Chapter 22: Crystal Reports with ASP and ASP.NET

Overview

As discussed in Chapter 21, there are several general ways to integrate real-time Crystal Reports in a web page. In addition to Crystal Enterprise (CE), discussed in Chapters 24, 25, and 26, you can integrate Crystal Reports into your web pages using Microsoft Active Server Pages (ASP) with the Report Designer Component (RDC), and with Visual Studio .NET and ASP.NET. The new Version 10 Java Reporting Component allows web report integration in a J2EE environment (covered in Chapter 23). And, Crystal Reports 10 Developer and Advanced Developer Editions feature a limited-function version of CE known as the CE Embedded Edition (CE Embedded was known as Report Application Server, or CE Embedded, in Crystal Reports 9). Custom CE Embedded applications can be developed using Microsoft ASP and ASP.NET, as well as Java Server Pages on non-Microsoft web servers.

This chapter will discuss using the RDC, CE Embedded, and Visual Studio .NET to integrate Crystal Reports into your Microsoft Active Server Page and ASP.NET applications. One of the initial decisions you ll need to make ( especially if you re developing a new custom web application from scratch) is whether to base the application on the RDC or CE Embedded. You ll probably want to look toward CE Embedded, as it s the new direction for Business Objects Crystal single- tier web integration and positions you for eventual integration with the full Crystal Enterprise editions. If you have a large investment in existing RDC applications, you still may want to think about converting them to CE Embedded ”it will involve a significant amount of recoding, but you ll be better positioned for the future. While you can still use the RDC with Crystal Reports 10 applications, it includes no new features from Crystal Reports 9, and largely remains for the benefit of Visual Basic users to develop custom Windows applications.

And, remember that Crystal Enterprise 10 Professional and Premium editions contain their own set of object models programming interfaces that also allow you to customize web applications. While beyond the scope of this Crystal Reports “oriented book, these programming interfaces allow you to completely customize a report scheduling and distribution system that integrates fully with your organization s portal, intranet site, or Internet presence. If you choose CE Embedded Edition as your integration choice, you ll be well positioned to later move your application to the full versions of Crystal Enterprise.

Note  

You may also integrate Crystal Reports into your custom Windows applications using the RDC in various Windows development environments. Part III of this book covers Visual Basic 6 and Visual Studio .NET techniques to accomplish this.