[sims] SIMs and Command Reporter

[PhilNeal]

I wasn't referring to anyone just a principle - really!

[PhilNeal]

Localzuk, I've got hold of the NDA and the wording that you quote isn't isn't there. I'm not saying that it wasn't but this is what it says:

 

"a)The documentation will not be used to reengineer or decompile the SIMS software to allow the development of software that competes with SIMS or any of it’s modules that may exist on the date the documentation (TPID) is produced. It is envisaged parties may produce software that competes with SIMS and use this documentation to produce an interface between the products."

 

Hopefully this is clearer.

Edited March 26, 2010 by PhilNeal

[localzuk]

Looks like you've updated it since I saw it since last year.

[PhilNeal]

It's possible - I'd like to see what you were given if you were able to send it to me [email protected].

 

Thanks

 

Phil

[vikpaw]

...

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.

 

Surely, you could counter this, by doing the same yourselves...?

Offer variants with a new skin to make it more user friendly / accessible if that is what the market wants, especially if it's easily done...

[iceman]

Thanks - it is working beautifully now.

 

J Pratt

 

Please could you explain what you did to make it work as I am having the same problem. I have a report focussed on student with a subreport on attendance. I filter attendance to be after a certain date and before another one, currently very far apart. These are what I want to set via parameters. I ran the report with the \PARAMDEF switch but couldn't see any reference to my dates in it so don't know what to change (or even how to format the date if I did!) I even set the repoprt to prompt on running but got the same paramdef output. At the risk of boring you my paramdef output is below.

 

Howard

 

 

 

 

SIMS.net Command Line Report Exporting Utility 7.136.29.0

Copyright ¸ Capita Business Services Ltd 1984-2010. All rights reserved.

Logging into to SIMS.net as user hom-it

Getting reports for user hom-it

Report 'HOM_ExportAllSessionAattendanceMarksXMLS' found.

Generating Report Parameter Definition file

attributeFormDefault='qualified' elementFormDefault='qualified'>

Generating Complete

[vikpaw]

Have you got default dates entered in the report, so that when you get the above export, it has some data in it as an example? This was suggested by losojos earlier.

 

I can see some Date and DateRange elements, but no actualy data in between the tags.

[LosOjos]

As Vik rightly says, you need to set default dates on your report so that the Paramdef contains example data, then you can see what you need to modify in order to run your report.

 

I wrote a script a short while back for dynamically setting date ranges for Command Reporter, see this thread (it might help you write your own script):

http://www.edugeek.net/forums/mis-systems/66215-sims-net-reporting.html#post593543

[iceman]

Yes I do.

I tried it with the dates simply set as part of the filter and then again with the filter ticked to say prompt at runtime (but with the same dates in the boxes, so these ought to be the default?). I am assuming that the dates I set as my filter are my parameters. Unless there is somewhere else where I should be explicitly naming parameters? The report is correctly filtering with the dates set in it but the earlier one is set to 30 Aug 2010. Obviously as time goes on the amount of data is going to become huge.

Howard

[iceman]

Losojos, I can see what your script is doing but , like you say, I can't see the parameters I need in the output I get with /PARAMEF

[LosOjos]

Are the dates you're trying to filter part of the report filters or are you trying to set the effective date of the report?

 

Try setting an output file, then upload the resulting XML file here please?

[iceman]

Are the dates you're trying to filter part of the report filters or are you trying to set the effective date of the report?

 

Try setting an output file, then upload the resulting XML file here please?

 

My report already had an output file (as a csv not xml). I'm still unsure what you mean by parameter. I know what a parameter is - (I've taught computing for 25 years!) - but I'm not sure what how SIMS lets us refer to them. In case its any help this is what my report definition looks like. You can see that I am setting default dates in the filter (also tried ticking the 'prompt at runtime' box but I don't really want to do this as these reports run overnight. I can see no mention of parameters or how to define them anywhere in the report designer. There is nothing under 'filter students' as I'm not filtering the students, I'm filtering the date in the attendance sub report. (although even the word 'filter' is a bit odd. I'm used to using 'select' in SQL.)

 

Interestingly this time when I ran it with /paramdef I got no output (well, only that shown below the report definition shown here.

Howard

 

Report Name: SITKA_AllSessionAttendance

 

effective on: 05/02/2011

 

Data area: Student - Population: On roll

 

Data Fields: Admission number, UPN, Surname, Forename, Legal Surname, Legal Forename, Gender, Reg group, Year group; for attendance marks of each student where Mark date is after 30 Aug 2010 and Mark date is before 05 Feb 2035: Mark, Mark description, Mark date, AM/PM, Session, Day of week, Month, Statistical meaning

 

Filter Students

 

Use the default sort order: Surname, Legal Forename

 

Default Output: Text

 

Report Title:

 

 

 

the output with the /paramdef switch

 

SIMS.net Command Line Report Exporting Utility 7.136.29.0

Copyright ¸ Capita Business Services Ltd 1984-2010. All rights reserved.

