Last updated May 8, 2009

This document provides some tips and tricks in using BIRT reports with
cascade parameters and multi-value selections.

I am describing three interesting tricks:

1. How to enable multi-select capability in a report cascade parameter
presented as a list.
2. How to use the multi-selected values in building the IN clause of a
query
3. How to allow user entry from a combo box to drive the next level of a
parameter cascade
4. How to pass a multi-value selection as a parameter to a drill-down
report.

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Can we enable multi-selection when working with Cascading parameters
in a BIRT report? Note that this Cascading parameter dialog box (on the
right) does not present the option of multi-selecting in a list while the
dialog for building a standard report parameter (on the left) does.

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So, to achieve a multi-select on a CASCADING parameters we must
change the ‘Scalar Parameter Type’ to Multi Value (under the Advanced
properties section of the parameter)

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The following link has some interesting info: http://download.birt-
exchange.com/products/demos/birt/Parameters/Parameters.html

Uses the dataset filter IN option to use a multi-value parameter

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Here I’ve build a filter expression for the dataset that uses the In clause
and the report multi-value ACCESSION parameter

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Note that an expression can be inserted in the beforeOpen event handler
of the dataset (under Advanced properties). However, it still does not work
with multi-value parameters

After much head banging an important breakthrough!

By using toString() instead of value, I’m able to indeed get what I want, a
comma separated list of values that can be further manipulated using the
replace function! See next slide.

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It seems that unless the toString() function is applied we get back a java
object that can’t be directly used with java script!
(See next slide for what you get with value instead of toString)

So in conclusion multi-value properties can be used in expressions and

can be formatted as IN clauses for SQL

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The dynamic query clause:

this.queryText="select c.accession, a.peptide, a.frequency, c.description,

b.predictedmass_mono, b.predictedpi, c.polcrc64 FROM (select distinct
rp.peptide, count(*) FREQUENCY from REF_PEPTIDE@tip_link rp, ( select
distinct peptide from ref_peptide@tip_link rpep, ref_protein@tip_link rpro
where rpep.polCRC64=rpro.polCRC64 and rpro.accession IN
('"+params["ACCESSIONS"].toString().replace(/,/g,"','")+"') and
rpep.missed_cleavage=0 )q where q.PEPTIDE=rp.peptide group by
rp.peptide having count(rp.peptide)=1 )a, ref_peptide@tip_link b,
ref_protein@tip_link c where a.peptide=b.peptide and
b.polCRC64=c.polCRC64 and c.accession IN
('"+params["ACCESSIONS"].toString().replace(/,/g,"','")+"') order by
accession desc";

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All current examples of BIRT report cascading parameters start with a
parameter list from which the user can start the cascade.

I did not find any examples where the user can start the cascade by
typing a fragment of the query text, preferably with Oracle ‘wild’
characters. When the initial list is long the query becomes slow and the
difficulty of finding the term in the list increases dramatically.

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This is a useful trick to reduce the complexity of the initial list that the
user will select from. Basically it creates an INDEX of the GENEID (s) in the
REF_PROTEIN database and appends the % oracle ‘wild’ character. When
a user selects one of the options this parameter is passed into the next
cascading dataset which searches with this string.

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Once a gene index has been selected the cascading parameter GeneIDlist
is populated from the query shown in the previous slide. In turn selecting
the geneID populates the gene-related proteins and it populates the last
parameter list where the user can select the proteins of interest.

The query that populates the protein list is shown below;

Select DISTINCT rpro.POLCRC64, rpro.REFDBID, rpro.DEscription

, rpro.REFDBID||' : '||rpro.DEscription XDESCRIPTION
from ref_protein rpro
where rpro.geneid IN (?)
order by description asc

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All cascading parameters require to be bound to a data set and can be
only displayed as list boxes or COMBO boxes (and there hides the
solution!)

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This was a totally serendipitous discovery and I have not seen another
example like this.
It is indeed very useful. The only limitation is that we still have to start the
cascade with a data set based combo box rather than a simple text box.
This is still a small price to pay for the increased filtering functionality and
flexibility.

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It would be useful to query for a ‘list of items’ which can then be
submitted to a downstream report as a parameter

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User selections made from the multi-select list are reported and links are
provided for submitting this list to one or more tools that accept an
accession list as a parameter. In the example shown the list is reported
and two links are provided so that this list can be submitted either to the
AIMS or the Peptide Degeneracy Calculators. How do we link the multi-
select parameter to these drill-down reports?

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To use the value of the multi-select parameter in an IN query clause, I
need to format it appropriately and then pass it in to the
corresponding drill-down report parameter.
1. The inSelectedAccession parameter is set in the beforeOpen event
handler of the REFSELECTION data set (which also refines the query
for the data set for the first stage report).

I then engineered appropriate hyperlinks to drill-down reports that can

work with the inSelectedAccesion parameter.

This way I can link to a drill-down report passing the value of this
parameter as the IN clause to the next report.

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The parameter is formatted exactly as required by the AIMS calculator
tool so that the user is relieved from having to copy and format the
accession list from another source.

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