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Windward Core

Windward Core

Overview

What is Windward Core?

Windward’s low-code document generation solution embeds into any application, enabling users to populate data-smart documents within the familiar landscape of Microsoft Office. It's a solution from PDFTron since the April 2021 acquisition.

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Recent Reviews

TrustRadius Insights

Users have found AutoTag Designer to be a valuable tool for building reports both for internal use and for customers, particularly when …
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Windward Opinion

9 out of 10
February 15, 2019
Incentivized
It's used across several departments. It allows us to design reports, including a big variety of data: Text, tables, images. It has a …
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Pricing

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Windward Hub Standard

$19.00

Cloud
Per User, Per Month (10 user minimum)*

Windward Hub Premium

$49.00

Cloud
Per User, Per Month (10 user minimum)*

Windward Core Pro

$547.00

On Premise
per month*

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee
For the latest information on pricing, visithttps://www.windwardstudios.com/price/h…

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services

Starting price (does not include set up fee)

  • $190 per month
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Product Details

What is Windward Core?

Embed Windward in an application to deliver a document automation component.

The vendor promises the following capabilities and differentiators:

Visually Outstanding Designs

Users can create designs and attractive layouts.

Smart Document Logic

With a conditional logic feature, users can personalize the content of their document to suit a wide range of audience.

Easy Template Creation

The vendor says their platform is fast and user friendly: in under an hour, any ordinary business professional can have their templates completed.

Do it Faster for Less

Users do not have to spend a lot on developing templates and documents even if they are trying to get them done fast. The vendor says their software can simplify the process of creating tailor-made templates and documents which will let you significantly save time and money.


Windward Core Features

  • Supported: Visually Stunning Designs
  • Supported: Smart Document Logic
  • Supported: Massive Time Savings
  • Supported: Incredibly Intuitive Interface
  • Supported: Streamlined Cost Savings

Windward Core Screenshots

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Windward Core Video

Document Automation Software for high-volume output in a familiar user-friendly design environment (MS Office). Windward Studios offers world-class document automation tool using familiar tools like Word, Excel, PowerPoint. You don't have to know code or be a developer to de...
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Windward Core Competitors

Windward Core Technical Details

Deployment TypesOn-premise, Software as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based
Operating SystemsWindows, Linux, Mac, Anything that has Java
Mobile ApplicationNo

Frequently Asked Questions

Windward’s low-code document generation solution embeds into any application, enabling users to populate data-smart documents within the familiar landscape of Microsoft Office. It's a solution from PDFTron since the April 2021 acquisition.

Windward Core starts at $190.

Docmosis and TIBCO Jaspersoft are common alternatives for Windward Core.

Reviewers rate Usability highest, with a score of 9.1.

The most common users of Windward Core are from Mid-sized Companies (51-1,000 employees).

Windward Core Customer Size Distribution

Consumers0%
Small Businesses (1-50 employees)20%
Mid-Size Companies (51-500 employees)40%
Enterprises (more than 500 employees)40%
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(31)

Community Insights

TrustRadius Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, 3rd-party data sources. Have feedback on this content? Let us know!

