The information you must publish is often derived from data in various corporate data sources. These data sources may be SQL-based (relational databases) or non-SQL-based. Often, you must combine data from one or more of these data sources to publish meaningful information. For example, you may need to combine data that exists in a relational database with data from a multidimensional database to compare trends and performance.
Oracle Reports enables you to access any Oracle or non-Oracle data source, such as XML, JDBC (relational and non-relational), metadata from another system, or even a Business Component for Java (BC4J). You can even combine data from one or more of these data sources in the same report. For example, in a business intelligence scenario, you can combine and publish data that exists in a relational database along with multidimensional (OLAP) data, allowing the comparison of trends and performance. In a Business-to-Business supplier scenario, you can join XML data obtained from an external partner’s application with data obtained from an internal database and merge this internal and external data in real-time to display the results in a Web page.
Pluggable data sources (PDSs) enable data input from any data source through design time and runtime Java application program interfaces (APIs). Oracle Reports provides interface definitions, which act as a translator between Oracle Reports and a PDS by redefining Oracle Reports' requests in terms your data source uses. You can leverage the PDS (pluggable data source) architecture to connect to your own data source, as well as to the data sources available with Oracle Reports.
The PDS architecture in Oracle Reports replaces OCA (Open Client Adapter). With the implementation of PDSs, the ODBC drivers are no longer be supported in Oracle Reports. However, JDBC will be one of the pluggable data sources available that can utilize the JDBC-ODBC bridge, allowing access to other data sources.
Oracle Reports includes the XML, JDBC, Text, Oracle Express, and OLAP PDS out-of-the-box. All pluggable data sources shipped with Oracle Reports are integrated with the Single Sign-On feature available in Oracle Application Server. Additional PDSs can be incorporated into Oracle Reports as they become available and will also support Single Sign-On.
If your data source cannot use an existing PDS, the PDS API enables you to
write your own PDS and incorporate it into Oracle Reports to access your own
unique data sources. The API is documented in the Oracle Reports Java API
Reference documentation (available on the Oracle
Technology Network Oracle Reports Documentation page (http://www.oracle.com/technology/documentation/reports.html
).
The PDS API supports the number, date, and string data types. An individual
pluggable data source should appropriately map its types to these three types.
For example, XML schema data types would be mapped to the nearest ones of the
three supported types. These types would then be passed to the XML pluggable
data source. In the case of the JDBC pluggable data source, if the query tries
to retrieve a BLOB column from the database, the pluggable data source driver
would generate the error Column type
not supported
.
When you create an invalid link between two queries of pluggable data sources, you will receive the following error message:
Fail to fetch Plugin Data Source Java.lang.NumberExpection:G
When you receive this error, you should check the validity of your links (for example, are the data types of the columns compatible).
For detailed examples of using a PDS to provide data for your report, see the
following chapters in the Oracle Reports Building Reports manual,
available on the Oracle Technology Network
Oracle Reports Documentation page (http://www.oracle.com/technology/documentation/reports.html
):
Building a Report with an XML Pluggable Data Source
Building a Report with a Text Pluggable Data Source
Building a Report with an OLAP Pluggable Data Source
Building a Report Using Oracle Express Data
Oracle Reports Plugin Exchange on the Oracle Technology Network
(OTN): on the Oracle Reports 10g page(http://www.oracle.com/technology/products/reports/index.html
),
click Plugin Exchange.
Accessing non-Oracle data sources
Adding a pluggable data source
Connecting to a pluggable data source
Adding Online Help to a pluggable data source
Pluggable data source interface definition
The chapter "Configuring and Using the JDBC PDS" in OracleAS
Reports Services Publishing Reports to the Web, available on the Oracle
Technology Network Oracle Reports Documentation page (http://www.oracle.com/technology/documentation/reports.html
)
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