Exporting to Text Format 1

[rhinok]

I'm having difficulty with Text formatting on CE 8.5 Pro. My goal is pretty simple. I want to schedule a report for export to Paginated Text in a specific Shared directory.

My problem is that the report looks horrible in Text format once its exported from CE. I am aware of export design considerations and I took painstaking efforts to build the report in CR 8.5 Developer using a fixed-width Courier 10 font. The report exports just fine from CR 8.5 Developer.

I have a printer installed on the CE Server and its the same printer used in the report.

Has anybody else run into or have experience with this issue?

 

[synapsevampire]

Have you applied the patches to CE?

In theory, they should look the same if the DLL's are the same.

I haven't experienced what you speak of, so I'd suspect your CE hasn't had the hot fixes applied.

http://support.crystaldecisions.com/updates/default.asp

-k

http://www.informeddatadecisions.com

kai@informeddatadecisions.com

 

[rhinok]

Actually, I applied u2ftext.dll from the most recent Db export drivers patch, but the dll in the patch was exactly the same one in my new installation (8.6.1.121, I think). I also copied the the older version from CR 8.5 Developer on my workstation onto the server and the behavior was still the same

The Text formatting in the output isn't even close to what it is in CR. The CE output looks like its been formatted in portrait. Also, many of the fields are truncated or misaligned. According to the pdf in the db export drivers patch, this was an issue that has since been corrected.

Also, viewing the report output from CE launches an HTML page, not Notepad.

I guess I'll go through the pain of applying all the latest patches to see if I can get this to work.

 

[tecnova1]

Hi,

I had a similar problem and talk to Seagate software and they made me install the u2ftext.dll from Crystal Reports 8.0. Not sure what the Dll version was but it solved our problems.

 

[rhinok]

Thanks tecnova1!

After going through multiple rounds of troubleshooting with CD Tech Support (all of which I knew was unnecessary). I finally convinced somebody (on my third call) to send me the old .dll. This individual also tested my scenario on his installation and found that he had the same problem (of course, I had asked them to test this on my first call and they refused because its not part of the script).

Now, the old .dll does work but there are some caveats:[ol][li]I have to use the old u2ftext.dll (8.0.0.1) on my client machine so that I can gauge the export formatting appropriately[/li][li]I have to pad the fields with extra spaces unlike the later dlls which are tight to the field width[/li][li]Due to the extra spaces, I had to format the report in Legal Size in Crystal Reports so that it formats ~ Letter Size in Notepad[/li][/ol]Hopefully, CD resolves this issue before my project goes live because I really don't want to go back and reformat every report I've done as a kluge to their coding mistakes.

 

[rhinok]

Ok, the issue is resolved (after having dealt with Tech Support for over a month).

My exported Text formatting issues within CE relate specifically to a Windows 2000 permissions issue. This is something that was previously not documented by Crystal Decisions. I have asked that it be uploaded to their Knowledge base.

Problem:[ol][li]Crystal Enterprise is installed on a Windows 2000 Server. All components are installed on the same machine.[/li][li]The report is exported to paginated text from Crystal Reports 8.5 Developer. The formatting is perfect. Notes:[/li][ul][li]The export was performed on the CE Server itself.[/li][li]The same default printer was used.[/li][/ul][li]The report is exported to paginated text from CE 8.5 Professional. The formatting is substantially different than expected (based on the CR 8.5 Dev output). This is an issue, because every report in this system will be output to paginated text.
Notes:[/li][ul][li]All NTFS permissions have been created per existing Crystal Decisions documents[/li][li]Other non-html viewer formats (Acrobat, ActiveX, RTF, etc...) that could (potentially) be affected by printer or permissions issues export perfectly from both CR and CE.[/li][/ul][/ol]Resolution:[ol][li]The Crystal Enterprise Reports Server (Job Server) was configured to connect via the Local System Account. Changing the logon to use a Domain Account with local Administrative Privileges resolved the Text Exporting issue. This specific issue (Exporting to Text) only occurs on a Windows 2000 Machine. The issue did not occur on Windows NT4 and Windows XP during testing.[/li][/ol]Thankfully, this issue is resolved.

 

[Madawc]

You might get better results with Excel or PDF/ACrobat Madawc Williams
East Anglia
Great Britain

 

[beardenb]

Regarding the last post about using Excel or PDF -- we have had an exasperating time with Excel exports not looking the same from Crystal Reports 8.5 Pro to Crystal Enterprise 8.5 Pro. We have installed all the latest patches for both but still get different results on CR and CE.

I'm going to take a look at rhinok's solution for text exporting to see if it improves the disparity between CR and CE exporting. Not sure how permissions could have an effect on formatting but you never know...

--Bearden

 

[rhinok]

In my particular case, the client has a requirement that every single report (~1K reports) be exported in paginated text format due to their use of a home-grown document management, archival and retrieval system. Other formats are not an option.

Regarding Excel formatting issues, I've run the following tests in my test environment (CE8.5 with ActiveX viewer using ePortfolio):[ol][li]Scheduled a report to format Excel (Data Only). Result = Excel document formatted perfectly to my expectations[/li]

[li]Scheduled a report to format Excel with Export Report Header and Tabular Format checked. Result = Excel document with merged columns[/li]

[li]Scheduled a report to format Excel with Export Report Header checked, Tabular Format unchecked. Result = Excel document with merged columns[/li]

[li]Scheduled a report to format Excel with Export Report Header unchecked, Tabular Format checked. Result = Excel document with merged columns[/li]

[li]Scheduled a report to format Excel with both options unchecked. Result = Excel document with merged columns[/li]

[li]Scheduled an report that is formatted for Excel in Crystal Reports format and then used the export option in the ActiveX Viewer to export to Excel. Result = Excel document with merged columns[/li][/ol]As you can see, I've only been able to get decent Excel results in one of many tested scenarios.

I haven't tested this at my new client, but the following KB article refers to a registry setting that--in conjunction with a hotfix--may resolve this issue:

http://support.crystaldecisions.com/library/kbase/articles/c2010563.asp

Also, check out the following related article:

http://support.crystaldecisions.com/library/kbase/articles/c2012217.asp