| [birt-dev] Eclipse BIRT PMC Meeting Minutes - Monday, March 19, 2007 |
Meeting
BIRT PMC, 10am Pacific, Monday, March 19, 2007
Attendees
Wenfeng Li - BIRT PMC Lead - Actuate Corporation (www.actuate.com)
Paul Clenahan - BIRT PMC - Actuate Corporation (www.actuate.com)
Scott Rosenbaum - BIRT PMC - Innovent Solutions (www.innoventsolutions.com)
Jason Weathersby - BIRT PMC - Actuate Corporation (www.actuate.com)
Mike Fox - BIRT PMC - IBM Corporation (www.ibm.com)
Larry Liang - BIRT PMC - InetSoft Technology Corporation (www.inetsoft.com)
Minutes
BIRT 2.1.3 Development
There are currently 26 bugs assigned to this maintenance release. Release timeframe is still TBD, with iText IP approval as the primary gating factor. We still do not have an estimated completion date from the IP approval from the EMO.
For now, we continue to note the release date as "Dependant on iText IP Approval for the EMO".
General Information
BIRT 2.1.3 is the third maintenance release in the BIRT 2.1 release series and is intended to be narrow in scope since the development team is concentrating on BIRT 2.2. The 2.1.3 release is focused on addressing critical bugs identified by the community.
The Development Plan for BIRT 2.1.3 is available on the Eclipse BIRT pages (http://www.eclipse.org/birt/phoenix/project/project_plan_R2_1_3.php).
For a list of bugs assigned to the release, refer to Bugzilla: https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/buglist.cgi?classification=BIRT&target_milestone=2.1.3
BIRT 2.2 Development
BIRT 2.2 M6 development continues to be on track for the April 6 release date.
General Information
The next major release of BIRT is BIRT 2.2, scheduled for June 2007 as part of the Europa Simultaneous Release (http://wiki.eclipse.org/index.php/Europa_Simultaneous_Release).
The Development Plan for BIRT 2.2 is available on the Eclipse BIRT pages (http://www.eclipse.org/birt/phoenix/project/project_plan_R2_2_0.php). A number of BIRT Project Specifications (BPS) relating to BIRT 2.2 have been posted on the BIRT Wiki.
For a list of bugs assigned to the release, refer to Bugzilla: https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/buglist.cgi?classification=BIRT&target_milestone=2.2.0
BIRT 2.2: Word and Excel Emitters
A popular feature in BIRT 2.2 are the new Word and Excel emitters that allow a report document to be saved to these formats from the Viewer. Larry Liang's team have been working on these, with the Word version being checked in during December and the Excel one in January.
These are both available for community testing and the community is encouraged to look at these features and log any bugs in Bugzilla.
BIRT 2.2: Cross Tab Report Item
Another popular feature is the new cross tab report item that allows you to easily include dynamic cross tabs in a report. Work on this feature is progressing, with many of the underlying infrastructure changes already checked in. The feature is not yet feature complete, and this will likely not happen until the RC0 build.
Much of the initial UI should be available for testing by M6, and the community is encouraged to look at this and provide feedback via Bugzilla.
Apple OS X Support
Scott has been reaching out to the community to see if we can add support for Apple OS X via community testing. Morton at Lombardi Software may be able to provide some testing, but wanted more information on the amount of work expected.
Scott will continue to work on this, and if needed arrange for a conference call to discuss level of effort.
In the meantime, if anyone else in the community is interested in participating in testing BIRT on Apple OS X, please contact Scott directly.
Report Distribution Patch
In Bugzilla entry 173217 (https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=173217), Yip Ng has proposed a patch that extends the report delivery aspects of BIRT.
This extends the BIRT project functionality into the report distribution area and is something to consider for the next major release after BIRT 2.2. With the BIRT 2.2 release date approaching very quickly, we do not want to introduce risk into the project by adding this at this stage.
The proposal needs to be reviewed by the PMC in more detail to determine if this makes sense as an enhancement in the next major release. We will plan on discussing further at the next PMC meeting.
Next Eclipse Simultaneous Release: Ganymede
The code name for the 2008 Eclipse Simultaneous Release will be Ganymede, another of Jupiter's moons (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganymede_(moon) ). Detailed planning has not begun yet, but likely release date will be June 2008.
The BIRT project again plans to participate in this simultaneous release and will begin more detailed planning closer to, or just after, the BIRT 2.2 release.
One suggestion for the Ganymede release is to have a single reference platform across all projects that participate in the release. An agreed common reference platform that is decided early will ensure all projects agree on supported versions of Java etc. Wenfeng will bring this up at the Planning Council.
Examples and Documentation with New Code Contributions
As a general recommendation, we request that new contributions to BIRT include an example that illustrates how to use the feature being contributed (or that show how to test the bug fix) and some sort of documentation for the feature (it can be basic documentation). This allows us to add examples to the Wiki etc. and makes it easier document the feature for the community.
We will update the contribution page on the BIRT web site to include this request.
BIRT Events
The following upcoming events will include talks on BIRT and/or Actuate sponsored BIRT booths:
BIRT Technical Webinar on March 28, 2007 - Webinar by Actuate - http://www.actuate.com/uk/BIRT-WebSeminar
Eclipse Forum Europe on April 23-26, 2007 - Wiesbaden, Germany - http://eclipseforumeurope.com/ - Integrating BIRT talk
IBM Rational Software Development Conference on June 10-14, 2007 - Orlando, FL - http://www-306.ibm.com/software/rational/events/rsdc2007/ - Integration of BIRT into IBM Rational Products
Jazoon 07 on June 24-28, 2007 - Zurich, Switzerland - http://jazoon.com/ -
BIRT Articles
The following articles have recently been published on BIRT:
Eclipse Magazine - March 2007 - A Primer On ODA Extensions and BIRT by Scott Rosenbaum - http://www.eclipsemag.net/
Eclipse Developer's Journal - February 2007 - Developing an Application Using the Eclipse BIRT Report Engine API by Jason Weathersby; Tom Bondur; Jane Tatchell - http://eclipse.sys-con.com/read/336872.htm
Open Source Magazine - February 2007 - Same article as above - http://opensource.sys-con.com/read/336872.htm
Eclipse Magazine - February 2007 - Getting Expressive with BIRT by Krishna Venkatraman and Jason Weathersby - http://www.eclipsemag.net/
Eclipse Magazine - January 2007 - Deploying the BIRT Viewer to JBoss by Jason Weathersby - http://www.eclipsemag.net/
Eclipse Magazine - December 2006 - POJO Access Using BIRT by David Trainor and Jason Weathersby - http://www.eclipsemag.net/
Java Developers Journal - October 2006 - Java Feature: Developing an Eclipse BIRT Report Item Extension by Jason Weathersby; Iana Chatalbasheva; Tom Bondur - http://java.sys-con.com/read/286915.htm
Eclipse Magazine - September 2006 - BIRT Reporting Interactivity by David Trainor and Jason Weathersby - http://www.eclipsemag.net/
Eclipse Magazine - August 2006 - Using BIRT 2.1 for Embedded Reporting by Jason Weathersby - http://www.eclipsemag.net/
ONJava - July 26, 2006 - Deploying BIRT by Jason Weathersby - http://www.onjava.com/pub/a/onjava/2006/07/26/deploying-birt.html
Eclipse Review Magazine - Spring 2006 - Business Intelligence And Reporting Tools by Jason Weathersby and Krishna Venkatraman - http://www.eclipsereview.com/issues/eclipsereview_200606.pdf