple Sheets

• Complete control of individual cells

– Formatting of individual rows/columns/cells

– Formulas

• Client specific Branding/Formatting

Options

• XMLP

• SQRXLS

• nVision

• XSLT for XMLP

The Solution

• Application Package

– Kept within PeopleSoft

– Standard PeopleSoft APIs

– Classes and Methods

Benefits

• Rapid development

– Standard PeopleCode

– Object oriented API

– Simply pass a RowSet to the constructor

Example

Summary

• Client Requirements

• Flexibility

• Rapid Development

AEXLSThe Internals

What Have We Done

• Formatting – text, cell and sheet

• Print and Page Settings

• Formulas and Functions

• Multiple sheets

• Named Ranges

What Can be Done

• Short answer – everything but Macro’s and Passwords

• For Example– Pivot Tables– Charts– Hyperlinks (drill-down like nVision)– Data Functions – filters, sorting etc– Smart Tags and Comments

Components

• Excel/XML

• XMLDOC Object

• Application Packages

Excel/XML• Need to learn XML

• Simple Cascade - Worksheet/Column/ Row/Cell

• Styles used like CSS

• Namespaces and Schemas

• MS Schema’s of some use

XMLDoc• PeopleSoft’s XML Parser

• Provides random access to the xml document – Like a Database

• Based on W3C standards – Uses XPath

• XPath is like a directory structure

Examples• Get a Sheet

Findnode(Workbook\Worksheet

[@Name=“Sheet1”] )• Get a Cell

Findnode(Workbook\Worksheet

[@Name=“Sheet1”]\Row\Cell

[@Index=“4”]\Data\Text()

App Packages• Object Oriented

Approach – Classes

• Makes things more complex but so much faster/easier to maintain.

• Model your classes on the excel objects – sheets, cells etc

• Quicker debugging

Problems

• Namespaces and XMLDoc

• Other XMLDoc Issues

• Performance

Tips• Plan your object model first

• Remove namespaces and add them in by string manipulation after XMLDoc is finished

• Consider generating large chunks of data by other methods (e.g. SQL)

• Leverage PeopleSoft Metadata (e.g. Field labels, translate and prompts)

• Apply a template (like the report class)

Finish

• Time estimates– 2 man months for the Excel generator

– 1 man month for the template overlay

– Much of this is learning curve

• Time is easily recouped in developing reports etc that use it.

Thanks for listening.

Does anyone have a Question?