Escape Online and Crystal Reports
Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 with Crystal Reports
Crystal Reports Viewer supported .Net version 3.5
Crystal Reports is a SAP software product. It is the world's leading reporting tool -- powerful and flexible. Using this tool, Escape Technology has designed highly formatted, interactive reports that can be run from within Escape Online.
Depending on your needs, you may or may not have to purchase Crystal Reports. To give you an idea of what you need to buy (and train for), review the following scenarios:
- Use standard reports only. You do not need to buy Crystal Reports. The Crystal Reports Viewer is bundled with Microsoft .Net, including multiple seats for running report requests simultaneously. We developed a queuing method that takes advantage of the seats so you don't have to buy any additional software for reports.
- Develop your own custom reports. You will need to buy Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 with Crystal Reports. Keep in mind that Crystal Reports is a powerful, complex program that requires training. We believe only in-house IT power users will have the time and capacity to develop reports using this product.
- Contract with us to develop custom reports. You do not need to buy Crystal Reports. We will work with you to develop the report and integrate it with Escape Online. Our standard consulting fees and scheduling practices will apply.
Crystal Reports Viewer
The Crystal Reports Viewer is integrated with Escape Online. When you run a report, the report is displayed in the viewer, where you can print it, export it, drill down, zoom in or use the search tool for specific words, phrases or numbers.
As stated above, the viewer is bundled with Microsoft .Net. The upside of this arrangement is that you get the viewer for free. The downside is that you cannot upgrade the viewer without upgrading to a new version of .Net.
In addition, the viewer doesn't support all of the functionality of a stand-alone report (run from Crystal Reports as opposed to Escape Online). In this FYI, we will list the features we have found to be troublesome in the viewer and some other special considerations concerning custom report development using Crystal Reports.
Report Development
There are basically three types of reports: standard, custom and stand-alone. The following explains each type.
Standard Reports
We have a fully developed set of standard reports (what you had in Escape Classic and then some!). These reports are integrated with Escape Online. They can be run from within a record (a snapshot) and/or from the Reports activity.
Most districts should find that these reports fulfill all of their reporting needs.
Custom Reports
We recognize that you may need some custom reports. We can develop them for you, or you can have your staff develop them.
If you choose to have us develop the reports, our standard consulting fees and scheduling practices apply.
If you choose to have your staff develop them, we will provide all our Crystal Reports files, stored procedures and functions for use in your reports. You can copy these to your custom report directory and use them as templates. We even developed report standards that you can use so that all of your reports have the same look and feel.
Some of the things to keep in mind if you choose to develop your own reports are the training and maintenance required.
Crystal Reports is a complex program that cannot be picked up and lightly used. Your staff will have to attend training sessions to be able to use this product effectively. They will also have to understand database structure, stored procedures and functions to create complex reports.
Custom reports require maintenance. Escape Online is a growing product. Database updates will occur. These updates could affect the reports you have developed. Your staff will be responsible for updating your custom reports when there are updates to Escape Online.
Stand-Alone Reports
Stand-alone reports are custom reports that are run from Crystal Reports as opposed to Escape Online. Some customers may want to run reports directly from Crystal, taking advantage of the raw SQL data for data warehousing and in-depth analysis.
One of the advantages of the stand-alone method is that you are not restricted by the report viewer. You can use Crystal to export data to a variety of formats. Once again, we can develop these reports for you or you can develop them.
These reports would require licenses from SAP for every user running the stand-alone report. In addition, if the stand-alone reports are created in-house, your staff will be responsible for updating the reports when there are updates to Escape Online.
Special Considerations
Let's review some of the considerations that we've already discussed along with a few additional points you should consider:
- Crystal Reports is a highly complex program that requires a power user to be trained.
- Report development requires an extensive knowledge of SQL, including database relationships, stored procedures and functions.
- Updates to Escape Online may require maintenance for your in-house custom reports, views, or user defined functions.
- The version of Crystal Reports must be compatible with the version of the Crystal Reports Viewer that is bundled with Microsoft .Net, if you want your custom reports to be integrated with Escape Online.
- Reports run from Crystal Reports and reports run from within Escape Online can appear different. For example, fonts have a slightly larger point size in the viewer.
- Some features that work in stand-alone reports do not work in the viewer, in particular:
- InRepeatedGroupHeader - for conditionally formatting the header (i.e., add the word (Continued) to the top of each page when the group header is repeated).
- DrillDownGroupLevel - for conditionally formatting the header in a drill-down report.
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