[sims] SIMs and Command Reporter

[RuAware]

I am trying to create an auto script to dump a rtf on the network that shows all children not in school when the report is run.

 

I have created the report in reports using

 

Attendance Marks

Is not Present

Mark Date

 

As filters

 

Running it is fine and gives me the result i want either using sims or the command reporting tool.

 

Running through sims - i can change the date at prompt for "Mark Date"

 

But i need to tell the command reporting tool to use the current date on run.

 

Anyone know how i can do this?

 

 

Thank you

 

Jamie

[dhicks]

But i need to tell the command reporting tool to use the current date on run.

 

I seem to remember you have to pass an XML file with your parameters to CommandReporter. Sorry, I don't have any more details to hand at the moment and that's all I can remember.

 

--

David Hicks

[RuAware]

Thanks for the reply... I am trying to pass paramaters using xml but it is just not listening!! Any help greatly appreciated

 

Thanks

[MattMitchell]

Ask your LA or Capita support for the third-party reporting documentation - apparently that'll tell you how to do it.

[Greg]

you can do this via a bat file.

You need to get the date and then convert into the correct format in DOS. The required date format is yyyy-mm-dd

 

You can do this with the following code

for /f "tokens=1-4 delims=/ " %%f in ('date /t') do (

set dd=%%f

set mm=%%g

set yyyy=%%h

)

 

Then call commandreporter with the required parameters and add the following between the tags

subreportfilter='True'>%yyyy%-%mm%-%dd%

 

Make sure that you have a corresponding date filter set in the report.

[robins]

Thansk - thats clever. With regards the SIMS report designer - I've asked for the concept of a current date range like today, this week, this month, this term etc to be added to the data dictionary in some future release.

Simailarly it would be nice to choose 'current user' as a filter so its not necessary to customise report designs to only pick up records that relate to them, eg kids in their class or behaviour incidents attributed to them etc.

[J_Pratt]

I'm having great trouble making commandreporter do what I want it to. I have got it running reports, but it does not use the parameters I try to give it. This is what I have rtied to use:

 

C:\Program Files\SIMS\SIMS .net>commandreporter /user:MYUSERNAME /password:MYPASSWORD /report:"JPs Todays Register" /params:"2010-01-15" /output:"C:\current register.txt"

 

The report runs fine, but it doesn't use the parameter (instead it gives me the register for 5/10/09 as that is the default day in the prompt when you run the report in sims).

 

Any idea how I can make it use my parameter to limit it to today's register.

 

PS I'm generating the above line in VBA from Microsoft Access so I can import the data to a database to process it.

 

Cheers

 

J Pratt

[MattMitchell]

Have you tried running commandreporter without an output switch (or whatever the syntax is) to see what the parameters should look like? I'm pretty sure you have to name the parameter.

[J_Pratt]

I have tried doing that, but I'm not sure which bit I'm looking for.

 

My report starts:

 

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

 

The mark date data is also very complicated, as it is includes a time.

 

Mark Date in the main report is recorded as either:

• 2009-10-01T09:00:00+01:00
  
• 2009-10-01T13:00:00+01:00
  

 

I have tried changing in my original attempt to , but it still ignored it.

 

J Pratt

[LosOjos]

if you run the report from commandreporter with the /PARAMDEF switch, the output file will be the paramdef file you need to pass to set parameters. Just read the XML from that and alter the relevant values to specify your parameters.

 

EDIT:

Set a default value for the parameters manually in Sims before you run commandreporter, that way you get an example in the output XML

Edited January 18, 2010 by LosOjos

[J_Pratt]

Thanks - it is working beautifully now.

 

J Pratt

[vikpaw]

Thansk - thats clever. With regards the SIMS report designer - I've asked for the concept of a current date range like today, this week, this month, this term etc to be added to the data dictionary in some future release.

Simailarly it would be nice to choose 'current user' as a filter so its not necessary to customise report designs to only pick up records that relate to them, eg kids in their class or behaviour incidents attributed to them etc.

 

good idea have you got a change request number we can vote on..?

[browolf]

anychance someone can email me the documentation for command reporter? /pm

[penfold_99]

anychance someone can email me the documentation for command reporter? /pm

 

The documentation is bound by an agreement with capita, so can't be shared.

 

To be frank you have more information here plus the /? output of command reported than the documentation contains.

[vikpaw]

The documentation is bound by an agreement with capita, so can't be shared.

 

To be frank you have more information here plus the /? output of command reported than the documentation contains.

 

lol - that's shocking

[browolf]

I managed to get hold of it from from our sims maintenance company. not a huge lot in there but some vb stuff might be helpful.

 

whats that other that other thing called that you have to pay for to be able to talk to sims directly?

[localzuk]

I managed to get hold of it from from our sims maintenance company. not a huge lot in there but some vb stuff might be helpful.

 

whats that other that other thing called that you have to pay for to be able to talk to sims directly?

 

The business objects, which you have to sign an NDA for, and has a list of restrictions such as you're not allowed to write anything to compete with any other Capita software, or talk about the NDA.

[penfold_99]

The business objects, which you have to sign an NDA for, and has a list of restrictions such as you're not allowed to write anything to compete with any other Capita software, or talk about the NDA.

 

Plus your not allow to say anything bad but true about capita.

[MattMitchell]

whats that other that other thing called that you have to pay for to be able to talk to sims directly?

 

It did say on the website (back when it was Redirect or similar) that you could get the BO API docs for free, as long as you didn't want partner status, and (presumably) signed an NDA.

 

No mention was made of giving out the SQL stuff for free though, which seems a shame...

[browolf]

so is the "3rd party SDK" more than just the command reporter chm documentation? Edited March 26, 2010 by browolf

[LosOjos]

3rd Party SDK (as I understand it) is a set of DLL that you can package in to your own app to give you access to lots of Sims functionality. You can actually do this with the DLL's in your SIMS.net program folder, though I don't know whether that's a breach of contract, and with no documentation it'd be hard to put anything usable together anyway.

[PhilNeal]

Just for the record our partner agreement does not say that a company cannot compete with Capita. There is a clause that says that a third party "shall not be in breach of" damaging sales simply by having a competing product. You only have to look at the partners we have to see that we do not insist on not competing.

 

There is a clause that says that you can't take our code and then broadcast things about it. However anyone that reads the press will know that companies have printed negative things about us and they are still a partner.

 

Free speach is allowed and negative comments are how any company can see where it needs to improve.

[localzuk]

Phil - sorry, but I don't know what you mean by saying it doesn't state they can't compete... This is directly from the NDA (which we did not sign, therefore I am not covered by the clause saying I can't discuss it - something you may wish to take up with your legal people...):

 

The documentation will not be used to develop software that competes

with SIMS or any of it’s modules that may exist on the date the

documentation (TPID) is produced.

 

How is that not a clause stating that partners can't compete??

[PhilNeal]

I'll certainly take a look at it because I can see what you mean however it is clear that TPs do use our data access code to write into SIMS with applications that compete directly.

 

What I am aware of is that it is possible to use our data access code/database (that have cost us literally millions) and put a new skin on it very easily and cheaply and that we do frown upon.

[matt40k]

Wonder who Phil is referring to, could it be the company that just released a web version of SIMS? Surely not. Bad Matt.