10 minute Tip - Birt Report Only Server (BROS)

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10 minute Tip - Birt Report Only Server (BROS)

For this session we will discuss the Birt Report Only Server, or BROS (pronounced “B-ROS”, or “BROSE”, take your pick).

Enabling BROS will balance report load processing and can improve overall system performance. The BROS will be utilized for most of the report processing – regardless of what clustered server the user may be currently connected to.

A BROS server is, for all intents and purposes, another Maximo JVM. In this case, however, the JVM is not used for UI processing, it is set aside to only execute reports.

There’s not much to the configuration of a basic BROS instance. 

• Deploy 2 jvms 
• Set a value for mxe.report.birt.viewerurl GLOBAL system property to your BROS jvm to offload immediate report processing to the desired server (the BROS server)
• Set a value for mxe.report.birt.disablequeuemanager INSTANCE system properties to offload processing of scheduled reports to the desired server(s) (the BROS or CRON server)

Example:

Maximo UI server – http://MaximoProd.mycompany.com:9080

• Global property mxe.report.birt.viewerurl = http://MaximoRpt.mycompany.com:9080
• Instance property mxe.report.birt.disablequeuemanager = 1

Maximo BROS server – http://MaximoRpt.mycompany.com:9080

• Instance property mxe.report.birt.disablequeuemanager = 0

The above settings will ensure that immediate report requests (see exceptions* below) and scheduled report requests will not execute on the UI server (MaximoProd). They will execute on the Report server (MaximoRpt).

*Exceptions (Version 7.5 only)

Certain report functionality will continue to execute from the UI server, even when a BROS server is configured. This functionality includes:

A. Direct Print Reports

B. Direct Print with Attachments Reports

C. Query Based (Ad Hoc) Reports as they are being created. Once a QBR report is saved, it will execute from a BROS server (if BROS is configured)

(These exceptions do not exist in version 7.6)

Notes:

1. The hostname in the Version 7 URL cannot be the same as the hostname in the BROS URL. For example, if the user logs into Maximo as http://abc.com:9080/maximo, the Hostname is “abc.com”. The BROS value, mxe.report.birt.viewerurl, cannot also use abc.com. If the same hostname is used, the Maximo UI Session will become invalid, and the user will be logged out.

A valid work around for this situation is to use the server IP address as the mxe.report.birt.viewerurl property.

2. When a BROS is configured in a your environment, the BIRT Engine will still be deployed on the V7 Maximo Server and will be used for any of the three exceptions listed above.  In Version 7.6 the Birt engine will also be present but will not be utilized for any report processing unless BROS is disabled. The BIRT engine will always be deployed on any Maximo install.

This is a basic BROS configuration. There are more complex configurations that can include multiple servers (Cron, UI, Integration) and clusters of each. This would take more than 10 minutes and is covered in the Performance Guide. Maximo support is always available to assist with any questions you may have on this topic.

Until next time…