Users have found AutoTag Designer to be a valuable tool for building reports both for internal use and for customers, particularly when they require native Microsoft Office output. By using AutoTag, users have experienced a significant improvement in the efficiency and ease of report creation, as it eliminates the need for manual data collection and editing. The Windward Document Generation Software is highly regarded for its ability to aggregate and display data from various sources, with the added benefit of being able to extend functionality through code. This has led to its integration into cloud-based solutions for financial institutions, allowing clients to create custom documents that meet their specific needs. One of the standout features of Windward Reporting solutions is their user-friendly nature, making it easy for non-technical individuals to edit and maintain reports. It has also been selected as a replacement for Oracle Reports due to its flexibility in changing text and graphics content on correspondence. The Windward Reporting engine is widely used for generating sales proposals, presentations, orders, and reports with reliable recreation of documents at runtime. For those with special requirements in report elaboration, the Windward Java Reporting Engine has been highly valued for its rapid performance across all types of reports. The AutoTag Template Designer has proven useful across multiple departments as it aids in building and fixing templates while providing basic troubleshooting and enhancements. It offers an ideal solution for users looking to create and modify custom report templates based on their specific requirements with minimal time and effort. Windward Studios stands out as a critical component of Loan Automation Solutions, facilitating document and report generation with minimal coding required. It has also made a significant impact on the Baker Hill NextGen solution by enabling the communication of critical information for banks and credit unions. Moreover, its usage extends to formatting critical text reports for airplane cockpits, ensuring accurate and reliable information delivery. With Windward Studios, SaaS administrators and clients gain the ability to create and modify custom report templates tailored precisely to their needs, thus reducing time and effort. A government agency even uses Windward to generate customized flight plans for pilots worldwide and design templates for outgoing communication with their government clients. The software has enabled users to create templates without any technical knowledge, resulting in saved development time. In the finance and insurance industry, a company leverages Windward to generate various documents such as insurance declarations and certificates. To accomplish this, business analysts at the company utilize Windward's report design with Microsoft Office products to create templates for their source systems. They also integrate Windward's RESTful API with multiple source systems and third-party software. Another notable use case of Windward's software is its adoption by a software development team for downloading data from tables with different formatting. The team finds Windward to be efficient and reliable in this task. Additionally, a document generation solutions provider partners with Windward to deliver tailored solutions to their clients, including loan documents, insurance letters, and proposal generation. This partnership highlights the versatility of Windward in catering to various industries and document types. Apart from its broad application, Windward is widely used across several departments within companies, enabling them to design reports with text, tables, and images. This flexibility in design allows users to export reports to Word and PDF formats seamlessly. Notably, Windward plays a crucial role in the origination and servicing phase of loans for generating letters by capturing and processing data received from USD. Its integration into the company's process ensures the creation of accurate and finalized products by efficiently incorporating data into the documents.

Overall, users have found AutoTag Designer and Windward's Document Generation Software to be valuable tools in building reports, generating custom documents, automating processes, and facilitating communication across industries such as finance, government agencies, aviation, software development, and more. The user-friendly interface and flexibility provided by Windward's solutions have resulted in increased efficiency, reduced manual effort, and enhanced customization options for non-technical individuals.

Intuitive and User-Friendly Interface: Users have consistently praised the intuitive and user-friendly interface of Windward Reports, mentioning that they find it easy to navigate and manipulate tables using drag and drop functionality. Many users appreciate the simplicity of the interface, which allows them to quickly create and complete tasks efficiently.

Responsive Support Team: Users highly appreciate the responsiveness of Windward's support team. They mention that their questions and concerns are addressed promptly and professionally, leading to a positive experience. The support team provides quick assistance whenever needed.

Seamless Integration with Microsoft Office: Users highlight the major advantage of Windward Reports being seamlessly integrated within the Microsoft Office suite. They appreciate being able to leverage familiar features from Office products, such as Word, to easily create visually appealing reports. This integration enables users to work efficiently without requiring extensive technical knowledge or additional software.

Limited Customizability: Some users have found the software to be limited in terms of customizability compared to other report tools they use, feeling restricted in their ability to tailor reports according to their specific needs.

Difficulties with Drag and Drop Feature: Several users have mentioned that the drag and drop feature is not intuitive as they are unable to drag and drop individual fields, causing inconvenience and frustration during report creation.

Issues with PDF Output Accuracy: Some users have experienced issues with the accuracy of the PDF output, noting that minor tweaks are often required for it to match the original report exactly.

