Question

I need a reporting capability in my web application. I have googled the net and found that JasperReports is the best Java reporting framework out there.

I wanted to learn about JasperReports but when I went to their site, I found out also about iReport.

I checked at the download site and it says.
If you’re interested in JasperReports, particularly if this is your first download, we recommend that you may want to consider downloading iReport instead. The iReport download includes JasperReports.

Does this mean that I should learn iReport instead? Or which is which.

Answer 1

iReport is a graphical tool for creating jasper reports.

It will generate the xml jasper report file for you.

Or to quote iReport:

iReport is a visual report designer
for JasperReports. The library is a
report engine that can be integrated
in your open or commercial application
to generate the reports designed with
iReport, display them on screen or
export them in a final format like
PDF, OpenOffice, DOCX and many others.
Alternatively, you can stream the
result through a web application or
send the final document directly to a
printer. JasperReports is in some way
the core of iReport.

After you create your file you will have to learn a small bit about Jasper report to integrate it into your program.

For more information have a look at this iReport introduction page.