Export reports to HTML? You may owe $10K per year. 12

[kenhamady]

Allow me to make your point even clearer. CR defines a 'report' as anything created with their software, including a text export. Broadcasting an exported file requires a CBL, which is the fact that spurred my original post. So if I give this file to someone else, and they broadcast it, they aren't even using the RPT fomrat.

Or here is another scenario. A developer can create a cllent application that allows user's to view and export reports. That user gets a copy of the runtime software and doesn't sign any license agreement with CR. What if they write a script that automates the distribution? Hard for CD to enforce a license with someone like that.

I am not sure, however, that you could transfer that right to yourself, since you have agreed to the license. You might be able to say the license is unenforceable, but only if you are willing to spend the money to argue the case. Ken Hamady, On-site Custom Crystal Reports Training & Consulting
Public classes and individual training.
Guide to using Crystal in VB

http://www.kenhamady.com/

tek@kenhamady.com

 

[mctaylor]

Well I'm certainly not the one who's going to be the guinea pig!

As for 'transferring the right back to yourself' that's not really what I meant. I was simply saying that if you can achieve this outcome using an artificial mechanism, the the situation is absurd and therefore I doubt the provision is enforceable. The proviso is as stated before, you can't use any Crystal software to create the report output or deploy.

I asked the Crystal-Clear guys in Germany about their take on this, and they said they did not believe there was a problem.

 

[AEldridge]

Hi All,

I've just had a look at the Crystal Clear web site and unless I'm reading it wrong, one of the big differences between it and Crystal Enterprise is that Crystal Clear is a fat client solution - i.e. the client must have the VOYA viewer component loaded onto their PC - either as an applet or as a bean within a Java application.

While this is OK for intranet deployments it has some important limitations when considered for internet deployments:

1. If the component is used as an applet, the VOYA viewer must be downloaded to the client PC. While it is not very big, the client browser may not have sufficient security permissions to run the applet, or there may be firewall filters that will prevent it from downloading correctly.

2. Not all browsers persistently cache Java applets - this means the Java applet will have to be downloaded once per report viewing session.

By comparison, Crystal Enterprise provides a true zero-client solution that does not require any active code (Java or ActiveX) on the client PC. This allows reports to be delivered to any client that can render HTML3.2 or better (HTML4.0 is preferred) and will not be stopped by active content filters.

Furthermore, the Crystal Clear solution requires that reports get run via their JDBC drivers and there are only a limited number of options available (Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle, Sybase, Plain Text, News Server, JDBC to JDBC). Crystal Enterprise provides a far more comprehensive set of data access drivers and these are included at no further cost.

One final note is that the back end architecture of Crystal Clear does not seem anywhere near as robust or scalable as Crystal Enterprise. Running reports is a resource intensive task and as the number of users/reports/records increases the processing load ramps up proportionally. The ability of the report processing task to scale up looks as if it will require significant skills in Java and web coding to move it away from the web server tier.

I hope these points contribute constructively to this discussion.

Cheers, Alan Eldridge
Melbourne, Australia

 

[DaveHowe]

I asked the Crystal-Clear guys in Germany about their take on this, and they said they did not believe there was a problem.

IIRC, the crystal clear guys used only components available under V7 of CR - so they could remain inside the more hospitable licencing for the runtime report engine at that time.

 

[AEldridge]

Dave makes a good point here...

As both Crystal Reports and Crystal Enterprise are released by Crystal Decisions, they will remain in synch with new releases. With Crystal Clear - if they have truly reverse engineered the file format then there will be a lag time if the file formats change (which is likely).

Cheers, Alan Eldridge
Melbourne, Australia

 

[mctaylor]

Hi Alan,

Not betraying a little bias are we? <g>

Anyway, just to clarify a few things:

1. Yes Crystal clear does use an applet viewer, but it is extremely small, and so this is not an issue with use over the Internet - even if applet caching doesn't work. It's certainly the complete opposite of a fat client solution. In fact, I have done installation and config of both Crystal Enterprise and CrystalClear. The former is absolute bloatware by comparison!

2. There are no problems with applet security for printing/exporting.

3. True, it doesn't do HTML report output. I can live with that.

4. True, you need jdbc connectivity. I can live with that too. (Even MS has finally released a jdbc driver). SYbase bundles jdbc as does Oracle. Not a problem...unless you don't do java. Actually it's not that difficult to write jdbc drivers for other types of interface.

5. I disagree with your analysis (or perception?) on the scalability issue - you would have to do a really careful side by side comparison on the same hardware and O/S platform. (Which I have not done, but would be interested to have a go at). I don't see how you can even comment on the robustness question based on just looking at the C/Clear web site.

