BIRT, which stands for Business Intelligence and Reporting Tools, is an Eclipse-based open source software project that provides reporting and business intelligence capabilities for rich client and web applications, especially those based on Java and J2EE. BIRT is in fact a collection of development tools and technologies used for developing reports utilizing the BIRT runtime framework component on an application server. BIRT has two main components: a visual report designer within the Eclipse IDE for creating BIRT Reports, and a runtime component for generating reports that can be deployed to any Java environment.
This book has a fast-paced, task-driven, tutorial style, which provides understanding and structure, not just lists of steps to follow. The focus is on the most visible and familiar product built with the BIRT framework, which is the BIRT Report Designer. The BIRT Report Designer is an Eclipse plug-in that utilizes BIRT technologies to allow users to design reports in the BIRT document format. Also covered is the BIRT charting engine, which lets you add charts to your application.
Java developers who want to get reporting as quickly as possible will find this book useful. The book is published by Packt and is available now. For more information, please visit: http://www.packtpub.com/
