The connection profile includes information about the database driver, a user ID, password, port, host, and other properties related to the type of data source. BIRT supports using a connection profile when creating a data source in a report design. When a connection profile changes, the BIRT report picks up those changes. This behavior makes migration from a test to a production environment straightforward.

You can use connection profiles for all data source types, except SQL Query Builder data sources. If you have to use connection profiles for this type of data source, you must define a unique connection profile in each report.

Connection profiles are stored in text files called connection profile stores. Connection profile stores can contain multiple connection definitions for various ODA data sources. The default connection profile store is ServerProfiles.dat, located in the .metadata folder in your workspace.

You can also define your own connection profile store, and choose an absolute or a relative file path to store it. It is a good practice to create and use your own profile store file, instead of the default store. Using the default store requires using absolute file paths for a profile location and involves additional procedures of exporting a profile.

Using the Data Source Explorer to create a connection profile limits the connection profile location definition to an absolute file path only, while Data Explorer allows a relative and absolute file path definition. When using a relative file path, the Resource folders in the designer and iHub are used as the base folders. At design time, the BIRT Resource folder points to either the project root or an item in the workspace or a folder on the file system. This setting is available under Report Design➛Resources node in the Preferences view. At runtime, the BIRT Resource folder points to the Resource folder on the iHub.

Like other BIRT resource files, you must deploy the connection profile store to the iHub when you deploy the report that uses it. By default, BIRT Designer deploys relative path connection profiles to the iHub resource folder.

The connection profile store file can be encrypted using BIRT secured encryption framework. The default extension for the connection profile is .acconnprofiles. This extension is tightly integrated with the default out-of-the-box encryption.