6. Yes - if you want to use CrystalClear you need some Java experience. I consider that a 'plus', not a drawback! (But I recognise that not everyone else might agree).

7. True, C/Clear will lag behind new Crystal Reports versions. And that is possibly both drawback and a risk. Even now the compatability is not 100% on every feature.

Crystal Reports attempts to cover a lot of ground in terms of data source support, output formats etc. Crystal Clear serves a narrower range of needs, but it's a very clean and simple piece of engineering, and it is more versatile as a software component for embedding into software applications in various ways. At the end of the day, you pick the solution that best fits your needs and your budget.


To respond to Dave Howe:

Crystal clear does not use any software components from Crystal reports, and they do support features added in CR8 and 8.5. I don't think the CR license has anything to do with it because they are not bound by that license.

Cheers,
Milton Taylor

 

[CFDude]

Interesting thread. Just my .02 --

I've developed reporting systems from scratch using Cold Fusion and ASP and about 6 months ago, was saddled with developing a reporting sytem for the enterprise that was done with Crystal.

Quite frankly, Crystal is past its prime. Its a great tool to embed into a program from a single user standpoint, but for serving up reports to an enterprise, its a joke.

My opinion is that for a web based reporting system, you are better off using straight ASP, CF, JSP, PHP, or what have you over using Crystal as your design medium. My reasons: (I'll use ASP as an example)

1 - Designing -- with ASP, I can duplicate a header across multiple pages. With Crystal, I have to put in kludges to get the header to print on groupings. (I mean, this is pretty basic here)

2 -- Data cacheing. I see no way to cache data with Crystal. You can save the data with a report, but it doesn't work when you try to pass parameters to filter the data. (If 2 people request the same report at the same time, but with different select criteria, Crystal will only show the last report requested. This is a serious bug, in my opinion.

3 -- Speed. Crystal is way too slow. My reports are very basic. No graphs -- just 5 groupings of the data. However, they average 12,000 records / report. With ASP, I can cache the data and show the output in about 2-3 seconds. With Crystal, it takes on average 60-90 seconds. (Even if I save the data with the report, it takes it that long to sort and group the data)

4 -- Proprietary. The .rpt file is not an open format and if it becomes corrupted, then you are SOL. With ASP, it's text based and can be edited with any text editor. Last week, I had 3 unrecoverable errors that took me 4 extra hours to recover from. (Yes, I did have backups). XML support is a plain joke.

5 -- Security. I need to be able to suppress information based on user role on the report. This is extremely difficult to do with Crystal, if not impossible.

6 -- Development time -- It could be argued that Crystal allows you to develop the reports faster. However,
ASP.net and Cold Fusion all have built in data formatting controls, functions, data caching, built in security that make it a much easier decision to go with that. With a good designed framework, and the problems I have run into (all bugs that have been verified with Crystal, so it is not me) The extra time needed to overcome those problems make it a moot point.

7 -- Price. Well, ASP is free. Looking at the new CrystalReports.net, it will cost me 50,000 just to upgrade!

What Crystal does offer is pagination and printing if you use the viewers. (The export is a joke -- you can't export beyond the first page with the activex viewer)

Another problem I see with the CrystalReports.Net, is that it looks like they got rid of the activex viewer, so the printing advantages are moot now as well. I don't see the export on there either. So right now, I see no advantage to keep with Crystal. (The only reason I am still using it is because we spent so much money on it, the management is determined to keep it for a while)

I can go on, but those are the main points.

 

[AEldridge]

Hi Milton,

Yes - a clear display of bias there - but to be fair I am registered as a vendor ;-)

I think you hit the nail squarely on the head when you say that CC and CE are targetted at different markets. CE is aimed at the corporate space and is designed to be an infrastructure - providing report management features (like a repository and security features) in addition to the basic web-publishing.

CC on the other hand only addresses the web-publishing aspect and seems to be primarily aimed at the web developer market as a &quot;deliver RPT files to the web&quot; tool. This is not a bad thing (as you say it is a clean and simple piece of engineering) but it makes the two products quite different.

As you say, each organisation needs to examine their own needs and select the tool that is appropriate.

I conceed the point that it might be able to get CC to scale to support high user volumes, but based on the information on the web site this will require a fair amount of work in the deployment phase and will require skills in Java/web servers/app servers/etc. Scaling CE is much simpler and does not require these technical skills - this &quot;out of the box&quot; scalability is what you are paying for with CE.

