Study On Reporting Technologies And Implementation Of A Reporting Tool

Currently, only a few reporting tools under UNIX, which support database application development, are available and they do not fulfill the developer's and user's needs well. Hereafter, we conduct study on reporting technologies to develop a better reporting tool under UNIX.First, we study some reporting tools, identify and discuss the three main problems that reporting tools have to address, which are report data, report format and report output.Then, we construct a reporting tool model. In our model, report data definition language and report format description language are used with interpreters to interpreter them. Patterns such as pipe-and-filter and interpreter are utilized in the model, providing reusability, extensibility and easiness to implement.Last, we build a reporting tool under UNIX based on the model, which has been integrated into a real world database application.The experience makes us believe that with some improvement and refinement, the model may be used to implement a more powerful and applicable reporting tool under UNIX.