XML-Publisher 5.6.2, datasource and users

Last week I installed XML-Publisher 5.6.2 using the Windows installer. After this simple and painless installation we can now configure it to connect to our database against which we want to run our reports. You connect to your XML-Publisher using a browser like Internet Explorer and provide the username and password of a user with the XMLP_ADMIN role.

Then you navigate to the admin tab.

On this tab you can define besides your Data sources also the different types of deliveries, administer users, roles and permissions and refresh the Metadata.

So lets create a new data source by selecting the JDBC tab and pressing the Add Connection button. In my case I want connect to my SQLLIMS database. So I specify a name for my data source, the URL in the format jdbc:oracle:thin:@host:port:sid, the username, password, database driver class and now I can test the connection by pressing the “Test Connection” button. After the connection is confirmed successfully you can save the information pressing the Apply button.

You can add as many connections as you want. The information is saved in the datasources.xml file in Orahome\xmlpserver\Admin\DataSource. So if you have huge number of connections and multiple XML-Publisher installations you could simply use this file for you other installations.

We can also create users and roles. The system comes with 6 default roles, each with its own  set of privileges. The list below is taken from the help file and is missing the role XML Publisher Online Template. I suppose you will need this role to adress any template.

If this does not fit your needs  or if you want to limit access to specific reports you can create new roles and assign these to users or to other user defined roles. Roles can contain besides access privelege to folders also contain other roles.

After setting up your role system you can create users and assign the role to the user.

Again all this information is stored in 2 xml files on the server:

• Principals.xml stores the user and role information
• Security.xml stores the customer role information