And don't forget - there is more to scalability than just increasing the number of users. Consider:
- increasing number of different reports
- increasing the frequency the reports are run
- increasing the retrieved data volumes
- increasing the searched data volumes
- increasing the % uptime required by the system
- support for fault tolerence
- support for distributed data sources
- support for integration with web farms
- support for deployment through firewalls/DMZ

I could go on but this gives you a taste of the complexity of the problem. Again - with CE these aspects of scalability are handled &quot;out of the box&quot; whereas CC will require you develop solutions yourself.

It boils down to this... CC is probably the right tool for you if:
[ul][li] you don't want/need all the advanced features offered by CE,[/li]
[li]can live within the limitations of CC's support for the RPT format, and [/li]
[li]have the appropriate Java/web skills in-house. [/li][/ul]


CFDude - some points on your posting...

While I agree that you can do a lot of clever report processing and display using developer tools like ASP and CF, I think you miss the point here - YOU might be able to do this but Joe from Finance cannot. And while you might be able to support Joe with every report request he makes, how will you support Joe + Bill + Mary + the 20 other people within your organisation who also want reports? Suddenly you are spending all your time doing report design/modification and your reporting system costs your company whatever your annual salary is to run. According to monster.com, a programmer's salary ranges from $50K to >$100K pa. Ouch!

On the other hand, Joe (and his friends) with a bit of training could learn how to use CR and could learn how to save a report into the CE repository. If they can do this, all of a sudden they are now self sufficient for creating and deploying reports and you can continue to work on more important projects that are deserving of the attention of a highly paid developer.

The who idea of Enterprise Business Intelligence is about making report writing something that anyone can do - not just the IT staff and developers. I mean, you wouldn't even entertain the thought of using ASP and CF to help Joe from finance crunch his spreadsheet numbers, would you? You'd simply give him a copy of Excel, some training and tell him to do it himself.

So why should report writing be any different? My position is it should not, and tools like CR are the enablers for this change.

Whew! End of rant ;-)


As for the problems with performance and bugs, it sounds like you might have some configuration problems with your install of CR/CE. I would suggest you contact Crystal Decisions technical support in your country/area and they'll be happy to help you.

Cheers, Alan Eldridge
Melbourne, Australia

 

[CFDude]

Alan,
It doesn't really matter who can design the reports -- in an enterprise financial reporting system, you will most likely have a system administrator and someone who has maintain that system. Plus there is a deeper level of controlling the business rules and access to the data. In that instance, you wouldn't want Joe from accounting sticking his own reports out there unless it follows the business logic.
The how and who can design those reports is almost secondary and doesn't encompass the entire job. My job is to maintain such a system and I can assure you that designing the reports themselves is about 20% of the job. Most of my time is spent working around the problems and limitations with Crystal and trying to get the business demands into the reports. Its funny you mention the Excel thing -- I just had to create my own Export function for the reports, since the one in Crystal simply does not work and I did it in ASP.

Plus with the amount of money we had to plunk down for Crystal, we could have paid a developer for a full year.


As for configuration issues on our end -- we've covered all that. We have spent countless hours on the phone with Crystal (5 different technicians) and again, they verified that ALL of the problems we have/had with the system were due to bugs with the software. That is not configuration issues -- just poor software.

 

[HowardHammerman]

It is a bit off subject, but I recently came across a memo from Crystal Decisions showing the 'real' prices of Crystal Enterprise. Here is the link:

http://www.hammerman.com/newsletterapril02.html#crystal

I like the point made by a previous contributor: For the cost of a typical Crystal Enterprise installation, you can hire a competent ASP programmer for a full year.

Howard Hammerman,

Crystal Reports training, consulting, books, training material, software, and support. Scheduled training in 8 cities.
howard@hammerman.com

http://www.hammerman.com

800-783-2269

 

[hmohrmann]

Crystal seems to have changed some of their licensing requirements in version 9. At least for those people that only use the reports inhouse.

Check the license agreement on their web site. Here is the part that applies inhouse.

4.2 Deployment Within Your Organization of Server/Web Applications Utilizing the Runtime Software. You may install and use Server/Web Applications utilizing the Runtime Software in one or more Server Environments owned or operated by you for your internal business purposes. The Runtime Software may be installed on only one server in each Server Environment, and only one instance of the Runtime Software per Server/Web Application may be utilized on that Server at any one time. Under no circumstances may you allow a single Server/Web Application to Access more than one installation of the Runtime Software by combining additional Software licenses, other Crystal products that include the Runtime Software, promotional offers of any kind, or by Any other means, unless you acquire an add-on license for additional Runtime Software scalability.

 

[kenhamady]

Crystal has changed the license for server based applications, but this doesn't have anything to do with the Broadcast license or CBL. The CBL covers distributing your output, not people running reports through a server.