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-25 of 25)
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Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Windward's Document Generation Software is one of the best products out there for aggregating and displaying data from disparate sources. If it can't be done natively, which is rare, you have the ability to extend it through code. We have it integrated with our project reporting database to generate weekly status reports for our clients. No need to track someone down for their hours, tasks that were worked on, and how much time was spent. It truly cuts down the time a project manager needs to assemble a status report.
  • Handles data from disparate sources.
  • Uses well-adopted Microsoft Word as the template designer interface.
  • Ability to integrate with existing applications.
  • Ability to extend functionality.
  • Reusable component creation.
  • User friendly error messages.
  • PDF output sometimes not exact and requires some minor tweaks.
  • Perhaps more out of the box chart options.
It's well suited for organizations that rely on their IT departments to make minor changes to reports that can take days to put into production. Windward Core, with its simple to use Microsoft Word interface, empowers savvy business users to make modifications to reports in minutes. They can even create their own reports with ease. It's a great tool for creating static reports that take manual effort to produce (especially from disparate data sources). If you're looking for advanced drill-down capabilities, Windward is not for you, but then again, it's not designed for that. What it does, it does extremely well and everyone I have recommended it to has been pleased with the end results—to the point it's their centralized global reporting platform.
Michael Horrocks | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
ResellerIncentivized
Windward is a critical component of our Baker Hill NextGen solution, which is used in hundreds of banks and credit unions. We have clients that use this fully integrated solution every day to communicate critical information externally and internally to drive their business needs. By being able to leverage the extensive data sets within Baker Hill NextGen, Windward gives our clients the ability to drive their business and make the decisions they need to grow revenue and minimize risk.
  • Leveraging the data sets within Baker Hill NextGen to maximize communication of the data for external and internal purposes.
  • With the latest releases to the ability to sort and control the flow of data, clients will have a better representation of the information needed to make business decisions.
  • I really have not found a big set of gaps with Windward. They are accessible all the time for any suggestions.
If you are wanting to simply take advantage of a large data set and be able to push this into a really simple and automated document format, there is no better solution than Windward. The fact that I can have this fully integrated into our solution, and that with a minimal amount of training we can have users up and running critical business reports and letters is a huge lift for our solution.
September 27, 2019

Happy with Windward Studios

Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Windward helps us to design templates for outgoing communication of our government clients. Designing templates requires zero technical knowledge and has been made very easy. By using Windward, we have saved a lot of development time for creating templates, by being able to directly get feedback from subject matter experts.
  • Design templates.
  • If/else logic, placeholders, repeating attributes, etc.
  • Microsoft Word integration.
  • Licensing is not always clear.
I would always recommend Windward unless cost is a major problem for the project.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We are an insurance and finance company, and we use Windward to generate documents like insurance declarations, certificates, etc.. Our business analysts use Windwards report design with Microsoft Office products to create templates for our source systems. We also purchased their RESTful API to integrate with multiple source systems and third-party software.
  • Windward report designer makes it very easy for our business analyst to create the report and/or document template needed for our business needs.
  • Windward RESTful report engine makes it easy for us to integrate with other systems.
  • Windward has excellent support, either with their wiki site or their support technicians.
  • When we first purchased Windward, their support for JSON data sources seemed to be lacking.
Windward has been great in creating templates for all areas of our company. In our Insurance department, we use it to create insurance declaration packets, certificates, etc. In our Claims department, we use it to create all kinds of reports and data extracts. We also use it to create all of our form applications as well.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It is being used by the Software Development team and it allows us to download data from tables with different formatting.
  • Looping logic.
  • Drag and drop coding.
  • Easy integration with Office.
  • Could do with more documentation.
  • More training videos.
  • More intermediate to advanced videos to understand the full capability of Windward.
It is suited for non-tech people who want to create templates that can be reused. It is less appropriate where a template isn't possible or if the user doesn't want to integrate with a third-party application and wants to code all the logic themselves to have more control and flexibility.
September 26, 2019

