OpenLMIS v3 Reporting

Reporting needs are generally very implementation specific and OpenLMIS has seen considerable variation between source code in this area.  To address implementation needs in customization, OpenLMIS defines two types of reports:

• out-of-the-box reference reports
• reporting tool set

A limited set of reference reports come with OpenLMIS.  Such reports are designed for the general use-case and take the perspective that they would serve as a starting point to be taken and customized in a bespoke manner should they require customization by the implementer.  A reference report is one that comes with, and therefore has the perspective of, an Independent Service (IS).  By being a part of an IS, they naturally rely on the other ISs that theirs relies on, and would use the same RESTful APIs exposed by the other ISs.  Being a reference report, they’d either reside within or adjacent to a Reference UI Module of the IS.

For reports that require heavy customization, require a broad view, or those for which performance is not met by built-in reports, a tool set will be recommended and provided where possible that enables the type of reporting that BI tools are built for.  To support BI tool integration, each Independent Service is expected to be able to make available a read-only connection to its data store(s).

A potential integration strategy that would allow for reports to be more easily accessible in services which are meant to be reusable will be to design a feature within OpenLMIS that allows reports as files to be delieverd to users through a file repository type model.  This would allow external analysis to be preformed but make the user experience in accessing those reports appear seamless.