Abandon XML reports - replace with PHPOffice based reports

[fisharebest]

The report library is based around XML files, which are processed to create either HTML or PDF reports.

• The PDF reports are tightly coupled to the TCPDF library, which has been abandoned for a long time. It is unlikely to work with PHP 8.0, which is due for release at the end of 2020.
• The reports are impossible to localise, as they do not allow you to change word order.
• There is no support for right-to-left languages. webtrees has a crude implementation of the standard bidi (bi-directional) algorithm, but it has many deficiencies.
• The code is very difficult to support and maintain, and is largely unchanged since it was added to phpGedView, approx 15 years ago.

I propose to replace these XML reports with ones based on PHPOffice.

PHPOffice allows us to create abstract "documents", which we then render in a specific format (CSV, XLS, XLSX, ODS, DOC, DOCX, PDF, etc.)

[mestaritonttu]

Nice to see this on the roadmap! We had an email exchange about this in March. I started hacking on the core files in order to make the markup and CSS saner (getting rid of position: absolute), but got distracted.

Do you have an idea on how to offer customisation of the report templates? Our use case is adding profile photos and custom facts to the (descendancy) report.

[fisharebest]

Do you have an idea on how to offer customisation of the report templates?

I haven't thought much about this.

But since they will be generated entirely using PHP, it will be much easier to have options built in to the core code.

[melizaa]

I see that the issues are no longer part of 2.1.0.
I see also that the original issues are closed.

When can I expect the issues to work as expected?
Then I might be able to upgrade my production site code.

[melizaa]

This becomes more and more urgent.
When do we plan to carry out the change?

[fisharebest]

When do we plan to carry out the change?

Not until after the 2.1 release is completed.

[iyoua]

Is this work in progress now? I have only recently started to focus on the format of the report. If the official plan is to rewrite the report code, I will learn it after the new report system is launched.

[fisharebest]

Is this work in progress now?

I hope to start on this soon.

[RAMINCNZ]

Am guessing this is a larger more difficult project than anticipated..

Might this be done for the next upgrade or will it be longer still??

I am voicing my support for this to happen including Profile Pictures

Rick M
Tauranga
New Zealand - Nu Tirani

[fisharebest]

Might this be done for the next upgrade or will it be longer still??

This is waiting for updates to the database structure, which will happen after the new database-schema code is ready (which is planned for 2.2 at the end of 2024)