Report automation made easy

Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use Windward Studios to automate a certain amount of mandatory/regulatory reports that need to be delivered and approved on tight deadlines.
Windward enables us to quickly provide robust and detailed data reports for our clients and regulators. Given that templates can be designed directly in Microsoft products, preparing templates becomes very easy with minimal coding. We are very happy with this product and use it company-wide.
  • User-friendly, amazing UI integrated into Microsoft products, no steep learning curve.
  • Generates large and complex reports at great speeds.
  • Windward has a great and very responsive support team. Every request or question will be answered in a timely manner.
  • Support for multiple data sources.
  • Lack of documentation regarding the Windward Java Reporting Engine (Linux implementation).
  • Error messages could be more elaborate/precise.
Our company produces lots of mandatory and regulatory reports which are large and complex. Our reports contain a lot of data which is stored in an Oracle Database. Windward allows us to easily use the data in the Oracle DB and produce those reports directly from MS Word. The data-source connector also supports Views and Oracle functions which makes the process even simpler/lighter.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use Windward Studios to format critical text reports that are delivered to airplane cockpits.
  • The ease of using Microsoft Word to create templates is second to none. Most other template engines require a good degree of technical knowledge.
  • The feature where you can generate code previews through Microsoft Word is very convenient.
  • Windward support is very quick and helpful
  • Windward's PODs (partial templates) are very useful for multiple reports that contain common sections.
  • Maybe could improve the documentation, although Windward Studios support is always there. A lot of the links on Google to the documentation are obsolete.
Windward Studios is well suited for non-technical people to create templates.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
My company partners with Windward to deliver document generation solutions to numerous client organizations. I have recently worked on solutions that include loan documents for a lender, insurance letters for a medical auditor, and proposal generation for an insurer. The solutions range from generating one document at a time to using a web front end to build a custom selection of documents to combine into a single proposal.
  • It is very easy to get up and running to see it work.
  • There are numerous options for data sources.
  • Technical support is very responsive and helpful.
  • It would be very helpful if it was possible for tag logic to handle an array of data. Without it, the syntax can become very verbose when there are multiple logical conditions to check.
  • Most tags are only built to handle a single piece of data so it can be a little confusing when a query only appears to return 1 record.
Windward makes it very easy to pull data out of a wide variety of data sources in order to dynamically generate documents (forms, letters, etc) in any type of industry.
Bharati Sadhwani-Tully | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
In our cloud-based software solutions for financial institutions, Baker Hill NextGen® and the Baker Hill Legacy solutions, we have integrated with the Windward Engine. Our clients use the Windward Designer to create their documents and upload them to our solution. Then we use the Windward Engine to produce those documents on demand. Our clients are very happy with their custom documents.
  • A document can be created in many different formats, like Word or Excel, and be output into many different formats, like PDF, Word, Excel.
  • The document is generated based on the data and the document template you provide. The template can have conditions to format what is shown based on the data, and still retain the powerful formatting of the platform like Microsoft Word.
  • Windward Support is very responsive when we reach out with questions or problems.
  • The documentation for the Wiki could use more examples of how to use the functions.
  • We tend not to upgrade very often. When we do upgrade there can be significant feature changes that necessitate template rework.
Windward Studios is well suited for documents into which you want to merge data.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Windward Studios was being used to create custom reporting for SaaS administrators clients. Both our administrators and our clients have different reporting needs and Windward allows each user to create and modify their own report templates based on their specific requirements. Windward reduces the time required for custom report creation and modification.
  • Windward handles multiple reporting template formats using tools people are already familiar with. Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel are particularly useful for us.
  • Windward has great technical support. Questions and issues are always answered in a timely manner.
  • Windward has multiple pricing options which were helpful for us in getting started.
  • I would like to see more organized and up to date documentation and videos for setup and training.
  • It depends on your particular setup and requirements, but our particular setup required a separate Windows server to run the Restful Engine. A cloud-based web-service that Windward maintains would be preferred.
  • While Windward's Microsoft based tools are great, they can be a bit intimidating to non-programmers at first glance.
Great for Technical Users. It's great for people a bit more on the technical side. It allows developers to quickly create and modify reporting templates without having to modify source code or make updates to a repository.

