## Chapter 4 Binding Data

The data set or data sets you create return the data you want to use in a report. Before you can use or display data-set data in a report, you must first create the necessary data bindings. As the first tutorial demonstrated, to display the data in a report, you simply drag data-set fields from Data Explorer to a table in the layout editor. You might also remember in that same tutorial that when you dragged a data-set field to the layout editor, BIRT Report Designer first displayed a dialog called Select Data Binding. This dialog, shown in Figure 4-1, shows the data binding that BIRT Report Designer creates each time you insert a data-set field. This data binding, called a column binding, defines an expression that specifies what data to display.

Figure 4-1 Select Data Binding showing a column binding