Preface

The examples in this book are intended to help you learn about Oracle Reports Developer and its features.

Intended audience

This book is intended for anyone who uses Report Builder to build reports. The needs of both novice and advanced users are addressed. Each chapter contains step-by-step instructions to build a report from start to finish. Each report that you build will demonstrate how to use many of the powerful features in Report Builder.

Structure

This book contains the following chapters:

Table 0-1 Summary of manual contents

Chapter	Description
Chapter 1, "Basic Report Builder Concepts"	Contains basic information to get you started.
Chapter 2, "Building a Report with Conditional Formatting"	Describes how to build a report that uses conditional formatting so that the appearance of your report automatically changes when certain specified criteria are met.
Chapter 3, "Building and Applying Report Templates"	Describes how to create a template and apply it to a report. Templates define common characteristics and objects in a report. When you apply a template to a report, the report takes on the characteristics defined in the template.
Chapter 4, "Building a Report for the Web"	Describes how to create an HTML report that can be viewed on the web, including how to configure Web Settings properties.
Chapter 5, "Building a Report with Sections"	Describes how to define report sections, and how to specify different distribution criteria for these sections.
Chapter 6, "Building a Report with Ref Cursor Queries"	Describes how to define a ref cursor query, which uses PL/SQL to fetch data.
Chapter 7, "Building a Report Using Express Data"	Describes how to build and edit a report using Express data, and how to add custom measures.

Notational conventions

The following conventions are used in this book:

Table 0-2 Notational conventions used in manual

Convention	Meaning
boldface text	Used for emphasis. Also used for menu items, button names, labels, and other user interface elements.
italicized text	Used to introduce new terms.
`courier font`	Used for path and file names, and for code and text that you type.
`COURIER CAPS`	Used for: File extensions (.`PLL` or .`FMX`) Environment variables SQL commands Built-ins/package names Executable names

Additional information in online help

Some of the tasks in this manual tell you how to access online help for additional information. If you see a table like the one that follows, use the steps to get more information about the task you are performing:

For online help on this topic, choose Help->Report Builder Help Topics

On the Index page, type...
report wizard, about

Then click Display to view the help topic...
Report Wizard: Welcome page