Potentially Difficult for Non-Technical Users. Making substantial changes to the data portions of reporting can be a bit difficult for non-technical users. While Windward's tools for this are great, it still requires an understanding of the database schema which not all users will have.
Greg Snyder | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use Windward Reporting solutions to help with reporting needs. We wanted the ability to create dynamically generated content, but also allow non-technical individuals to be able to edit and maintain the static content within the report. Windward allows us the ability to provide data friendly reports to our client's and design them with our own branding and style to make them easy to read and review. We use Windward's solution for our whole organization.
  • Allow business users to modify and update report content without the need for engaging a software developer.
  • Create user-friendly, content-rich reports that help to support the dynamic data we wanted to present to the client.
  • We initially purchased Windward to help build reports related to disclosures to our clients. Windward was the perfect solution for solving this issue.
  • Some functions in Word related to graphics do not always translate when producing the Windward report. We have overcome these by tweaking the design of the report at times. This issue is more common on reports that have many graphics and complex layouts.
  • Some reports rendering to PDF to not render like the original report.
  • We have found it is important to stay current with upgrades. Sometimes a report would have to be reworked when moving up 3 o 4 version of the software.
Windward is a great reporting tool that provides a lot of flexibility. It is very helpful in production reports that have other static content mixed with dynamic content and are client facing. We may or may not use Windward on reports that are strictly data centered, as other tools are available for this use.
February 15, 2019

Windward Opinion

Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
It's used across several departments. It allows us to design reports, including a big variety of data: Text, tables, images. It has a flexibility for design and helps people to export reports to Word and PDF.
  • Managing well the tinyMce fields content
  • user friendly in the design
  • allow the export to word and PDF and is plugged to word
  • Supporting HTML 5 format.
Well suited: User-friendly, easy to use.
Less appropriate: The number of reports generated by day is limited to 500 reports per day.
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Windward Studios is a vital component of our organization's flight planning service and gives us the capability to generate customized flight plans to pilots around the world.
  • Windward's Report Designer provides instant ease-of-use and a sense of familiarity by being integrated into Microsoft Word.
  • The overall application is fairly user-friendly and intuitive by itself, but Windward Studios also offers a full array of user guides, training sessions, videos, step-by-step tutorials, and other resources that allow users to truly learn and understand the program in order to utilize its full capabilities.
  • Windward Studios has truly unparalleled support. Every question or support request I've had has been responded to in a timely manner, and immediately addressed. Regardless of the complexity of the problem, they've been able to find a solution to generate the document output that I needed.
  • It would be greatly helpful if I were able to run two (or more) ForEach tags simultaneously.
  • The POD feature is great for applying identical template sections across multiple documents, but there should be a simpler/easier way to update it globally across every template.
  • The error messages could be more descriptive -- I sometimes get an error when generating the output and don't know exactly what's causing the problem.
Windward Studios would be well-suited for creating any kind of dynamic documents, letters, or forms that can utilize the design layouts and capabilities of the Microsoft Office applications.
February 07, 2019

