Installing the BIRT report viewer as a web application
The BIRT report viewer files provide core functionality to run, render, and view BIRT reports. To use additional JDBC drivers that are not part of the standard BIRT packages, you must install these drivers as well as the BIRT report viewer itself. If you install the BIRT report viewer as a WAR file, you must include the JDBC drivers in the WAR file.
The following instructions assume that you have installed the BIRT Report Engine from the BIRT web site, that your web application directory is $TOMCAT_INSTALL/webapps, and that your BIRT run-time installation directory is $BIRT_RUNTIME.
How to install the BIRT report viewer from the BIRT Report Engine WAR file
The steps to install the BIRT report viewer from the WAR file differ depending upon whether you need to include additional JDBC drivers for your reports. If there are no additional drivers, install the WAR file from the BIRT Report Engine installation. If you use additional JDBC drivers, you must pack them into the WAR file before you deploy it.
To install the BIRT report viewer from the BIRT Report Engine WAR file, copy the BIRT Report Engine WAR file, birt.war to the Tomcat applications folder, $TOMCAT_INSTALL/webapps, as illustrated by the following DOS command:
copy $BIRT_RUNTIME/birt.war $TOMCAT_INSTALL/webapps
Then, restart Apache Tomcat.
To install the BIRT report viewer with additional JDBC drivers, perform the following steps:
1 Create a temporary directory and navigate to that directory.
2 Unpack the BIRT Report Engine WAR file into the temporary directory, using a command similar to the following one:
jar -xf $BIRT_RUNTIME/birt.war
The BIRT Report Engine application unpacks into the temporary directory.
3 Copy the JAR files for your JDBC drivers to the following folder in the temporary directory:
WEB-INF/platform/plugins/org.eclipse.birt.report.data.oda.jdbc_<version>/drivers
4 Repack the BIRT Report Engine WAR file from the temporary directory into a new birt.war file, using a command similar to the following one:
jar -cf birt.war *
This command creates birt.war in the temporary directory.
5 Copy the new birt.war file to the Tomcat applications folder, $TOMCAT_INSTALL/webapps, as illustrated in the following DOS command:
copy birt.war $TOMCAT_INSTALL/webapps
6 Restart Apache Tomcat.
How to install the BIRT report viewer from the BIRT Report Engine viewer folder
To install the BIRT report viewer as an application in a file system folder, use the WebViewerExample folder in the BIRT Report Engine installation.
1 Navigate to $TOMCAT_INSTALL/webapps.
2 Create a subdirectory named birt.
3 Copy the web viewer example directory and all its subdirectories to this new folder, as illustrated by the following DOS command:
xcopy /E "$BIRT_RUNTIME/WebViewerExample"
$TOMCAT_INSTALL/webapps/birt
4 If the BIRT reports need additional JDBC drivers, add the JAR files for the JDBC drivers to the following directory:
$TOMCAT_INSTALL/birt/WEB-INF/platform/plugins/org.eclipse.birt.report.data.oda.jdbc_<version>/drivers
5 Restart Apache Tomcat.