CMFReportTool

Copyright (C) 2002, net-labs Systemhaus GmbH.

CMFReportTool is an Extension to Zope/CMF and Plone.

Similar to HTML-Skins one can use PML to describe Dynamic Content as PDF-Document using the advanced layout-capabilities of reportlab's Platypus module. The MarkupLanguage is inspired by pythonpoint (example from reportlab) but is provides all features of the Platypus module.

The Product supplies a tool: portal_report and several skins as well as an Installation routine.

The portal_report Tool renders PML Documents to pdf and converts StructuredText-Documents to PML. the provided skins are mostly examples of views for CMF Standard Types.

The Rendering-Process uses a script with traversal to determine the PDF-Templatename and the PDF-Documentname. The templatename is looked up in the context of portal_report, which is folderish and usually holds the portals templates. the documentname is looked up in the context of the object (here) and the portal_skins Tool will provide the right objects. PML Documents are (Alt)PageTemplates that are parsed/interpreted and result in a valid (hopefully valid - the parser is not perfect yet) PML Document that is rendered using reportlab. the portal_report Tool returns a buffer that needs to be return to the client (setting the header to application/pdf is required - look at the example-skins)

External Resources (Images) can be located in ZODB or Filesystem. A filename-Attribute knows two url-schemes: file:// and zodb://.

The Markup-Language (PML - PageMarkupLanguage) defines:

• Templates: Templates define static elements, stylesheets as well as Frames. It works like Quark-XPress or FrameMaker. Predefined and linked Frames are filled with Flowables from the Document (think like slots in PageTemplates, but content is concated and nicely distributed across the frames.
• Documents: Documents define dynamic Content, Images, Vectorgraphics as well as Metadata. This part is usually generated when the client requests a view as PDF and it is filled in (using PageTemplates) with the objects/lists values and rendered.
• Styles: Paragraph- and Table-Styles can be preconfigured within the Template-Header.
• Static-Elements: FixedImage,InfoString,Line,Rectangle,.. all these Static-Element-Types are usable within the Templates Pagedefinition to setup static content.
• Frames: Frames hold Flowables (Dynamic-Elements). They are linked via Names to enable things like: different Startpage, left/right-page of books, etc.
• Flowables: Dynamic-Elements are called Flowables. They are aranged within the predefined order in Frames. Available Types are: Paragraph, Preformatted, Table, Image, Line, Rectangle, ...

What is needed ??

• >= Zope-2.5.1
• CMF-1.3
• PageTemplates

CVS is available:

http://collective.sourceforge.net

This tool is made by

Ulrich Eck (net-labs Systemhaus GmbH, Germany) email: [email protected]