Windward Studios Rocks

Randy McLachlan | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We have selected Windward Studios as our replacement for Oracle Reports. Finding a product that allowed users to easily change their own text and graphics content on correspondence was the main focus. With Windward Studios, users can use Microsoft Word to integrate their report templates with our database application to generate high-quality documents. With very high volume printing requirements, speed was also a critical factor. Windward Studios easily met our expectations. We are very pleased with this product.
  • Easily integrates MS Word templates with database tables or views.
  • Generates high-quality output at great speeds.
  • Produces output in several formats for a variety of uses.
  • We had difficulty loading the jar file for the Java engine in our Oracle database. Calling reports using the command line worked fine.
Windward Studios is perfect for maintaining letter or statement templates. It's easy for users to do this themselves, saving development time and costs. Generating tabular reports is probably better using other tools. We use Oracle Application Express as our development tool, and it does a better job for that.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Windward helps us to generate letters during the origination and servicing phase of a loan.
  • Easy integration: there is no steep learning curve to get started with WindWard.
  • Template buiding is easy because of the Word integration.
  • More detailed documentation that addresses some very specific problems.
Constantinos Tsiartas,  CIMP | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
ResellerIncentivized
We have embedded Windward Studios in our Loan Automation Solution and provided a document and report generation module with ease. Given that the design is totally done in MS Office (Word, Excel, Powerpoint), we prepared the templates for 40+ legal agreements and 20+ reports within weeks with minimal coding.
  • Design documents and reports with MS Office (WORD, EXCEL, POWERPOINT). This can be done by the business and not only be the IT. Template maintenance, which is usually mostly on content, can be done solely by business users.
  • Insert tags and business logic within documents to show/hide paragraphs depending on data or user input.
  • Integrates easily with 3rd party applications and it can also be used as the document and report generation engine of your software solution.
  • It can pull data from multiple sources (SQL, XML, OData, etc).
  • Better and more updated documentation. There is a wealth of functionality and the knowledge base does not reveal this much. You must be very specific in what you are looking for.
  • Web service consumption besides OData to pull data from other systems directly into the template would have taken Windward to another level.
  • User support in European timezones. :-)
Windward Studios is best suited for document and report generation. Where the design of output is required, Windward Studios is a must.

