Launching Reports from Progress Character Mode Programs

Prior to QAD .NET UI 2.9.5 (2012 EE), there were limitations in the ability for a Progress program to be able to automatically launch a QAD Reporting Framework report. The fundamental issue was that the report must be rendered in a QAD .NET UI process on a Windows machine, and Progress programs are not run in this environment. The Scheduled Report API (introduced in QAD 2010.1 EE) first opened the door to this possibility, allowing the Progress program to call the API to allow the report to be scheduled to run on a (Windows) report server in batch. This approach still had major limitations: a time delay between the time at which the report is scheduled and when it later gets run on the server, and also a limited ability for the user of the Progress program to have access to the report output.

Important: Because some maintenance programs in the 2012 EE release use this mechanism to invoke reports, it is necessary to install, configure, and run the QAD Reporting Framework Service in order for these programs to run properly.

The service mode (see Service Mode) provides the basis for a solution of the time delay: by scheduling the report to be run in the virtual immediate batch ID, the report is run typically within a matter of seconds from the time it was scheduled.

Furthermore, a new mechanism was introduced into the QAD .NET UI such that if the Progress program is initiated from a QAD .NET UI session, it can now invoke the launching of a new QAD .NET UI tab containing a report viewer that will display the report output to the user. The viewer runs in a mode where it polls the report server for the output of the scheduled report. Once the report has completed on the server, the viewer then automatically displays it for the user.

Note: If the Progress program is not launched from within the QAD .NET UI (for example, on a terminal), then it can still launch the report but will not be able to view the output. However, the report output can still be saved on the Web server or sent to a printer.

Note: This capability relies on the Scheduled Report Progress API, which requires a component called the “Service Interface Layer.” This component is not included with QAD Standard Edition but can be acquired by contacting QAD Services.

If you are interested in doing development to invoke reports from Progress programs, you should order the free QAD product called QAD Reporting Framework Source, which contains API supporting materials and examples and other resources useful for report developers, including launching reports and report viewers from Progress programs.