New Report Design - 2009

Introduction

The components/modules that are using Report engine are: Dashboard, Monitor, Tabulation Script, Report Viewer, Diagram Viewer. These modules send request of generation to report engine including:

• A data cache which contains all source data
• Stylesheets (including external and inline stylesheet) to apply
• Kind of presentation that the report should be exported as (pdf, excel, ppt, word, html, image)
• Other kinds of settings

The report engine takes the request, make calculation using the Interpreter, and then export the result into desired format.

A report consists of elements like: diagrams, images, text blocks, pages, paragraphs. The most important element is Diagram, which can be discriminated based on:

• Data
  • Cross Diagram
  • Standard Diagram
  • Tracking Diagram
  • Campaign Diagram

• Presentation type
  • Table chart
  • Image chart which include many kinds of chart like: pie, bar, line, funnel, area, radar etc.

Why a new system?

Current system drawbacks

• Heavy XML processing
• Heavy code duplication
• Inconsistent generation process

Thus it makes the cost of fixing bugs and maintain the old system greater than the cost of making an new system.

New system goals

• Remove the drawbacks of current system
• Side by side working with the old system
• Fully unit testing
• Unit/Integration tests can be run automatically
• Testing API must be simple enough for testers to join writing test cases
• Report API must be keep as simplest as possible
• Design documents must be officially registered on wiki page

Approach to new system

Steps are defined for approaching the new system, which are described below:

• Take the smallest possible case for prototyping (CrossDiagram with one axis for both row and column)
• Design the core functions to server the single case with full testing
• Approach in depth to:
  • Tabulation Script
  • Diagram Viewer
  • StyleSheet
  • Different presentation types
• Move on with Report and Report Viewer
• Move on with Monitor
• Move on with Dashboard
• Move on with data calculation optimization
• Performance refining => change design and test cases
• Full implementation for:
  • Cross Diagram
  • Other diagrams
  • All presentation types
• Replace the old system's gui components

Design details

• Report unit testing system
• Diagram generation process
• DiagramInfo
• Tabulation Script
• Tabulation Script for setting inline style to Table Chart
• Diagram viewer control
• Cross diagram settings control
• Report viewer control
• Integrating with Dashboard
• Integrating with Monitor
• Generic object visitor pattern
• Generic XML de-/serialization
• DiagramInfo de-/serialization
• Table chart builder
• Integrating Ajax.Pro and MS AJAX.NET Json Serialization
• Full CrossDigramImplementation
• TrackingDiagram
• Support for IFKA cross diagram layout
• XmlVisitor
• Pdf table layout

Presentations

• NewReportSystem.ppt
• NewReportSystem - Unit Test.ppt
• NewReportSystem - Table chart builder.ppt
• NewReportSystem - Diagram generation.ppt

Test cases

• Test case - Diagram viewer page

Lesson learn

This section lists all the:

• Mistakes
• Useful knowledge

that we have encountered during implementation.

• Code that MUST be improved
• Transferring Array object among different javascript context
• Associated array vs MS.AJAX NET vs for each loop

Current implementation status

Modules	Done	To be done	Time estimation
CrossDiagram	Rather stable with lot of unit tests	Missing feature (VN2950REP - CrossDiagram - Support missing features in 5.8): Weight Left header Show error	TODO
Nevron (image) charts	Bar/Line/Pie/Radar charts have been implemented for single case of CrossDiagram => However the design is not good enough !	A new design and implement will be done (VN2894REP - Reimplement NevronBuilder)	TODO
Table charts	Rather complete	Support exporting to PDF with nice layout (VN2808REP - Make PDF output look nice without fiddling with stylesheet) More request from the customer (VN2813REP - Conditional Formatting)	TODO
Stylesheet	The stylesheet is kept as is intentionally in order to keep changing at the minimal level	Redefine the hierarchy of stylesheet classes	TODO
Tabulation Script	Rather complete	Add missing features (VN2951REP - TabulationScript - Support all PDF related scripts)	TODO
Web controls	GUI for crossdiagram is nice enough	More advance implementation with real Skin support (VN2895REP - Support skin for Setting control) Increase the ratio of unit testing on GUI	TODO
Unit tests	Rather complete for crossdiagram 3D image assertion => at last resort compare byte to byte, another approach is comparing by calculating hash value	Integrate with CruiseControl for running everyday Web-testing for testing controls Ppt/Excel assertion => Use new XML format of Office (VN2779REP - Upgrade Slide component) Configuration settings for hard-coded values	TODO
Optimization	Stylesheet rendering is being optimized for using with AJAX	Code profiling must be done => minor change in design Performance counter must be implemented Generation time must less than current system	TODO

Document revisions

Version No.	Date	Changed By	Description	Svn revision
0.1	27.04.2009	Nguyen Trung Chinh	Create the first version for working with a single case of CDG	NA
0.1	20.07.2009	Nguyen Trung Chinh	Refine the document	NA
0.2	30.07.2009	Nguyen Trung Chinh	Finish version 0.2	54885
0.3	27.10.2009	Nguyen Trung Chinh	Update implementation status	57470
0.4	31.12.2009	Nguyen Trung Chinh	Update status and new projects	59167