Report Distribution Using AddDistributionOption

In my previous post on Report Distribution Using XML Publisher - Right Report To The Right Person, we have seen how to distribute the report to the right person, without any coding efforts. Because we have that feature pre-built in XML Publisher. 

What if, when SQR process comes with a similar requirement?

This can be achieved by the AddDistributionOption, from the CreateProcessRequest family.

A small trick has to be implemented to launch n number of process request based on the parameters. 

&RQST.AddDistributionOption("User", "Your User ID"); will take care of distributing the reports from there, based on the User ID fed into it.

You can use this approach for the XML Publisher and nVision reports too.

Like we have an alternate way in XML Publisher, there is a way to do the same in nVision. However, I did not get a chance to try out the same.

If anyone has done it before, feel free to share the tip here.

XML Publisher - Clean Up

Cleaning Up BI Publisher Metadata

Some people are very specific about the way the data is managed in the system. I have seen several Admins who is very serious about the accurate data in the system, they will always clean up the data in the system, like the perfect housewives maintains a good home. 

In BI Publisher we have a delivered way to do this act. The Application Engine program name is PSXPCLEAN. It tracks and manages the orphaned objects in the system and provides you a report too.

What the different sections does in the AE. It find outs the orphaned definitions to the state record and deletes it in a sequence.

Various sections performs this duty.

This application engine program is delivered in Report and Delete mode. To run the program in Report Only mode, open the application engine program PSXPCLEAN in Application Designer and remove the comment in the following statement in PSXPCLEAN:Main:Start PeopleCode action:

rem PSXPFILECLN_AET.REPORT_ONLY_FLAG = "Y" (which is marked in Yellow below)

From here, the AE starts collecting the info about the missing definitions.

From this point the clean up starts.

A handy tip to know about the AE and the main tables in XMP Publisher for quick reference.

How to print bar codes and micr fonts using XML Publisher

For those friends who havnt done the font setup for XML Publisher. I stumbled on this article while browsing through Oracle Support Site.You need to have an Oracle Support login to view the article.

Click this link to view

Whats new on XML Publisher in PT 8.50/8.51?

- Rowset and XML doc data source are deprecated
- Connected query as a new data source
- XML generated in C++ for query data source
- Schema files no longer required for bursting
- Email as an output option
- "File name" field on the output page in report definition
- Use "Alt XML" for previewing the templates
- Full path mapping for use of repeating fields
- New "Properties tab" to control report attributes for specific PS implementation
- Enforce unique burst value feature for bursting
- Global properties page to define global properties
- App engine PSXPCLEAN to clean XMLP metadata

Excerpts from the HEUG seminar taken by ERP Analysts on XML Publisher.