Windward Studios is less suited where lots of input fields are required, such as for electronic forms. Windward is not a UI platform for data capturing. It is for presenting data.
Larry Grady | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use the .NET Windward Reporting engine across several of our applications. It is our primary tool for generating sales proposals, automated presentations, orders, industry specification documents, and reports. The main reason we use Windward is the ability to not only design our reports right within MS Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files, but also the reliable recreation of these same documents at runtime. We receive very detailed forms from our customers who want their data merged into an exact representation of that document, and Windward has reliably provided us with this functionality.
  • If you have an existing Word or Excel document that you need to populate with data, then Windward is the right product for this functionality. It will reliably recreate this document in the same format (.docx, .xlsx, .pptx) or in PDF (there are other formats as well but this is what we use primarily).
  • The use of office documents as report templates allow us to have non-technical people submit reports to us and then we have a report writer who can tag the document for use in Windward. All of this is done without any specific programming knowledge other than AutoTag which is pretty easy to use. This allows us to free up valuable programming resources for other tasks.
  • The flexibility of Windward Reports allows us to generate data sources that are formatted around our business logic knowing that we don't have to worry about some rigid data specifications or requirements from our reporting tool. However, our data is structured so we're able to pull it into AutoTag and get exactly what we need for our reporting requirements.
  • I know we have wanted some more robust features in the powerpoint presentations, but to be honest we haven't looked at the update in the last two versions. So, a criticism of this wouldn't be fair because I'm not up to date on their more current PPT offerings.
  • One of the issues we've had in the past is getting the licensing correct. The licensing structure is a bit strict and can be a little unwieldy at times. Once it's set up we don't ever have issues, but when upgrading or migrating servers we've had issues in the past, and if you have licensing issue it can shut down reporting on your server until it is resolved. I will say that their support team is responsive and has always helped us to work through our issues. If I were recommending Windward to someone I would mention our problems with licensing so they would pay specific when setting up their configuration, but it wouldn't keep me from recommending their services.
I don't know where it wouldn't be appropriate, I just know it works well for us. We've looked for other products that provide the same features that Windward does and I just don't think one exists.
Miguel Angel Merino Vega | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Windward Java Reporting Engine is a wonderful tool for reporting for Java applications. Currently I use it for the rapid elaboration of reports with special requirements, which allows to have a formidably fast engine to elaborate all type of reports without the wastage of time that involves the elaboration of reports in other engines more generalized in Java.
  • Fast and direct report engine, using friendly templates through an add-in for Microsoft Word.
  • Adequate support and documentation to ensure a quick integration
  • Your template designers dont need to learn Java at all. They can work through Microsoft Office
  • The learning curve can be a nuisance, considering that currently Jaspers is the antonomic engine for Java
  • There is a price (not so expensive) so yeah thats always a cons.
  • Many customers currently use Jaspers, so migration can become a point to consider
If the project is currently new and has no business interfaces to deal with other systems areas, developing at WindWard can greatly ease development costs. On the other hand, where a culture of using other reporting tools already exists, change would probably not be the viable option for me and my people.
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use Java Reporting Engine to capture and process data we receive from USD. The we return the data using a HTML format which is easy to view for analyst to judge the input data. This data is then integrated into our process to create our final product.
  • Flexibility. The ability to modify the reporting engine to what you are exactly looking for and what you expect back.
  • Speed. Extremely quick page generation.
  • Overall it leave a very small footprint and does not burden too much on our system.
  • I found the API documentation to be rather lacking and descriptive.
  • Initial setup can be a little more complication due to the above confusing documentation.
For us it is well suited to retrieve data from our sql database [to] create a report of the data type, information, and attributes, format this report and then send it over to an Analyst who can go over the exact change that has taken place when a new batch of USD has come in.
Brent Rossow | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use AutoTag designer to build reports for our customers to use internally and with their own customers. It is one of several report design tools currently in use, and we selected AutoTag specifically for its native Microsoft Office output for which there simply is no comparison against our other tools, which technically create Office-type output (RTF, DOCX, etc.) but not in formats that are easy for our customers to adapt and modify after the reports are generated. AutoTag output behaves exactly like Office documents because they are Office documents. Certainly this isn't the answer for every reporting scenario, but when native Office output is required, AutoTag delivers exactly that.
  • Native Office output -- not nested tables and/or horrible RTF like other tools generate.
  • Ease of use -- once the data sources are set up, creating tables is as simple as drag and drop (okay, maybe not exactly that simple, but you can certainly create a table of data using drag and drop, then format it and manipulate it as needed).
  • Responsive developers and support -- when I've had questions, they've been addressed VERY quickly and professionally.
  • Limited in terms of customizability -- this is a double-edged sword. Other report tools we use support anything from limited to incredibly complex JavaScript, for example, and we often use a combination of JavaScript and complex queries to pass and manipulate data. AutoTag can do some of this, but it wouldn't be our go-to solution for complex reporting.
  • Limited drag and drop -- while you can easily create tables with drag and drop, you can't drag and drop individual fields, which really isn't intuitive
AutoTag is a brilliant solution for less complex reports where native Microsoft Office output is required. This is where AutoTag really shines. It's also appropriate in situations where our customers want to develop and maintain their own reports but don't necessarily want to commit an experienced data person or report developer to do the work. For complex report requirements that need JavaScript or considerable data manipulation inside the report templates, we will continue to look at other tools in our kit.
Adam Murray | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 5 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
AutoTag Template Designer is used across multiple departments in my organization. Our development team uses it to build and fix templates, and our product support team uses it for basic troubleshooting when clients are experiencing issues, or are looking for basic enhancements.
  • Using Microsoft Office capabilities to format templates.
  • Integrating SQL queries into a template.
  • Tagging specific datapoints to display from a SQL query.
  • Conditional formatting.
  • Sometimes using foreach tags can be confusing.
AutoTag Template Designer is well suited to create a template that uses basic concepts (clear locations to insert tags). It is a little more complicated to use if needed for more complex situations that include more logic than just inserting x data point to this tag.
September 23, 2015

This is the one!

