Does anyone have any comments or experience with OpenRPT? Not in a Dabo
context obviously, in a general Python context.
TIA.
--
Alan Bourke
alanpbourke (at) fastmail (dot) fm
On Friday 03 July 2009 02:43:30 am Alan Bourke wrote:
> Does anyone have any comments or experience with OpenRPT? Not in a Dabo
> context obviously, in a general Python context.
>
> TIA.
I looked into finding a replacement to reportWriter and OpenRPT was one of
many. I found that reportWriter did most of everything needed for reporting
directly from dabo. I decided that it was better investing in reportWriter
(Paul fixed a paragraph issue) then presenting a different interface to the
user to a report writer such as OpenRPT and making the install have much more
complex.
I have a lot of experience with OpenRPT - it's the embedded reporting tool
for Postbooks / Xtuple open source ERP/MRP system. As a standalone tool, you
have the design part, and the renderer that your end user would see. I
spend a lot of time tweaking things from within the ERP system for clients.
Works well with postgresql, not so much with other databases -- might work
with mysql or sqlite, and there's been talk of ODBC connectors but the
Xtuple guys are focused on postgresql. It is easy to install / setup if you
Not sure how you'd use it in a Python app -- it's QT based, and C++ based,
not Python based.
It's about on par I'd guess it's about on part with Crystal Reports -- maybe
version 7.x -- no graphical query / database connector tools. They call the
coding system "meta sql" -- so you can embed parameters etc. and get prompts
for filters....and a hell of a lot easier to use than Jasper/ Pentaho stuff.
On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 2:43 AM, Alan Bourke <alanpbourke@fastmail.fm> wrote:
> Does anyone have any comments or experience with OpenRPT? Not in a Dabo
> context obviously, in a general Python context.
>
> TIA.
> --
> Alan Bourke
> alanpbourke (at) fastmail (dot) fm
>
>
>
[excessive quoting removed by server]
On Fri, 03 Jul 2009 06:47 -0700, "Dan Means" <dkmeans@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Not sure how you'd use it in a Python app -- it's QT based, and C++
> based,
> not Python based.
>
Yeah, that's the problem.
> and a hell of a lot easier to use than Jasper/ Pentaho
> stuff.
I've got Jasper installed in Ubuntu, and it looks very powerful, but
unless you're developing in Java you have to use the Jasper report
server and call reports programmatically against that, which might be
too heavy a solution for smallish applications. You'd have the added
complication of Tomcat and MySQL. I've looked at Pentaho too, but it
seems to be a maze of different applications which all seemed to have
previously called something else, and it's completely unclear from their
website as to exactly what one would require for any given application.
There's just some gaping holes in the toolchain if you wanted to do
desktop apps with Python (present Dabo company excluded of course!)
We were so spoiled with VFP ...
--
Alan Bourke
alanpbourke (at) fastmail (dot) fm
>
>
> <<We were so spoiled with VFP ...>>
Little did we know what an awesome tool Dr. Dave gave us.
I've had some luck with the various designers for Jasper engines, but I get
the weirdest java errors on data types doing simple lists / totals that I
gave up, and their community is less than helpful when you ask questions --
it's always "buy my book for $59" which was so out of date that it was
useless.
--
Dan Means
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Linux needs a Crystal Reports basically. Reporting seems to be the last
thing on the list with *any* development approach I've looked at under
Linux. Present company excluded.
--
Alan Bourke
alanpbourke (at) fastmail (dot) fm
I cannot agree more. John Fabiani and I go back a long way with Foxpro based
ERP apps - (old SBT hounds) - with Postbooks / Xtuple we got around that
missing piece - but a nice generic Crystal type app would be ideal.
The OpenRPT app is close. There's a big opportunity I suspect in this piece
of the puzzle.
On Mon, Jul 6, 2009 at 9:23 AM, Alan Bourke <alanpbourke@fastmail.fm> wrote:
> Linux needs a Crystal Reports basically. Reporting seems to be the last
> thing on the list with *any* development approach I've looked at under
> Linux. Present company excluded.
> --
> Alan Bourke
> alanpbourke (at) fastmail (dot) fm
>
>
>
[excessive quoting removed by server]
On Monday 06 July 2009 09:29:09 am Dan Means wrote:
> but a nice generic Crystal type app would be ideal.
Maybe I'm just getting old but I hated Crystal. Way over the top. After
spending hundreds of dollars and maybe hundred hours setting up drill down
etc. I never had a client that ever said "wow" or even anything close. I
even asked a major client if they enjoyed the click and drill down. I got "I
don't use it".
My clients do not care about all that can be done with crystal. So I gave up
and just used Fox. And the same goes for foxfire, stonefield and others. I
show them how to create reports and two month later I watch as they use Excel
to create a new report.
And today I'm presented with the same situation. Yea, I could use something
other than ReportDesigner and reportWriter. But why?
Larry has been able to do everything the clients want so far. Sure there are
issues but nothing is a deal breaker (Thanks to Paul). At the moment we have
email (converted PDF to text and attachment of PDF), Fax, printing, and
review. We will soon have SMS text messages too.
The only thing I'd like to see is better tools to create reports. I had to
create a small app to generate test data for the XML's. Also the
ReportDesigner is not always stable.
On Mon, 06 Jul 2009 06:51 -0700, "John" <jfabiani@yolo.com> wrote:
>
> The only thing I'd like to see is better tools to create reports. I had
> to
> create a small app to generate test data for the XML's. Also the
> ReportDesigner is not always stable.
That's what I really mean I guess - an independent GUI-based report
designer that will connect to PostgreSQL, MySQL, Firebird, couple
others, maybe even MSSQL, producing portable report definition files
that can probably rendered to PDF by a seperate renderer, which in turn
can be leveraged by whatever language.
I can't believe there aren't scads of them out there in Linux land
already. Maybe they're too hard to write.
--
Alan Bourke
alanpbourke (at) fastmail (dot) fm
On Jul 6, 2009, at 2:32 PM, Alan Bourke wrote:
> I can't believe there aren't scads of them out there in Linux land
> already. Maybe they're too hard to write.
Crystal and similar products came about before the advent of the web
as the primary development platform. Since the web, very little effort
is being expended in the non-web fields. I guess if there was a strong
demand someone would have stepped up, just like if there was a strong
demand for desktop apps, Dabo would be used by millions.
-- Ed Leafe