Reports Security thru Java

Question

How can i implement report column level security?
I mean depending on the role, a particular column needs to be hidden / shown on the report.
How can i implement the same using Java?
Please help immediately.
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Hi,
1) Report AccessibilityYou can do this directly via the built-in secrity for Oracle Reports (exposed via Oracle Portal). For this, you need to register all reports with Oracle Portal, and define who can access each report. Whenever the end user executes a secured report, he is challenged for username and passwd, and depending on the permissions you set, the report is shown / not shown. See Publishing Reports manual chapter 10 and 11:
http://www.oracle.com/technology/documentation/reports.html
and these demonstrations
http://otn.oracle.com/products/reports/htdocs/getstart/demonstrations/10g_portalintegration/viewlet.html
http://otn.oracle.com/products/reports/htdocs/getstart/demonstrations/pub_rep_in_portal/viewlet.html
2) Column level securityAs I said, you can use Format Trigger here (though I still think this should be taken care of, at the database level, and not at the report level). Anyway, you can code your security program in Java (return true or false depending on the role), and import this Javaclass into Reports. This will create a PL/SQL wrapper over the Java class. In the format trigger of the column, you just need to write PL/SQL calling the PL/SQL wrapper.
3) Data SecurityEncryption of data is not supported out-of-the-box in Oracle Reports. You might again want to write a Java program to do this, and in the Format Trigger, just reference this Java class.
If you want to see a Java Importer example, look at the Building Reports manual, chapter on generating barcode:
http://www.oracle.com/technology/documentation/reports.html
Navneet.