ActiveReports Developer 7
Reports with XML Data
See Also Support Forum
ActiveReports Developer 7 > ActiveReports Developer Guide > Samples and Walkthroughs > Walkthroughs > Page Report Walkthroughs > Reports with XML Data

Glossary Item Box

This walkthrough explains the steps involved in connecting a page report to an XML data source and creating a dataset. It also demonstrates the use of the List control.

The walkthrough is split up into the following activities:

Note: This walkthrough uses the Factbook sample database. By default, in ActiveReports Developer, the Factbook.rdsx file is located at [User Documents folder]\ComponentOne Samples\ActiveReports Developer 7\Data\Factbook.rdsx.

When you complete this walkthrough you get a layout that looks similar to the following at design time and at runtime.

Design Time Layout


Runtime Layout


ShowTo add an ActiveReport to the Visual Studio project

  1. Create a new Visual Studio project.
  2. From the Project menu, select Add New Item.
  3. In the Add New Item dialog that appears, select ActiveReports 7 Page Report and in the Name field, rename the file as ExchangeRates.
  4. Click the Add button to open a new page report in the designer.

See Adding an ActiveReport to a Project for information on adding different report layouts.

ShowTo connect the report to a data source

  1. In the Report Explorer, right-click the Data Sources node and select the Add Data Source option or select Data Source from the Add button.
  2. In the Report Data Source Dialog that appears, select the General page and in the Name field, enter a name like Factbook.
  3. On this page, check the Shared Reference checkbox.
  4. Click the Browse button and select Factbook.rdsx, which is located in [User Documents folder]\ComponentOne Samples\ActiveReports Developer 7\Data. See Connect to a Data Source for information on connecting to a data source.

ShowTo add a dataset

  1. In the Report Explorer, right-click the data source node and select the Add Data Set option or select Data Set from the Add button.
  2. In the DataSet Dialog that appears, select the General page and enter the name of the dataset as ExchangeRates.
  3. On the Query page, enter the following XML path into the Query text box to access data for every country except "World":
    //country [@name != 'World']
  4. On the Fields page, enter the values in the table below to create fields for your report. Values for XML data fields must be valid XPath expressions.
    Field Name Type Value
    Name Database Field @name
    Currency Database Field ./ExchangeRates/Currency
    2004 Database Field ./ExchangeRates/VsUSD2004
    2003 Database Field ./ExchangeRates/VsUSD2003
    2002 Database Field ./ExchangeRates/VsUSD2002
    2001 Database Field ./ExchangeRates/VsUSD2001
    2000 Database Field ./ExchangeRates/VsUSD2000
  5. Click OK to close the dialog. Your data set and queried fields appear as nodes in the Report Explorer.

ShowTo add controls to the report

  1. From the toolbox, drag a List data region onto the design surface of the report and go to the Properties window to set the DataSetName property to ExchangeRates. 
  2. From the Report Explorer, drag the Name field onto the list, center it at the top and go to the Properties window to set the FontSize property to 14pt.
  3. From the Report Explorer, drag the following fields onto the list with properties set as described in the table below.
    Field Name Property Name
    Currency Location: 1.125in, 0.5in
    Size: 2.25in, 0.25in
    2004 Location: 4.5in, 0.875in
    Size: 1in, 0.25in
    2003 Location: 4.5in, 1.25in
    Size: 1in, 0.25in
    2002 Location: 4.5in, 1.625in
    Size: 1in, 0.25in
    2001 Location: 4.5in, 2in
    Size: 1in, 0.25in
    2000 Location: 4.5in, 2.375in
    Size: 1in, 0.25in
    Note: You will notice that the expressions created for these fields are different than usual. Because Visual Basic syntax does not allow an identifier that begins with a number, any numeric field names must be treated as strings in expressions.
  4. From the toolbox, drag a TextBox onto the list and go to the Properties window to set the properties as described in the table below to combine static text with a field value.
    Property Name Property Value
    Location 0.145in, 0.875in
    Size 3in, 0.25in
    Value ="Value of " & Fields!Currency.Value & " versus US$ for year:"
  5. From the toolbox, drag TextBox controls onto the list and go to the Properties window to set the properties as described in the table below to create static labels.

    ShowTextBox1

    Property Name Property Value
    Location 0.125in, 0.5in
    Size 0.75in, 0.25in
    FontWeight Bold
    Value Currency:

    ShowTextBox2

    Property Name Property Value
    Location 3.375in, 0.875in
    Size 1in, 0.25in
    TextAlign Right
    Value 2004:

    ShowTextBox3

    Property Name Property Value
    Location 3.375in, 1.25in
    Size 1in, 0.25in
    TextAlign Right
    Value 2003:

    ShowTextBox4

    Property Name Property Value
    Location 3.375in, 1.625in
    Size 1in, 0.25in
    TextAlign Right
    Value 2002:

    ShowTextBox5

    Property Name Property Value
    Location 3.375in, 2in
    Size 1in, 0.25in
    TextAlign Right
    Value 2001:

    ShowTextBox6

    Property Name Property Value
    Location 3.375in, 2.375in
    Size 1in, 0.25in
    TextAlign Right
    Value 2000:

ShowTo view the report

  • Click the preview tab to view the report at design time.

OR

See Also

©2014. ComponentOne, a division of GrapeCity. All rights reserved.