Crystal Reports XI is the latest version of the report writer from Business organization Objects. Local reports guru David McAmis takes the new version for a spin.

Most developers might know Crystal Reports from versions included in Studio, Visual Studio.Internet, and other popular developer IDE's such every bit BEA Workshop, C# Builder, Delphi 2005, JBuilder, WebSphere.

In this latest installment both written report and awarding developers take something to exist excited about as there are a host of new features for report pattern and integration. Hither's a run-down of what you tin expect in this release.

Updated Report Designer

The offset thing developers volition detect when they first open up the Crystal Reports XI designer is a new user interface. The changes to the UI are apparent from the kickoff, with a new -Offset Page" that features links to external resources, sample reports, a list of study wizards, and the near recent reports you have been working with.

The toolbars and icons accept also been updated and developers who are familiar with Crystal Reports will notice that when yous open multiple reports, a new tabbed interface has been included to allow you lot to switch quickly between open reports. The report designer also features a new -Project Workbench", shown beneath in Figure 1, that you can use to organise reports into projects and publish these reports en-masse to Crystal Reports Server (which we will look at a lilliputian later)

FIGURE i: The new Project Workbench

The written report designer still features the same tools you lot may take used earlier. You lot can use these to insert groups, summaries, charts, maps, running totals, and more than into your report with ease. The one new feature that volition accept developers jumping for joy is the new dynamic parameter fields.

Previously in Crystal Reports, parameter fields were static. So if you wanted to display a parameter field with a list of employee names, for example, you could populate a pick list while yous were designing the report. When the study was run, this aforementioned pick list would exist displayed and the user could make their pick. The only problem with this is when a new employee was added, the listing of values did non modify. You lot would accept to go back into the report and manually refresh the listing yourself. This caused most application developers to create their own custom user interface for passing parameters to the report itself, which was frequently costly and time-consuming.

With the new dynamic parameter fields in Crystal Reports XI, this custom development should become a matter of the by. When you create a dynamic parameter field in Crystal Reports XI, y'all tin can specify a database table, view, etc. every bit the dynamic source for the choice-lists or you lot tin can use an SQL command that will call up the values, each fourth dimension the written report is run, as shown in Figure 2.

FIGURE two: Dynamic parameters in action

In improver, this version introduces the concept of -cascading" parameters, where the values shown in a listing of values are determined by your previous pick. For example, going dorsum to our previous instance, you could set up two parameters, -Manager" and -Employee". Whenever you selected a manager, the side by side parameter value list would be filtered to merely evidence those employees who work for that managing director.

This flexible approach to report parameters should hateful less time coding custom application pages for reporting and more time spent getting on with the application development.

In terms of time-saving features, the updated charting components get in possible to only insert a chart into your report and let Crystal Reports decide what data and chart type should exist created. Frequently this will not be the terminal desired result, merely it does make it like shooting fish in a barrel to quick pull together visual, information-rich reports without having to click through multiple dialogs to go a simple nautical chart.

This same concept has also been applied to cantankerous-tabs, with a single click all that is required to place a cross-tab object in your study. Unlike charts, there isn't an easy way to automatically select the content for the cantankerous-tab only just the creation of a bare cross-tab is plenty of a fourth dimension saver to make you want to use cross-tabs again.

New Developer Features

For developers, at that place is a grab-pocketbook of new features regardless of whether you develop in .NET, COM or Java. To start, Crystal Reports XI now includes the ability to shop images external to the report file itself. This may seem like a small thing, but it has been a sore bespeak with developers for a while, particularly with web developers who want to use Crystal Reports in Web applications but don't want to store the images in the study itself, which could increase the file size dramatically.

In addition, the use of CSS Mode Sheets has been better documented in this version, making it a viable option for Web developers who desire to integrate reports with the same look-and-feel into their spider web applications.

For application developers integrating reports into their .Cyberspace applications, the viewer components accept been updated (Figure 3) and include all of the new features found in the written report designer (dynamic parameters, new consign formats, etc.). There is a setting to disable tool-tips, which was an annoying feature in previous versions, as almost report developers would not enter tool-tips for each chemical element on the report.

FIGURE three: Updated report viewer

And at long last there is a single merge module you can use to deploy your awarding, which makes creating installation and setup packages much easier. There has been a renewed focus on this area with this release and it is at present possible to setup packages that install right the showtime fourth dimension.

On the Java side of things, the enhancements are along the same lines, with the exception of dynamic parameters which didn't make it in time for the first release. However, there are enough new features though to proceed most Coffee developers happy, including a new JavaServer Faces(JSF) Viewer and ready of custom JSF tags to cut downward on evolution fourth dimension.

At that place are a number of enhancements to the Java API itself, with additional methods that give more command over the data source and location. There is also an updated version of the Coffee Reporting Component that brings information technology closer to rough parity to with the other platform API's.

Updated Server Engineering

This version of the product not merely includes new features, both for report design and awarding development merely besides brings together the platform components from Crystal Decisions and Business Objects. Business Objects bought Crystal Decisions over a year ago and this version represents the offset -combined" production featuring the tools and functionality from both production lines.

The outset immediate benefit for awarding developers is Crystal Reports Server, which provides a subset of the features and functionality institute in Business Objects Enterprise, which is an enterprise framework for publishing reports to the Web, as well as scheduling and distributing reports in a secure environment. And in addition to the subset of features, it is too a subset of the price, at around AU$12,000 for v concurrent users.

Crystal Reports Server brings the cadre report scheduling and distribution framework and functionality to awarding developers, which they tin utilize to create scalable, multi-tier applications for modest to medium-sized user bases. And when scalability to thousands of users is required, at that place are only minor changes required to use the same code with the full-force Business Objects Enterprise.

It also bears mentioning that the licensing within both Crystal Reports and related products has been simplified and now is much more competitive with other products in the market. For most internal applications you lot won't demand any additional licensing and if you are developing applications for commercial distribution, there is a costless runtime for thick-client applications and simplified process for any components that are licensed and would crave a software license.

Summary

So in the cease, this release offers a picayune bit of something for everyone. Report developers will honey the new look and feel and features constitute in the written report designer itself, while application developers can look forwards to an updated set of tools and technologies to assist them easily integrate reports into their application.