Write to the database from a BI Publisher report

Question

I have a requirement to setup a BI Publisher report that writes a snapshot of data to a database table whenever the report is run.
Putting aside whether doing this is a good idea or not (I'd prefer not to do it for security reasons) if I were to do it in SQL server (that i'm more familiar with) I'd write a stored procedure that does this and enter "exec storedprocedurename" as the report query.
From searching through this board I see that I'm supposed to use a pipelined function instead of a stored procedure but I'm unclear if once I have setup the pipelined function that I'll be able to achieve my objective of both returning the data to the report as well as writing it to a snapshot table, is this possible? If so then I have some questions as I don't really understand the syntax with my limited pl/sql knowledge.
create type numset_t as table of number; --where does this go, it doesn't appear to be part of the function?
create function f1(x number) return numset_t pipelined is
begin
for i in 1..x loop
pipe row(i);
end loop; -- do I need to do a looP? i just want to do select *...
return;
end;
select * from table(f1(3)); -- again this appears to be outside the function, where does it go?
Thanks
Bruce

Answer 1

Jorge:
I was looking into something similar some time ago. The suggested solution may or may not work for you, depending on what it is you want to write to the tables. I was trying to write audit information - who ran what report when. Through BI Publisher template variables I could get the who and the when, but not what report was being run, so the report trigger option wasn't of any use to me.
In the end, I opted to change the attributes of the report so that the "show controls" checkbox is unchecked and make users run all reports through BI Publisher Scheduler. It turns out that reports run via the scheduler have all of that data saved off and you can see it from the Schedules/History display.
Good luck,
Gaff