pdf exporting opens a new Window

[ricky_ru]

Dears,

Cognos versoion: 10.1.1

I met a very strange problem and I could not find any clue on this. I make the report very simple. It does not rely on any package. Just show no data for you to easy to reproduce.

When you run the report, first click the "Search" (查询) button at the right side and then click "PDF Export" (PDF导出) button. And the pdf will show.

The difference is that in customer's env, the pdf will be opened within a new browser window(or tab. whatever IE or FF). The report has css to hide the toolbar but this will not work for the pdf browser window if it is in a new window.

I also checked the RS setting and browser setting. It is the same as mine. The Resue IBM Cognos Viewer Window is also checked.

Here is the PDF Export button defination and CSS
<input type="button" value="PDF导出" style="padding-left:0px;width:70px;color:#808080;padding-right:0px;font-size: 12px" onclick="javascript:gCognosViewer.getRV().viewReport('PDF')" onmouseover="this.style.cursor='hand'"  class="toolbarButton"/>

   <style>
.mainHeader1{ display: none;}
.mainViewerHeader3{ display: none;}
</style>
<script type="text/javascript">
var vIbmLog = document.getElementById("headerBack");
vIbmLog.style.display="none";
</script >

I attached the report specification and different behaviors within a zip. For the report design, you can point to any package to fix no package reference issue.

Any suggestion is greatly welcome.

Happy New Year!

Thanks,
Ricky

[ricky_ru]

Does anyone meet this problem in cognos 10.1.1? The customer said he is using cognos 10.1.1 32bit. But I also installed that version but I still could not recreate the problem.

What's could be the reason of this problem....

[sunosoft]

There are few differences in adobe reader and adobe acrobat products.

Check what user is using.

There few known issues with adobe acrobat while using it for cognos.

[bdbits]

Also if using adobe reader there are some options you can set within the reader that can control behavior in the browser, which you can find by opening the reader and going to menu item Edit > Preferences. Also browser extension settings (especially for IE) may be involved. Also you might want to check if your IE and Adobe Reader versions are the same as things do sometimes behave differently between versions.

[sunosoft]

Agree with dbbits.

I am sure there was some checkbox under preferences setting to allow it to open in the same window. However for now i am not able to see the same in my current adobe reader version. Probably that option was in some old version.

[bonniehsueh]

I also agree with bdbits and sunosoft.

It sounds like you want the toolbox to show for the user?  I ran into what sounds like the opposite of the issue you described. When I exported reports to pdf, the report would open in pdf in another window, but I wouldn't get a pdf toolbar. I wanted the toolbar so that I could zoom, print the pdf easily

I found that a setting in Adobe had to be changed. The open in 'read only' mode was checked by default, which was causing the toolbar to be hidden. I unchecked this box and now I always see the toolbox. If your user has this check box un-checked, it could be causing the toolbar to always show. The setting was under Preferences -> Internet. Adobe Reader X 10.1.8, IE 9

Hope this helps!

[ricky_ru]

Thank you guys for the kindly input.
Seems we could not control the behavior in server side. The background of this post is that customer needs to hide the cognos toolbar to prevent the client from navigating. They are using the js/css to hide the toolbar but if the pdf exporting opens in a new window,  the js/css will  not be loaded for the new window and then the toolbar will not be hided.

So, if there is another way to hide the toolbar for this case?

[sunosoft]

But the same is working fine for you...right ?

And its because, for you that pdf output is not opening in new window ..am I right ?

I am trying to recall, we had faced the same issue in past but it has been too long. But i am sure the issue was resolved by doing settings in adobe. Or user was using adobe acrobat and when we asked user to use adobe reader then it worked fine for him also.

[ricky_ru]

What I was trying to say is hiding the toolbar is for security reason.  With the toolbar, the user can navigate into RS. If the client can do some adobe settings to control the toolbar appearance, it is not safe. That's why customer want to control that in server side.

Maybe, the administrator can invoke the client's permission from openning RS. Whatever, the tool bar shows or not, the client won't be able to use RS.

[bdbits]

I do not have a link handy but there are some options to control toolbar options presented by Cognos, using security groups. That said, if they do not have Report Studio, they should not see an option to launch it from a toolbar and even if they do and try to use RS, it should deny them access. If that is the primary concern, the client admin should tighten up security and all will be well.

They are implicitly relinquishing some control over presentation by choosing to use PDF, particularly the options surrounding the actual content. If that is not acceptable, maybe they should consider delivery in a format over which you can have more control over presentation from the server-side, e.g. HTML. Sometimes the client needs to be informed they are restricted by their own choices.

But definitely, security can (and should) be set so that only those who are licensed can access Report Studio.