Re: HTML and PDF Reports

Dave Odom wrote:

Joe,
I'd like to learn about EGL and see if it has any applications here. I think we have most all our reporting needs satisfied by IBM's DataQuant but there will be a need for some simple Web based applications that can call SQL stored procedures on the i5 or send SQL and return one or more records at a time. Is EGL the best road for such applications or JavaScript/HTML or what?

EGL has inboard support for SQL. It's really very easy to invoke SQL, load up arrays of records and drop them onto a page. You can also insert and update records using SQL, either with standard insert statements or via updatable cursors. You can also call or open stored procedures (open allows you to process the results one row at a time).

You define the fields to process in a "record", which identifies the columns to process. The record is a metadata construct: it can be used to write the EGL code (such as "get customers") and it can also be used to paint pages using the WYSIWYG editor. For example, if you drop an array of customers onto the page, the JSF editor will paint a table with column headings and so on. This table is then automatically tied ("bound") to the array, so that whatever you do in your EGL code automatically is displayed on the page.

It's really quite powerful.

Joe