Thread: Report Viewing Problem

honestly speaking, this post could be messy, let me start with I DONT KNOW 'How' and 'where' could i get the answer for this one..

-im looking for a way how to get a report 'view' thing for the program im writing(time keeping), generating reports for log in/out of an employee
-i saw a thing called JasperReport for generating an .xml file, that can be manipulated using iReport, a complex one
-i was mentally shocked due to i dont know where and how to start, i tried different articles stating some codes , samples, step-by-step procedure(which-i CANNOT follow), but i always ended up in a very nasty exceptions, stream exception, doc != null..
-i saw some samples that queries a database values with some varchar, int data type to the iReport/.jrxml
-the problem is, im manipulating Employee data by serializing objects, a table with longblob type that saves my Employee instances
-the codes that i saw passes an argument of an instance of Connection directly to a .jrxml file, i really dont know how can i pass the values
to the file from java code, not directly by from the Database, due to this serializing, i have to deserialize and object first, get the values on it, and pass it into a report viewer thing (.jrxml), but i only see samples that directly passes a Connection to the .jrxml and queries all on it

-so i decided to go hard core again(atleast i have some idea though), instead of using these bunch of things that i wont be able to study due to time constraints,
-i decided to go back to swing components, JTextPane, JEditorPane, Text Components


Question: (while im trying to look for resources which can be accepted by my brain)

1.) which of the components do i need to write JUST...... a simple looking Paper that will stand as a report view? where i can pass java data from a deserialized object
2.) will it be printable? if yes, what classes should i focus on? for printing THESE paper looking reports
- though i have some idea how, the print package of awt.



im really stressed up, my statement writings expereses my stress.. i hope you can give me some advice with this one..

let me state the thing that i want to accomplish using the iReport/JasperReport that i wasnt able to comprehend due to tons of things i see in the web

1.) create a file which has 8 columns(specificaly for the 8 data inside a seriliazied object)
2.) pass the deserialized object's data to that file using some connection
3.) after passing the data, a dialog or a swing component such as a button will access that report(.jrxml) that has the values that i passed

You can use NextReports (Business reporting software - NextReports Designer, Engine and Server) . Free java engine, free designer. Easy to use. Free manual. Just look at it.