Unix Oracle Reports 6i + barcodes

My company wants to be able to produce Oracle reports (postscript files) that include barcodes (type barcode 39 to start with).

On my Windows2000 Professional pc it is easy to produce these reports.

But getting these same reports to run correctly on our AIX 4.3.3 Unix servers is no easy task.

None of our AIX machines have graphics cards installed (i.e. they have no graphics capability). So Oracle says to run the Oracle report on the AIX machine but set the DISPLAY environment variable to point to another machine that it running a X server. In my tests, this other machine has been a Red Hat 7.1 workstation.

Test1. Generate simple barcode reports on Windows machine (i.e. select 1234 from dual and set font to be barcode). In the reports builder
(rwbld60) the font is called "barcode39a (Western)"--I do not know
where the western part is coming from. Not copy the rdf file from my Windows machine to my AIX server. Install the Postscript version of my barcode font on my Linux workstation (install is successfuly because I can select this font from the Linux verison of Notepad--ALTHOUGH the font name is "barcode39a" and not "barcode39a Western" as on my Windows machine). Now I run the report on the AIX server with the DISPLAY environment variable pointed at my Linux server. Unfortunately when the report runs I do not get any barcode.

Test 2. Log into AIX server from Linux machine. Set DISPLAY environment variable to point to Linux machine and run reports builder
(rwbld60). In this case I am unable to select a barcode font from the
reports builder font selection box. I am not sure where this font information is coming from. Does anyone know where this font information is coming from--the AIX or Linux machine?

As an aside, Oracle (on Metalink) has notes describing a complicated way of getting barcodes into reports--basically find and replace one font with a barcode font. I have yet to try this because it looks complocated and assumes that you do not have the barcode font for your Unix machine.

Does anyone have any experience with Oracle Reports 6i, barcodes and remote X servers?

Thanks for any help,

   Daniel Received on Thu Feb 14 2002 - 22:23:21 CST