Crystal Reports from the web 3

[DirtyB]

I have ASP pages that hit Access and SQL Server databases. I now am writing ASP pages to show Crystal reports from these databases. I have been told that you can call the report simply from a hyperlink. I have also been told that you must set the report as an object and write tons of extra ASP code to get the reports to show properly? I looked at some sample ASP code from Seagate and there are HUNDREDS of lines of code to get the reports to show over the web. I am using Crystal 8. Can someone please tell me the definitive most effecient way to show Crystal Reports through ASP code? If I have a report that does not need to be dynamic, what is the simplest way to show it? no parameters, or anything.

 

[mmaz]

How about exporting your report as an HTML file,and open this page from your link?

 

[DirtyB]

that could work for an immediate solution. I said that the reports don't need to be dynamic, but they need to be up to date. They don't need to accept parameters at all, but the data should be fresh from the database. I'm just looking for the simplest ASP code I can write to get them up .

thanks

 

[mmaz]

In that case, why don't you use the sample files from Seagate? The only thing you'll have to do is to change your db connection from your ASP...and Seagate also has samples for that.

 

[DirtyB]

Yeah, I have some of those samples, but the ones that I found are like several pages of .ASP code and I just thought that there was a simpler way to do it. The sample that I am looking at has about eight .ASP pages in it. Can I not just make a hyperlink directly to a report?

 

[mmaz]

I really don't know the answer to that...

 

[mickyd]

I have downloaded some of the sample code but have been having the same problem as you to get the most current data to display. So far, I've only been able to get it to display reports with saved data, which like you said isn't much good since the reports are required to be up to date. I can't seem to get the viewer to connect to my database through ASP.

Which seagate example code did you look at (which file name) ?

 

[LV]

If all you want to do is just call your report through the URL, then you don't need ASP code (I assume that you were looking at their Report Designer Component samples).
Crystal comes with the WCS(Web Component Server) that allows to display the .rpt file in the Web Browser. You should have it installed. Create a virtual directory on your server, pointing to the physical directory where your reports are and then call it through the URL, ex.
//servername/directoryname/report.rpt

 

[DirtyB]

Thank You!! That answers my question. The pages need to be in ASP for other reasons, but that is what I was looking for. If I do it that way...my reports will come up in the CR viewer, but will the refresh button work? The problems i've had in the future, are getting the reports to refresh data from the web viewers...???

 

[LV]

The refresh button will sure work. Just make sure you have no "Save records with report" option checked in the Designer while creationg the report.

 

[DirtyB]

I have that option taken care of, but what happens is that the data that comes up is old, and when you hit the refresh button, it prompts the user for a login/password to the database. How can I avoid this?

 

[DirtyB]

and even furthermore...one of the reports has several sub-reports, and it prompts for a login/password for each and every sub-report.

 

[LV]

Using version 8, you should be able to pass the user ID and password with the URL as well. I've never tried that, but there is an article at Crystal KB explaining all this(about subreports as well):

http://support.crystaldecisions.net/library/kbase/articles/c2006481.asp

 

[DirtyB]

wow...thanks a lot...I've searched that thing several times and not come up with anything. That answers my question, i'll try to implement it. Thank you so very much.

 

[LMRollins]

I use my cr reports on a web server using the web component and they work great. I used the password and id report mentioned above and it works great also. When you do a refresh, you'll need to hit the lightening bolt in the CRviewer not the one from IE or netscape. Also use the printer button in the Viewer. Need any other info, feel free to send me an email (lrollins@morrisontexmach.com). I have over ten reports using the Seagate web server component.

 

[Guest_imported]

just do this

yourrpt.rpt?prompt0=param1?prompt1=param2

and so on.

 

[joseomar]

I am following this thread as I am having basically a similar problem. ie. I want to allow users to run Crystal reports from the web, but without having to use the functionality of Crystal Enterprise.
My question is; we have CR8.5 proffessional version. Can we display the reports in the ways being suggested on this thread or do we need to have the developer version of Crystal reports. and, is there a document giving detailed information on how to achieve this, I am afraid that I am quite new to CR and for the most part I am not quite sure what is being suggested here.

Any help is much appreciated.

 

[LMRollins]

I have version 8.0 on my web server for the web reports but I use 8.5 on my desktop to create reports. I don't have any problem with this setup. Enterprise is more than we need and the licenses are too expensive. Do you have version 8.0?, if so use it instead.

 

[joseomar]

Unfortunately, we have not got version 8 !! so what we really need is a simple way of allowing users to run Crystal reports through the intranet, whilst being able to secure access to certain reports (I guess this could be done at OS level ??!!) Have any of you any experience of this? How was it done? are there any example files out there, or a document listing the steps?

Thanks

 

[Guest_imported]

Help please, i'm new to crystal reports as well i have the developers edition 8.5. I have created a report *.rpt. I want users to be able to view it on the web. I don't want users to install CRviewer to be able to view my reports. I want the report to be in pure html, and i want the data to be retrieved each time a user views the report. IS THIS EVEN POSSIBLE??