Logging into to SIMS.net as user hom-it

Getting reports for user hom-it

Report 'SITKA_AllSessionAttendance' found.

Generating Report Parameter Definition file

Generating Complete

[LosOjos]

If you want to be able to change the date range from Command Reporter, you must tick 'prompt at runtime' on any filters you apply and want to be able to change. Command Reporter will not actually prompt for input, instead it takes an XML file defining the parameters, so fully automatic execution of the report is still possible.

 

The reason you get no output from /PARAMDEF is that you haven't ticked prompt at run time, so SIMS doesn't give you the option to change any parameters. Try running the Command Reporter again with the /PARAMDEF tag and 'prompt at runtime' ticked, but also define an output file so we can see exactly what your paramdef file should look like (just add /output:"filename.xml" to the end of your call to Command Reporter)

[vikpaw]

@iceman not sure how you're defined the output file, as by default it becomes a csv, well it did for me.

basically, it's probably overwritten your old output file. just open that and it should be the xml output.

 

The output you've described above is correct, and it should update the output file for you.

 

As an example, i've run one of my own reports that have a subfilter on dates, it's for medical events.

 

With the output file set, and paramdef switch i get a full page of xml, at the end after </xs:schema> and before i get the key parts i believe you are missing:

 

<Parameter id="PZliJoDsjLeQr6G/EyWPIA==" subreportfilter="True">

<Name>DateName>

 

<Type>DateRangeType>

 

<PromptText>Date is betweenPromptText>

 

- <Values>

- <DateRange>

<Start>2010-09-18T13:46:25Start>

 

<End>2010-12-15T13:46:25End>

 

DateRange>

 

 

Values>

 

 

Parameter>

 

ReportParameters>

 

So first i ran this:

commandreporter /trusted /report:"bisj - medical events by date" /paramdef /output:"test.xml"

 

producing the parameter file.

 

Next running this:

commandreporter /trusted /report:"bisj - medical events by date" /output:"results" /paramfile:"test.xml"

 

Gave me a file called results.csv

 

I know you've probably tried something similar, but maybe this helps...

[iceman]

Sorry I've not replied earlier but I've been away. VikPaw - that seems a very clear example, thank you. I'll try these suggestions again and post my results (may be a few days as I'm not around again for a while). I appreciate the efforts being made. It would be good to get this sorted as although my current system works - exporting everthing after august 2010 - the output file is getting unnecessarily bigger and bigger!

 

- got my paramdef file now, looks like below. will try editing it and running it with CR.

 

  
- 
- 
- 
- 
- 
- 
- 
- 
  
  
  
- 
- 
- 
  
  
  
  
- 
- 
- 
  
  
  
 
 
 
- 
- 
- 
  
  
 
 
 
- 
- 
- 
  
  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  
  
 
 
 
 
 
 
- 
 Mark date 
 Date 
 MarkBeforeDate 
- 
 2011-02-21T08:55:23 
 
 
- 
 Mark date 
 Date 
 MarkAfterDate 
- 
 2010-08-30T09:21:30 
 
 
 

Edited February 20, 2011 by iceman

[vikpaw]

cool.

See there are the bottom, now you have parameter tags and value tags for your MarkBeforeDate and MarkAfterDate from the subreport filter, which is currently bound to 30th august 2010 to 21st feb 2011.

So if you modify those parts of the file and re-run, you should get the desired output. First though, do as i did, and just run the output file back in unchanged, to make sure it's all working and you've got the syntax and all correct.

[iceman]

Thanks for your help VikPaw. Using parameters opens up a whole new world of possibilities. Might even get sims to do something useful for me . Shame SIMS has to go about it in such a convoluted way. What's wrong with simply '/MarkBefore:2011/02/20' on the command line like other DOS programs? Nevermind; I will be using a program that I wrote in Pascal to actually run the CR line so I guess I simply use my code to rewrite the param file with the dates I want (don't care about the time so I will leave that as is) and all will be fine! I'll try that when I get back from the mountains. Thank you very much. Howard

[PhillipHamlyn]

Iceman;

 

I can probably shed some light on that design decision; we have often found problems with the DOS limitaiton of >230ish characters on a command line - using a response file removes that problem, which often occurs when the path to the utility is taken into account and the command shell in "homed" into another directory.

 

Hope that explains the choice.

 

Phillip Hamlyn

Capita.

[iceman]

Philip, Thank you, I can see that makes sense given the dos line limit. But I don't see why we need to jump through so many hoops to get the paramdef file in the first place, then have to duplicate nearly a page worth of text exactly right except for the small bits that need to change. I can see why you cannot use positional parameters but even using a file to pass the parameters they could be done as simple named parameters - even typed ones. But parameters are not even mentioned in the report design. It appears one has to provide a textual prompt to a user that will never exist and then that prompt is used as the identifier for the parameter, at least it serves to identify it to me if not to the SQL. It all seems a very unusual way of doing it.

Howard