I am currently working to clarify the CRv9 CBL with the staff at Crystal Decisions. I will be writing up the results in my next newsletter. They now have 2 separate broadcaset license models, one for Crystal Reports and one for Crystal Enterprise. The license isn't clear on this, but they have agreed to post a clarification on their web site. Ken Hamady, On-site Custom Crystal Reports Training & Consulting
Public classes and individual training.
Guide to using Crystal in VB

http://www.kenhamady.com/

tek@kenhamady.com

 

[cecil69]

CFDude, are you saying you cannot export CR reports to Excel? Please say it ain't so. I currently work in R&R (not pretty) but we are forced to go with CR as we are upgrading our db program. I export to Excel all the time for management types so they can manipulate the data in their own way (there's no chance in h--- they could, or would, write their own reports in R&R). Even in R&R, if you have conditional lines, etc. it gets funky, but I can manage it.

I e-mailed this thread to &quot;upper management&quot; as I don't think they've even considered the ramifications of using CR.

Thanks in advance for your reply.

 

[kenhamady]

People export reports from Crystal Reports to Excel all of the time, and it get's better with every version. CFDude is talking about Crystal's web based viewers, not Crystal Reports. Ken Hamady, On-site Custom Crystal Reports Training & Consulting
Public classes and individual training.
Guide to using Crystal in VB

http://www.kenhamady.com/

tek@kenhamady.com

 

[CFDude]

I was referring to the limitation of crystal where it will only export the data on the first page of the report. As far as I could tell, it was not limited to just the web viewers. However, I think with version 9, it has been fixed, but the new web interface seems much slower and printing is a complete joke now.

Tim P.

 

[kenhamady]

I just opened Crystal version 6.0 and exported a 4 page report to MS Excel. I am not exactly sure what you are experiencing in the web viewers, but I know that CR itself doesn't have this limitation. Since this thread is so long I have started a new thread for this topic, if you want to discuss further:
thread149-375284
Ken Hamady, On-site Custom Crystal Reports Training & Consulting
Public classes and individual training.
Guide to using Crystal in VB

http://www.kenhamady.com/

tek@kenhamady.com

 

[bimaven]

And finally, for the (not so) final word...

Crystal Decisions employs hundreds of people to develop a software product that is the best in it's class. Most of the people who have posted in this thread use it most every day and a few people make quite a nice living from offering consulting and training services around the product.

If you are that unhappy with the licensing and pricing that Crystal Decisions offers, my suggestion to you is to not buy, use or reccomend their products. In this case two things will happen:

1) Crystal Decisions will realize that their licensing and pricing are restrictive and market economics will force them to change the way they do business OR

2) (Which is more likely) Crystal Decisions will not change their pricing or licensing, as you are in the minority of people who do not find enough value in their products to accept the licensing agreement and pay the licensing costs.

I myself am perfectly happy to pay for Crystal Enterprise licenses and think they should actually RAISE the price for the value the product provides. If cost is your driving factor, I suggest you use ASP or other languages or tools to try and create the same feature-rich application and functionality.

Once you have been in business for over 10 years, employ hundreds or staff and distribute and support your product worldwide to an installed user base of 11 million, you can compete with Crystal Decisions and set your own licensing and fee arrangements

 

[lalato]

bimaven,
I don't think many of us here are actively complaining about the &quot;fairness&quot; of the licensing agreement. This thread is more about fully understanding the extremely vague wording of the licensing agreement.

One that was made clear is that we didn't need the CBL when a report was going out to 50 or fewer people. Had this not been made clear, some people would have needlessly invested in a product they didn't need.

I'm sorry, bimaven, but this smacks of nothing more than FUD.

 

[kenhamady]

Crystal has the right to create just about any license they want. I have the right to complain about it being aggressive and to share my concern with others. My main concern was that I could use v8 for a year and not have a clue that this &quot;feature&quot; was added to the license when I upgraded from v7. This is a pretty dramatic and expensive change to be hidden in the fine print.

So my goal was to make sure that lots of people knew about the CBL. Crystal Decisions has already responded. They 'clarified' that despite the unfortunate wording in the license, you have to have a FULLY automated process to qualify as a broadcast.

With v9 they changed the wording in the license and made it even LESS clear. And, the v9 CBL is a $35K product - not the kind of thing you want to be liable for, simply because you read the license the wrong way. So, I wrote an article about the wording and what it would mean if taken at face value. CD contacted me, we 2 long conference calls, and they are going to post a clarification on their web site.

My point? Shining a light on these issues is often all that it takes. This thread is part of that process. Ken Hamady, On-site Custom Crystal Reports Training & Consulting
Public classes and individual training.
Guide to using Crystal in VB

http://www.kenhamady.com/

tek@kenhamady.com