Updated 16/06/2010
This guide has been tested and works with the latest version of Pentaho BI Server 3.6.
Pentaho 3.6 with MySQL, PostgreSQL & Oracle.
Posted under BI Server, Open Source, Pentaho, Tutorials
Using Variables (?) with Table Input Steps.
Posted under Data Integration, Open Source, Pentaho, Tutorials
Using arguments with Pentaho Data Integration (PDI) transformations are extremely handy when trying to pass through dynamic information. In this tutorial I will show how you can implement variables (denoted by ?) within SQL statements using Table input steps. Along with using variables I also cover how to copy and get rows from the result (memory), how to use system information and debugging steps. This tutorial was done with version PDI 3.2.0.
Creating Dynamic Sizing Charts with Pentaho Report Designer.
Posted under Open Source, Pentaho, Report Designer, Tutorials, Visualisation
Pentaho Report Designer’s (PRD) charting capability is great – it has numerous charts to choose from and the formatting is extremely flexible. However I did have a problem with charts represent large data sets. For example I had a list of countries and a bar chart showing the population for each country, users were able to view one or more countries at a time using a multi value list parameter. The problem occurred when there were too many countries, the chart’s labels became unreadable. One method was to create a chart which had a dynamic width depending on the amount countries a user selected.
Customising the Pentaho User Console – Part 4.
Posted under BI Server, Open Source, Pentaho, Tutorials, User Console
This post is part 4 of the series “Customising the Pentaho User Console (PUC)” Version 3.5.x. Here is a list of what I have covered in other parts:
- Login page and dialog
- Messages
- Main toolbar, menu bar and logo panel
- Launch page (covered in this post)
In this post I will show you how to customise the launch page.
Emailing Reports from the Pentaho User Console.
Posted under BI Server, Open Source, Pentaho, Tutorials, User Console
With the recent release of Pentaho’s BI Server 3.5.2 and Tom Barber’s (aka magicaltrout) post I thought I would put together a quick tutorial on how to use a new feature of 3.5.2 which allows end users to email reports directly from the Pentaho User Console (PUC).
Customising the Pentaho User Console – Part 3.
Posted under BI Server, Open Source, Pentaho, Tutorials, User Console
This post is part 3 of the series “Customising the Pentaho User Console (PUC)” Version 3.5.x. Here is a list of what I have covered in other parts:
- Login page and dialog
- Messages
- Main toolbar, menu bar and logo panel (covered in this post)
- Launch page
In this post I will show you how to customise the main-toolbar, menu-bar, logo-panel and other features for the PUC.
Creating Cascade Parameters with Pentaho Report Designer 3.5.
Posted under Open Source, Pentaho, Report Designer, Tutorials
Cascade parameters provide a way of managing large amounts of data in reports. You can define a set of related parameters so that the list of values for one parameter depends on the value chosen in another parameter.
In this example I will be using the Steel Wheels sample data to create a report which will display a list of customers using two parameters: a drop down parameter which will contain a distinct list of countries which will then filter another drop down parameter which contains cities which belong to the country.
Customising the Pentaho User Console – Part 2.
Posted under BI Server, Open Source, Pentaho, Tutorials, User Console
This post is part 2 of the series “Customising the Pentaho User Console (PUC)” Version 3.5.x. Here is a list of what I have covered in other parts:
- Login page and dialog
- Messages (covered in this post)
- Main toolbar, menu bar and logo panel
- Launch page
In this post I will show you how to customise messages for the login dialog and PUC.
Customising the Pentaho User Console – Part 1.
Posted under BI Server, Open Source, Pentaho, Tutorials, User Console
For the past couple of weeks I have been playing around with customising the Pentaho User Console (PUC) Version 3.5.x and to follow it up I thought I would put together a multi-part post on the topic. Each post will cover one aspect of customising the PUC, these include:
- Login page and dialog (covered in this post)
- Messages
- Main toolbar, menu bar and logo panel
- Launch page
In this post I will show you how to customise the default login dialog and how to create a new login page.
Free Tools to Create Sparklines.
Posted under Open Source, Pentaho, Visualisation
Sparklines are an invention by Edward Tufte and are a great way to provide a bare-bones and space efficient time-series context for measures (Few, Stephen. 2006. Information Dashboard Design). If you would like to read more up on Sparklines I suggest you get Edward Tuftes book Beautiful Evidence – there is a whole chapter dedicated to Sparklines.
Below is a list of open source and free tools which support or are dedicated to creating Sparklines or Microcharts.