With Crystal Reports for .NET it is easy achievable to automate the following process:
- load a predefined Crystal report
- fill the parameters
- print the report.
But as far as I know the .NET version only works with ODBC and not with SAP Netweaver datasources.
Is there a way to use a SAP-Netweaver datasource*) with Crystal reports for .NET or does anybody have another approach to achieve the above mentioned workflow with Crystal reports.
An option I was already thinking about was to use the Crystal Reports Viewer but there I struggled with opening parameterized reports.
Thanks in advance, Andreas
*) not by connecting through ODBC to the underlying database, as I want to be able to use also function modules in the report
AFAIK, there's no way to do this with either the .NET or the Java SDK. However, you could look at SAP Crystal Reports Server. It is built on the same foundation as the full SAP BusinessObjects, but will only run Crystal reports. If all you need to do is automatically print or distribute some reports (to files or email) on a schedule, you wouldn't need very many licenses and it might be a very cost-effective way of doing this.
-Dell
Hi Dell!
Thanks for your quick help. When exploring the features of Crystal Server I did not found anything about calling parameterized reports (by user input).
For example an user wants to call a predefined Crystal report enter the predefined input parameter eg. customer number (ideally within an SAP transaction or a .NET/Java program).
Before I dive into the Server universes it would be helpful to know if this is possible at all.
Thanks, Andreas
Yes, you can set up parameters in the report and the user will be required to enter them when the report is run. If you use URL reporting (OpenDocument), your application can get the parameter values from the user and then pass them to the report in the URL.
For more info about OpenDocument, you can find the documentation here: https://help.sap.com/doc/businessobject_product_guides_sbo42_en_sbo42_opendocument_en_pdf/4.2/en-US/sbo42_opendocument_en.pdf.
NOTE: OpenDocument will work with all types of reports that are in CRS or BOE. There is also something separate called "URL Reporting" that works only with Crystal. I prefer to use OpenDocument because of its flexibility, but if you're only working with Crystal reports you can use either.
-Dell
Hello,
Dell is correct, CR for VS and the BOE .NET's and Java SDK's are not capable of this.
Only work around is to use BOE or CRS based on a Universe and then use URL reporting to call the report which you can use in .NET, Java or RESTful SDK's
Don
Thanks Don!
The url reporting looks quite powerful. Together with the suggested solution of Dell I think this could be the last jigsaw part for my desired solution.