Gregory Bosko | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
The AutoTag Template Designer is used between multiple departments, including the development, quality assurance, and support team. This allows anyone involved in the template process to be able to see exactly what is being added into any report at any time, without having to consult with another department and take away from their work.
  • Lets you easily pull in data points
  • Allows you to validate a query before saving it to make sure that it works correctly
  • Easy export to most common formats so you can test out your template with real-world data
  • When dealing with large queries, the system tends to slow down.
  • Nested for each queries have issues validating
As long as the user has at least a small background in using any kind of SQL commands, this should be near effortless for them. Windward's support page on their website has an immense amount of knowledge available for free, and has saved me from pulling my hair out several times.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
AutoTag Template Designer is currently being used within a couple different departments. It is designed in Dev Ops and used by people in accounting and also in the field by our brokers.
  • Allows for customization of existing templates
  • Connections to several types of data sources
  • Very intuitive in conjunction with the tutorials
  • Allow users to modify the Excel file while in the AutoTag editor. I find myself taking screen shots and referring to them.
I definitely recommend AutoTag Template Designer to anyone looking to improve their reporting services.
Jenelle Cooper | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Autotag Template Designer is being used across the entire company and by several departments that specialize in reporting. It's being used as a tool to create templates that run in conjunction with the software out company has created. It allows our company to [access] extra data being stored in our software and generate it into specific documents that our clients need.
  • The set up of the product is fairly easy as long as you have the right version and license key. It's also fairly easy to transfer licenses between users.
  • Once you have the main queries down, the tagging of the template is fairly easy and you can reuse templates instead of starting from scratch each time.
  • If you are having issues with a template or a tag type- the help documentation provided is helpful to provide examples. The webinars are also a good stepping stone to get knowledge quickly.
  • Sometimes the formatting within the Microsoft Word documents can be tricky. That's where most of the time comes from is making sure the tags don't mess up the formatting of the actual template itself.
  • Error messages can be vague. For example if something is wrong with the query or a tag, it can be difficult to find the issue within the query or identify the offending tag easily. This means the whole template won't work because of one minor issue.
If the end users are going to be proficient in SQL, then they are already light years ahead. Most of the time learning the product comes from figuring out the queries. After that, tags are fairly easy! It's great for clients that don't know SQL too that will just need the initial template built and will update the wording or static text.
September 17, 2015

WindWard in my sails

Anthony Vengrofski | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
One of the most important parts of our printing deliverables are audit reports. These reports go to both internal and external clients and are used in everything from order verification to marketing materials. Before AutoTag creating the reports involved a lot of manual data collection and editing. This was a time intensive, error prone, and frustrating process. WindWard's AutoTag report creation made it easy to recreate the reports into templates. Whenever we got stuck there was a Wiki based user guide and top notch tech support. The reports now take a fraction of the time to create and are finally consistent in layout and content. With the success of the report generation in our department we have been tasked to review and identify more reports that could benefit. THANK YOU WINDWARD.
  • AutoTag can easily be connected to virtually any data source. The wizard walks you through all the needed steps. This is very helpful in getting reports from multiple sources or departments.
  • WindWard has put together a Wiki based user guide and has the best tech support I have ever worked with. For the rare occasions that we get stuck trying to convert a report the help is plentiful.
  • AutoTag is built within the Office suite and is therefore able to leverage all the familiar features. This is very useful when you need to make reports useful and appealing.
  • It is hard to pick out the tags if they are mixed in with a block of text.
  • Using report variables in select statements causes the selection list of available fields to not show anything.
  • The color themes do not match the office selection and it feels very disconnected.
AutoTag has a feature called POD. With PODs you are able to save sections of reports to reuse elsewhere. If your reports have several pieces that are common between several reports, or reused many times in the same report, making a POD is perfect. Once made the POD can be dragged and dropped into any report for instant use. PODs are not limited to just tags, we have several just for document styles and database connections. This makes adding a new datasource very simple.
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