Using Dynamic Images in PDF Reports

Question

There are a number of threads in the forum where we talked about dynamically including images in PDF reports before. In order to illustrate one technique you can use for doing this, I put together a sample application that illustrates how to dynamically include images that are stored in BLOB columns. I installed the application on apex.oracle.com and made it available for download and local install. You can find the link and login information for this application as well as the download link here:
http://marcsewtz.blogspot.com/2008/06/one-question-about-pdf-printing-feature.html

Answer 1

Based on a discussion we had today in another thread, I think it makes sense to add to this thread that the XSL-FO snipped used to get BI Publisher to render images is used when referencing images in a report column, e.g. you included them in your RTF layout using the BI Publisher Desktop Insert->Table option. In this case, the column is referenced with “value-of select”:
<fo:instream-foreign-object content-type="image/jpg">
<xsl:value-of select="LOGO"/>
</fo:instream-foreign-object>
On the other hand, if you want to dynamically include a company logo, or other data that’s not necessarily repeating, e.g. there’s only one value, then you would use the BI Publisher Desktop Insert->Field option . And you would reference your field as follows:
<fo:instream-foreign-object content-type="image/jpg">
<?LOGO?>
</fo:instream-foreign-object>
So in this case LOGO refers to either a single-value field, or a single-row report column value.
Regards,
Marc